by Celia Hales. Revised and reprinted from Miracles (publisher Jon Mundy).
This is a true story. Not only did inexplicable things happen with a battery-operated cassette recorder, but my mind and heart were changed for the better. I feel blessed that my wedding day miracle happened at all.
In July 1986 my husband Paul and I were married in North Carolina, on a day that started out balmy but would turn very hot and humid by 5 p.m., the time of our outdoor wedding ceremony.
The morning was splendid, crisp and clear. There was no hint of the humidity that would descend on my poor husband-to-be at 5 p.m. as he wore a monkey suit. Paul and I left my parents’ home in mid-morning to drive around my town in order to pick out a suitable place to eat lunch with Paul’s sister and her family, who were expected shortly.
We strolled toward the car, lost in thought about what lay ahead. I unlocked the door on the passenger’s side, for Paul. Immediately my voice filled the air. It was my cassette recorder, playing a cassette of my recording of passages from A Course in Miracles.
“That’s odd,” I said.
I walked around to the driver’s side of the car, got in, reached for the cassette recorder on the floor, and clicked it off.
“If this had been playing long, it would have already clicked off,” I said. Paul didn’t say anything.
I started driving in a distracted fashion. I was mulling over how the recorder could have been on. Nobody else had a car key, and I had not yet been in the car that morning. I sensed the day, the crisp and clear day, and I felt very, very safe.
The word “miracle” reached my awareness. But why? My immediate reading was that this strange occurrence was meant to say to me, “If you stay close to A Course in Miracles, your marriage will be all right,”
“All right.” Not “alright.”
“You did something to click it on,” Paul said. He is my skeptic.
“How could I?” I replied.
We rode on in silence.
—
We were wed and went on our wedding trip to Pennsylvania. Whirlwind days, I all but forgot the cassette recorder. We returned soon enough, and then traveled back to Charlotte, where we would live for six weeks before embarking for Minnesota.
In Charlotte, I remembered the recorder. Carefully I examined the tape, carefully lest I disturb anything. The cassette was near the beginning of its 30-minute run. When I replayed it from the beginning, I heard a “swoosh” a few moments into the tape.
“That was the intervention,” I thought to myself.
I mulled over the import of this miracle. A lot had happened in a brief time, and much more would happen shortly. I would learn, for example, that I never get angry unless I am stressed. Marriage would teach me that. I had never realized that in 39 years of the single life.
Once settled in St. Paul, I developed a pattern of going back to A Course in Miracles whenever Paul and I had a tiff. Of course, I read it much of the time anyway.
He noticed this. “These are your ‘happiness’ books,” he surmised.
It is true that I was much easier to get along with when I was reading them.
—
Several years ago, I told my story to Lynn, a friend at work, who also happened to be a licensed grief counselor.
“There was no way that I could have tripped the recorder on,” I said.
“I believe you,” she replied. “I have heard similar stories from my grief clients. One woman had a table lamp in the living room come on and off unexpectedly. She felt sure it was her dead husband.”
“That’s really something!” I exclaimed, scarcely able to contain my excitement.
“Yes,” she said. “It must be easy for another world to affect lights and that sort of thing.”
—
After 24 years of married life, I think my initial interpretation of this, my wedding day miracle, was accurate. I do need to stay close to my religion to remain on an even keel in my life with Paul. When I get away from my reading, I fall flat on my face in our relationship.
One such time was five years ago as we headed into retirement. Paul oversaw the partial remodeling of our house in St. Paul, to get it ready to go on the market, as well as the complete remodeling of our new house in our new small city in Mississippi.
There was little that I could do, because the contractors looked to him for their answers.
I have heard, “If you want stress, remodel a house. If you want a lot of stress, build a house.” Remodeling two houses is a lot of stress.
I never get angry unless I am stressed. I was stressed.
—
Now, settled beyond that bad time, I remember asking Paul once if he would do it again, would he marry me again.
He paused, then said with a straight face, “Do I have to do it in 99 degree weather?”
I replied, “No.”
He said, “O.K., then I would.”
I grinned. He chuckled. I grabbed him in a bear hug.
