Introduction

It all started with an accident.

John was fifty-nine years old. He was six feet two and was seriously overweight. He also had back problems.

The back problems were caused from being in several vehicle accidents in his youth, which were never fully corrected. John lived with strong pain all the time because the surgery to fix even some of his back problems would severely limit his movement, in 'best case scenarios', or cause paralysis in worst case.

John's wife of thirty years had died two years ago. Their two sons had gone their separate ways, one to the east coast with his wife and family to further their careers and the other serving in the military currently in Germany.

John had been brought up in a family that believed in fixing things themselves. He had learned concrete work and carpentry at home, and as a youth his hobbies were electronics and chemistry.

In college his love of math led him into physics and computer science. Once out of college, he'd had several programming jobs. These led him into teaching. He was introduced by some friends to 'rock hounding'. He'd enjoyed many trips with his wife into Colorado and the Black Hills of South Dakota for collecting expeditions.

John had deeply loved his wife, Judy. After going through many things that would have torn most marriages apart, they had stayed together. It had not been easy, but they had done it. Judy had loved going to auctions as a hobby, then bringing stuff home and selling it on E-bay. After Judy's death, John continued this hobby, because it let him get out of the house and he loved meeting new people.

He could not hold a regular job because of his back injuries so the E-bay sales supplemented his meager disability income.

John had been to an enormous three day antique auction down in Missouri, camping during the nights and enjoying the bidding during the days. He was able to look up information on values as the antiques were sold on his laptop and live internet connection. After 3 days with some outrageous good deals he celebrated and went out to eat with some people he met at the auction.

Heading home, going through Omaha, it happened. John heard a large boom. A tire had exploded on the eighteen wheeler in front and to the left of him. The world seemed to switch into slow motion.

The semi started sliding his way. A blue Suburban towing a U-Haul trailer was crushed by the semi and started sliding into his pickup. His pickup was an older green Dodge Ram 3500 quad cab with a pickup camper on it and was towing a white twenty-four foot dual axle cargo trailer full of stuff from the auction. He had nowhere to go. He prayed quickly, while watching the whole mess slide into his vehicle.

A crashing sound, a burst of pain, and he closed his eyes. He was sure he was going to join his wife.

Blackness.

Edited By TeNderLoin