"The Key Is Not in the Vehicle"

By Krista Schoff

     One Monday right after school, my friend asked me to drop her off at her mom’s work.  It was also my mom’s work.  I dropped her off and talked to my mom for a while, and then I headed home.  You can see my house in the sightlines on the highway there.  I was driving and I saw smoke coming from near my house, but since we live on a farm and regularly burn trash I didn’t think anything of it.  As I got closer, however, I could tell that it wasn’t a trash fire, but that our shed was on fire.  Living on a farm, most of our necessary equipment, including pickups, tools, and other like things, is stored in our shed.  When I saw the fire, my heart dropped. 

     I pulled in the driveway, and my sister-in-law, Julia, was standing there on the phone with the fire department trying to tell them the information. At the same time, I was trying to contact my dad or brother, since they are usually together.  When I did not reach anyone, it frightened me that they might be inside.  After Julia got off with the fire department, she was able to get ahold of my brother Eric.  As Eric and Father were headed home I called my mom also.  After I got off the phone the fire department, police, and ambulance arrived at our house.  Soon my mother and other brother, Joshua, arrived also and tried to get the pickups out of the shed. 

     As the police were questioning Julia and me, Eric called.  He needed someone to pick them up since they were stranded on the side of the road.  I, being the only one free, was volunteered to go pick them up.  My car was blocked off by the fire department and other emergency vehicles, so the closest free car was my mom’s brand new car.  Being a new car it was a keyless entry, which means you have to have the key fob within five feet on the car to start it and it was to be in the passenger or driver’s seat for the car to go into gear.  Being an emotional wreck, I just jumped in the car and drove off, not thinking of the key. 

     I got all the way to where my dad and brother were stranded and my dad took over driving home.  As we got barely a mile down the road, the car began to ding, saying, “The key is not in the vehicle.”  I panicked and began looking through my mom’s bags and couldn’t find it.  I was in tears thinking the car would shut off, because it has a safety mechanism to where if it doesn’t have the key it shuts off. 

     When we finally made it home safely, I asked my mom where the key was and she pulled it out of her pocket.  When I started the car, my mom was at least 200 feet away.  My parents have tried starting the car being ten feet away and it won’t start.  The Lord really blessed my whole family that day.