Many years ago, I was in Washington DC, trying to find the International Press Center in the middle of a snowstorm, and I got lost. I ended in a deserted street of a marginal district with no traffic and no people at sight to ask for directions.
I was kept going forward until I saw an intersection with a bus station. Finally! Someplace to get oriented. Suddenly my hope plummeted. There was a group of youngsters right there with sticks and chains and a violent demeanor screaming at each other.
I was scared. I didn’t want to go near them, but I couldn’t figured out which way take.
Suddenly I heard a deep voice from the other side of the street asking me:
– Do you believe in Guardian Angels?
-Well, yes , I answered
I looked around and saw an ordinary man: a tall, black man, walking his dog in the middle of the storm. His hat and coat white covered by snow. He was clapping his hands to keep them warm.
-You are lost, aren’t you M’am?
-Yes, I’am
-Where do you want to go?
I told him, and he gave me directions to avoid the group of youngsters and the bus station and reach a street where I could find a taxi.
-You see? There are Guardian Angels. Today was my turn, he said with his warm smile.
After thanking him for his help, I began to walk but immediately I decided to went back to ask him if he needed something, and he was no longer there.
From that day I’m sure that my Guardian Angel is an old black man who looks after me while he walks his dog somewhere around me.
It’s funny, the first city I knew in the US was DC, and I was struct by the abruptness of the change from a “safe” area to an unsafe one. Just a block could do it.
I think it’s that way today in most large U.S. cities these days.
the same happened to me. I have no sense of orientation and i took the wrong way. In a matter of minutes I was walking around the National Library and the Congress and suddenly I get lost in the middle of nowhere
What a sweet story. I’m glad you met your guardian angel that day.
Me too. I never have forgotten that moment