Wednesday, February 7 is going to be a day I never forget. For, it very well could have been my last. My life was spared by only a matter of seconds.
That morning, I awoke at my parents’ condo in Delray Beach. I had stayed there overnight after a very successful event that my organization, National Review Institute (NRI), had put together in Palm Beach the day before. We had a sold out event with over 110 people in the room to hear about the life and legacy of our founder, William F. Buckley Jr. This next morning, I had a meeting in West Palm Beach at 10:00 am. After that, my plans were to drop off my rental car at the Palm Beach International Airport, where I would be meeting my boss, NRI President Lindsay Craig, and my colleague NRI fellow Andrew McCarthy. We were headed to Charlotte, North Carolina, where Andy would be addressing a crowd of over 80 people in a partnership event with the John Locke Foundation, later that same evening.
As my day began, from the west side of Delray Beach, I had driven over from Jog Road to I-95 to head northbound towards West Palm Beach, hopping on at Woolbright Avenue in Boynton Beach. I noticed quite a bit of traffic in the southbound lanes of I-95. I learned later that there had apparently been a shooting in Boca Raton earlier that morning and many of those lanes were blocked, slowing down traffic in that direction. Northbound, there were a lot of cars on the road, per usual for 9:30 am, but traffic was moving. Since I had about 15 miles to go before I would get off my exit, right after I hopped on I-95 north, I got all the way over to the far left lane as quickly as possible so that I could move as fast as possible.
As I was cruising down the interstate, I was listening to the last leg of my audiobook, Gone With the Wind. I’ve been on a 30-book reading challenge in 2018, and this was a long one. An epic. The audio reading of it is just about 50 hours long. At this point, I only had about four hours to go and I was engrossed in the story. So there I was just cruising along, listening to the trials and tribulations of Scarlet O’Hara. Little did I know that would be the least of my drama this morning.
When driving, I have a habit of getting out of the left lane when I don’t need to be in it, even if there is no one directly behind me, but sometimes I stay in it. It was around 9:40am and I was approaching the exits for Lantana, a city just between Boynton Beach and Lake Worth, just south of West Palm Beach. With no cars to pass ahead of me, and with few cars to my right, I nonchalantly moved over to the next lane to my right (there’s about 5 lanes of traffic on these northbound lanes).
Less than 5 seconds (maybe 3 seconds) after I got over to that lane, what appeared to be a black SUV came roaring by me in the left lane — the vehicle did not pass me from behind. It had come from the OPPOSITE direction! Head on. My eyes could not believe what I just saw. It took me a few seconds to comprehend it. Then I blurted out loud to myself in the car, “What the hell was that?” It took me a second to realize that was a car traveling in the OPPOSITE direction — at what appeared to be 80, 90, 100 MPH. I could not tell, but when it went by me it came by so fast like a freight train. All of this went through my brain in a split second or two — with my thoughts realizing that I had just been in that lane.
In total shock, I looked in my rear view mirror and a few hundred yards back I saw a bunch of smoke. “Oh my God,” I said out loud. I almost cried. At the moment, all I could think was about how that vehicle must have gone head on into another vehicle. Moving that fast, anyone it hit should be dead, including the driver. I realized if I had not gotten over when I did, I would be dead at this very moment. My life flashed before my eyes, but I didn’t have time to think about it. I immediately called 911 to report it. I was flustered on the phone but told the woman on the other end what I just witnessed. She told me they were getting other calls but asked me to hold as she tried to connect me to whoever it was she needed to connect me to. It probably took a minute for me to get through and then I explained to the next woman on the phone exactly what I saw and how there must be a major accident behind me now. “I think I was just south of 6th Avenue.” And as I said that 10th Avenue was approaching. “I’m at 10th Avenue now, but I’m still driving.” She thanked me, took my phone number, and let me go.
I immediately called my mother. “You will not believe what I just witnessed,” I said. “I should be dead.” I told her that it looked like someone on a high-speed chase, except no one appeared to be chasing him – at least not from the direction he was coming from. I said to my mom: “This is going to be major news today … because a lot of people probably just died on I-95.”
Well… I went on to my meeting in downtown West Palm Beach. I was rattled, but I composed myself and told the person I was meeting what happened. It probably seemed unimaginable to him at the time. After my meeting, I posted something on Facebook. I had found the story with the initial reports. “The story below must be related,” I put at the end of my Facebook post about what I witnessed. One of my friends commented, “Dude, you should seriously stop everything today, do some fasting and prayers of thanks. I’m not even kidding.”
What could I do? I had my day all planned out. I had to get to the airport (it was now 10:45am), drop my car at the rental car place, check-in for my flight, which was leaving at 1:08 PM. I got into the terminal by 12:00 PM and had some pizza and a Coca-Cola. I’ve been on a no-soda diet, but screw it I thought, I deserve a Coke today. Several of my colleagues, family, and friends contacted me after seeing my post. I told them I was alright and was still trying to figure out details. My boss Lindsay and colleague Andy were the first to greet me at the airport and gave me a hug and were grateful I was ok. Normally, I travel on planes all the time, by myself, on business flights. On this day it was especially nice to have two colleagues with me — the last 30 minutes for the flight were quite turbulent too. But I just thought to myself, “Why be nervous? I already almost died today.”
So, what were the details of that story? Here’s the update as of now. The crazed driver behind the wheel who was just a few seconds away from smacking into me head-on, was Hugo Selva, a 22-year old man who was a recent father of a 3-month old child, which he had with his girlfriend, 26-year old Nicole Navak. Hugo had been involved in two shootings the night before. As of now, both of the people he shot survived. The next morning, Hugo and his girlfriend Nicole were seen entering a convenient store in Lake Worth. The clerk said they first came in to buy some cigarettes and then left. About 30 minutes later, they came back in to get some money out of the ATM. As soon as they walked out of the store, she heard one gunshot. One sound of death.
Hugo had shot and killed his girlfriend, the mother of his 3-month old child. He then threw her body into the Nissan Rogue, fled the scene and hopped on I-95. To me, it is still a mystery which exit they hopped on, how he got all the way over into the left lane, and how he managed to drive so fast, against traffic. It must have been less than 10 minutes from the time he stuffed his girlfriend into his car that he came roaring past me. And his vehicle came so fast. It looked like a man on a mission, just roaring forward at incredible speed without any hesitation. Had I not just gotten over from that lane, there’s no doubt in my mind I would not have had time to see him before getting over. At best, I would have caused a major accident by swerving. But more likely, Hugo and I would have collided head-on.
So, what happened next? Somewhere not far behind me, Hugo caused six to eight different accidents in that little stretch of I-95. By some kind of miracle, no other motorists were killed. Cops were on the scene quickly. There have been some videos posted online about them approaching Hugo’s vehicle. They deemed him a threat and they shot and killed him on the scene. The only fatalities that have been confirmed were Hugo and his girlfriend. A number of motorists were taken in to the hospital, but so far everyone has survived.
Meanwhile, I was in Charlotte, North Carolina. We had gotten off the plane at 3:30pm and to our hotel by 4pm. We left the hotel at 5:10pm and got to the venue at 5:30pm, for the 6:00pm event, where Andy spoke, and then we did a private dinner with some of the sponsors of the event. We got back to our hotel at nearly 10:00pm. That’s when I finally had some personal time to reflect on everything, catch up on the news stories, check all the messages that had come in from concerned friends and family (many of whom gave me some really beautiful words of hope), and just get on my knees and thank the Good Lord for protecting me on this day.
And that’s when I wrote this post on my Facebook wall to recap the day:
“Life is short. Life is fragile. And we are in far less control of things than we think. We all need to understand this, but I suppose it’s difficult to fully appreciate it. As I started my day today, I couldn’t have imagined anything other than what I had planned. Then, out of the blue, I saw what very well could have been my final seconds on this earth. But they weren’t. God protected me. He said: I’m not done with you. I want you to do more. The whole experience of just being missed by that crazed driver in Palm Beach County today – by mere seconds – has given me a whole new perspective. Maybe at the age of 40, I needed this. I always feel grateful for everything but today gratitude has reached a level beyond what I could have ever imagined. This is not a moment to feel frightened or terrified by what could have been. It’s a moment to feel absolute joy that there is more to do and I’ve been given more time to make an impact and to spend that time with people that matter and doing things that are meaningful. There’s not a moment to waste. God bless you all. Thank you for reading this and may we all get down on our knees each morning, each night, and praise the Lord for all the blessings He has bestowed on us and try to live the life He wants us to. Every moment is a blessing. Let us be continuously grateful.”
Yes… let us be continuously grateful. I have been given new life, new purpose, and now I must discern why it is God said he was not done with me. He’s not done with any of us. I just got a wake up call. There is more to do. And there is so much to be joyful about as we do it. I only wish Hugo Selva had realized this. I don’t know his life, his story, what he has been through, or what caused him to take the actions he did this past week, ultimately ending his young life and the young life of his child’s mother, while also risking the lives of dozens of other people in the process. We all may be going through challenges in our own life, but what we need to seek is gratitude for the blessings we have, for the time we have been given. Even if things seem dark or bleak, we must not give up. We must not surrender. God is not done with us. Every moment is a blessing. There is more to do. So, let’s get at it.