Well, the kid has done it. He totaled the car he drives. I was incredibly relieved to find him ok with very few scratches on him. Praising God for that all day and every day. He was pretty shaken up and I'm hoping this will become an important life lesson for him.

Here's what happened:
His college is about an hour and a half away. I called him Friday night around 10:30 to make sure he was at the dorm in case the storm (Ike) gave us any backlash. He said, "I'm ok, Mom, just hanging out here." We said good night, love you, etc, and I thought that was it.

At 1 a.m. we (my spouse and I) get a call from him. My son says "I've been in a crash, the car rolled over 3 times. I'm halfway (between school and home, which is all expressway). He asked if we could come get him... then his cell phone went dead.

We drove nearly to his college town (praying), then back again hoping to see him on the highway. We didn't find him nor his car and his cell phone was dead. There was no rain at all, so we were grateful for that, but we didn't find him. We went back home at around 3:45 a.m. and on the home voice mail was a message from him, except he was talking to the clerk in the gas station (not us), telling the clerk about the car crash and asking if there was a place to plug in his phone so he could get his step-dad's number out. (He didn't know it.) We called the gas station back (caller ID) to get the location, which was closer to home than we thought. We went driving again to see if we could find him. By this time, at least we knew that he wasn't trapped in the car.

We drove for another hour up and down the expressway, praying the entire time, and still didn't find him. We found the gas station but it had been 2 hours since he'd been there. At 5:45 my spouse's cell phone rings and my son is at the house. The tow truck had towed his car and him to the house. We were ten minutes away from home by then. By the time we got home again it was nearly 6 a.m., the tow cost $293 (for 15 miles), we had a copy of the police report (they were going to impound it, but the tow truck offered to take him home since there was no criminal or liability incident--nothing or no one else was hurt or harmed). Turned out my son walked for miles and miles on a dark access road trying to find help and he stopped at 2 gas stations and eventually found a church where firemen were setting up for evacuees from the hurricane and storm and they were able to help him.

Anyway, I was very glad and grateful and relieved to see him. So much so that I was in tears. The car, however, not so much. It is totaled. Rear windshield totally out, front windshield crushed and shattered, the trunk and gas tank area crumpled, tires blown, axle bent, etc. It's a 1997 Nissan so we only carried liability insurance on it. (We just got that insurance as a separate policy in his name at the beginning of the month!!)

He was speeding. Such a sad thing that this happened because he was speeding. And on the road when he wasn't supposed to be there, in the middle of the night. And it could have been SO MUCH WORSE!! But thank God, it wasn't. He'd already received 4 speeding tickets within the last year and he's had defensive driving classes and all the lectures about driving carefully, taking good care of the car, etc. It's unfortunate, but this may be the wake-up call he needs to take more responsibility - financially and personally. He is now without a car and without any plan for getting a new one.

I feel like I've done my part in purchasing the car and providing him transportation and insurance and rules. He didn't hold up his end of the bargain by respecting that. He could have died or killed someone because of his wrecklessness. Thank God he didn't. He now has a second chance to do better and I have a second chance to hopefully watch him learn. He appears not to be 'teachable' by me, but I'm hoping he will still 'learn' from his actions.

Right now it's a good thing for us that he stays in a dorm room--we dropped him off yesterday. We'll keep doing that until we (he) comes up with a better plan... But again, I'm SO GRATEFUL that he was ok.