A fiftieth birthday that ended on cold tile and the thing in the room that would not let go.

One of the things that bothered me while writing this book was that the chapter people will probably have the hardest time believing is the same chapter I had the hardest time writing. Not because I was worried people wouldn't believe me, but because I wasn't sure I believed myself. I know that sounds strange coming from the guy it happened to, but that's the truth.

The depression was easy to write about compared to that. The pain was easy to write about. Being on that bathroom floor was easy to write about. None of those things required me to explain something I couldn't understand. They were horrible experiences, but they were experiences I could describe. What happened after that is where everything fell apart for me as a writer.

I've rewritten that section more times than I can remember. Every version had the same problem. I'd get done, lean back in my chair, read through it, and think, "Nope. That's not it." Not because the facts were wrong. The facts never changed. The problem was that I couldn't find a way to explain what happened without sounding crazy, and I couldn't leave it out because that would have been dishonest. So I got stuck in this miserable place where every version felt wrong. One version sounded too religious. Another sounded too dramatic. Another sounded like I had completely lost my mind. None of them felt like the truth even though all of them contained the truth.

The phrase divine intervention wasn't even my phrase. I need to make that clear because people are probably going to assume I sat down one day and decided that's what happened. I didn't. The person who first said those words was my sister. I remember calling her because I honestly thought there might be something wrong with me. I wasn't calling to tell a story. I wasn't calling because I thought I had experienced something supernatural. I was calling because I couldn't make sense of what had happened and I needed to tell somebody before I convinced myself I was losing it.

I told her everything. The bathroom floor. The smell. The feeling that came over me. All of it. When I was done she got quiet for a moment and then said, "Bill, that's divine intervention." I remember sitting there thinking that those were two words I never expected to hear connected to anything in my life. Even now, years later, I'm still using her words because I don't have better ones.

The frustrating part is that people want answers and I don't have any. I can't tell you what happened because I don't know what happened. I can tell you exactly what I experienced. I can tell you exactly what I remember. I can tell you that it changed me. Beyond that, your guess is as good as mine. Maybe it was God. Maybe it was my grandmother. Maybe it was a brain under enough stress to do things we don't fully understand. I don't know. I've gone around and around with that question for years and I've never landed anywhere that made me completely comfortable.