Wherein Elise has a heart attack.

How did you guys like listening to the Platters? They're pretty all right, huh? I have another YouTube video for you today, but you'll have to be patient because I have a story first.

So my husband is in Alaska on a fishing trip this week. He scheduled the trip back in June or something and when he booked it I got this pit in my stomach. Just a little knot of worry, but I ignored it because I tend to overthink everything. No, really. I UNDER think a lot of things, but where the immediate physical safety of my loved ones is concerned I am hyper vigilant, believe me.

Fast forward to last night around eleven o'clock. My phone rang and it was DJ (or "Hottie McHottiepants" according to my phone). When I picked up it should have been immediately obvious from his tone that something was amiss, especially since he had gotten in much later than usual. Unfortunately my mouth works much faster than my brain and I said, "Uh oh, did your boat break down?" immediately BEFORE I realized that something really serious had happened.

"Something happened," he said and that little knot that formed in my stomach back in June turned to a lead weight.

I'll paraphrase my husband's story: After dinner he and his fishing buddy decided to fish the river for salmon, so they headed out planning to fish from the shore. When they got there an employee of the lodge they are staying in told them to take out one of their fishing boats because they would have better luck and they would have more fun than they would fishing from the bank.

So DJ and his friend rowed into the river toward what looked like a good fishing spot. The river was running fast yesterday since it has been raining since they arrived in Alaska. As they rowed the current forced them into a log jam.

One thing led to another and their boat overturned. My husband's waders filled with water and he was pulled under the river, with the force of the current pinning him against the snag of logs. He fought the current with everything he had but was pulled even deeper under. DJ is not a weak man and the river still held him down against the logs. He looked up and could barely see the light of day above him through the water.

He said, "I thought, 'This is it...Elise and the kids...This is it.'" He said that he felt strangely peaceful, even as he fought the water, thinking that his life was about to end. He kept pushing and fighting and eventually he prayed, "Please God, not today. Not today." He prayed there under the water, pinned down by the force of the river, when suddenly a few logs gave way and he was pulled through the snag of logs.

He came out of the water downriver and somehow made his way onto the bank. (You can imagine that at this point of his story I was near hysterics.) "Elise, you should have gotten a different phone call tonight. Those logs shouldn't have given way," he said.

There was definite divine intervention up in Alaska yesterday. Needless to say, it has been a life-changing experience for both of us. I am indescribably happy that my husband is safe. And I am endlessly grateful to my Father in Heaven for giving us a few more years together. I will try to remember this when DJ drives me bonkers by throwing his dirty clothes on the floor two feet away from the hamper. This video will be a handy reminder:

(And in case the curiosity is killing you - yes, the boat is still in the river. It's barely sticking out of the water, pushed into the log jam. And yes, DJ's backpack with his driver's license, debit card, and $400 in cash is still floating out to sea toward Russia.)

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