OH YES, WE HAVE NO BANANAS

By Mark Reed

In 1966, Tim, and I drove over to Bremen, Georgia to visit the factory outlets to buy some clothes. We were in Tim’s little Renault, the one with the sewing machine size engine. As we were driving back to Atlanta on Highway 78, we got behind a tractor trailer truck that was moving slower than we wanted to drive. When we finally reached a long flat stretch of road, Tim pulled out to pass the truck. He floored the little car, and it slowly inched out and beside the truck. Slowly we moved farther alongside the truck trying to pass (picture the little train from the childhood story that says, “I think I can, I think I can”).

Finally the highway starts up a long hill, a yellow line appears on our side of the centerline and we are still not past the truck. Then, to our horror, another truck appears cresting over the top of the hill in front of us, bearing down on us, head on. At this point, we are beyond the point of no return. It is too late to slow down and get back behind the truck we are trying to pass, and the road drops off to our left into a ravine. We have no choice but to try and make it. We are very close to the front of the truck cab, wondering why the trucker doesn’t hit his brakes and let us pass. At the very last moment, just before the oncoming truck plows into us, just as we know that we are going to die, Tim and I glance into each others eyes for the last time, and I utter the immortal last words, “Oh yes, we have no bananas!”

At that instant, Tim swerves the little car in front of the truck to our right, barely inches from its huge bumpers that are at eye level, and back into the right lane and safety, as the oncoming truck thunders past us with barely the same clearance. Tim pulls over to the side of the road at the earliest spot, as the big truck passes us by. We sit there, barely breathing, our complexions white as snow, staring ahead at eternity. Slowly, we turn and face each other, and Tim says, “Oh yes, we have no bananas?” We both broke into hysterical laughter mixed with tears of joy and relief. The Lord didn’t want those to be my last words.