Mr Norman Lewis Bowman

Hello All:

I want you to know who I am, so here is a run down of my life, at age 4, on a icy road my mother lost control of a 49 ford and hit a bank, I was thrown from the back seat through the windshield, and about 10 foot ahead of the car, head first into a bank, I was in the hospital for about a week, I nearly died, but I lived. At age 7, my father was driving down a road in Georgia called 212, he was driving about 35 miles an hour, he was from the horse and buggy days, we were rear ended by a car running about 70 miles an hour, the car flipped 3 times, and it threw me from the car, the car rolled over my body, but a door swung open on the car, and caused the car to raise up, just enough so that I was not badly hurt.

At age 11, I had to quit school, and go to work in a Waffle House washing dishes because my father was dieing, He did die about 8 months after that, so I worked for 40 dollars a week, at that time it supported my family, my older brother's leg was broken in about 12 places from a car wreck that he had been in, my mother was trying but could not get a job, she finally did bless her heart, and she supported us as best she could. Between the ages of 16 to 20, I was involved in around 20 motorcycle accidents, I walked away from them all.

In one of those Motorcycle wrecks a car turned out of a side road and hit me from the side, I raised my leg up, and it tore off the side cover of the bike, if I had not have raised my leg it would have for sure tore my leg off, In another of my near accidents, I was running at a speed of 140 miles an hour, I have to say, it was not my skill that saved me, it was in fact, divine intervention, I was just to dumb to see it for many more years.

At age 12, I started taking speed to stay awake nights to work, because I worked the graveyard shift at the restaurant, the cooks and waitress, would give me the pills to help me stay awake, I met a lot of people, and my drug abuse grew rapidly, as I grew older, I never cared for pot, I moved to harder drugs right away, by 14 I was using synthetic heroin, I continued to do so until I was 28, I then quit drugs and turned into a instant drunk, and over the course of my life I was arrested 53 times, many of those arrest were for simple things such as drunk and disorderly.

But 24 of them were for felonies. I was so bad at the time, I was never convicted of but one felony, because no one would testify against me, the one thing that I had going my way, Is that was a very hard worker, I was also smart, I served an apprenticeship, and became an electrician, I did that most all my adult life, At age 16, I was married, at 17 I had my first son, he is 38 now, I traveled 48 states and four 3rd world countries while working, I was also a runner when things got difficult or I got bored, I liked being able to go work some where else.

It seemed I got in trouble every where I went, many of my younger years, I was involved with the local mafia, I also got involved with a hate group at one time in my 20's. I fought all my life,I would fight for first one thing, and then another, It did not seem to matter I just liked to fight, it seemed I had a death wish of sorts, I was most always in the wrong or I was the one who started the fights, but I was good at it, and I never cared weather I won or lost, I just felt a need to fight, I was just so full of hate and anger.

I really never knew why, around age 22, I was shot 3 times, at point blank range with a 45 caliber automatic, probably one of the most powerful hand guns every made, despite the close distance that I was shot at, the bullets seemed to change course just enough that I was not badly hurt. Three bullets hit me, there was six holes in my clothing, there was an entrance hole and a exit hole for each bullet, one hit me at my right ankle, leaving two holes in my jeans, the next entered just below my belt on the right side leaving an entrance and an exit hole, the third bullet hit me just above my right elbow leaving and entrance and an exit hole, this bullet took a tiny bit of flesh with it, did I learn anything, no I did not.

Did I notice that someone or something gave me some divine intervention, no I did not. I went right back to doing what I had always done, the times that things like this happened, were way to many to count, I was stabbed two times in the back, I had been in at least a 30 or more brawl type fights, over the years, I never gave it any thought.

Until I got much older, at age 40, I broke my back in a working accident, I have not been able to do manual labor since, I got a settlement, as would be expected, On a on the job accident, I did a few things, my love for motorcycles drove me to a buying a motorcycle shop, I soon tired of it, after about a year and closed it soon after, I got interested in computers and did very well at it, until the prices of computers fell to where it cheaper to buy one than to fix one.

When would I ever learn, you would wonder, that is a good question, when would I ever learn, on Oct/ 30/ 2007, something different happened, that really started about two weeks before that date, there was a series of things that happened, for one my brother and I were having a bad day, we had been having to stay in motels for almost a year, because our criminal records were so bad that we could not rent a house or an apartment, so we were sort of arguing, but mostly just upset because we had just been turned down for another apartment.

We were driving down Glenwood Avenue in Atlanta Georgia, there was a golf tournament going on at one of the country clubs, we were distracted, as I said, the car in front of us kept stopping and starting sort of abruptly, I was in the passenger seat of a mini van, my Baby Girl, my dog she is a 70 pound Pit Bull, was in the back, the car in front of stopped suddenly, my brother rear ended the car, my dog flew towards the front of the van, I turned to try and grab her, I slipped out of my seat belt, I stopped her, but my head hit the windshield yet again.

There was cops and highway patrol every where, they were directing traffic, my air bag did not deploy, I refused treatment, but my ribs were cracked and I had a concussion, As I said it was series of things that led up to the DAY, and after that day a change slowly, and I do mean slowly began a change in my life, about four days after that had happened, I went to the lake, there was a guy hitting his wife, I stepped in and got into a fight, I was hit over the head with a liqueur bottle, and it was raining very hard that day, and cold.

I woke in the hospital, the medics had cut my clothes off me because I was very muddy, detectives came and talked to me, for once they decided that I was not at fault, the hospital gave me a paper suite, like the surgeons ware, they told me I had to leave the hospital, it was cold for that time of year, and still raining.

It took me hours to get a ride, but finally, I did , several times the police came by and asked me if I wanted to sit in there police car and wait, but with my background, well, I just never had any luck in the back of a police car, so I refused there help, and just waited, well now we are one week away from the 30th of Oct, I was in agony, I had no idea why, but I was in the type of pain where you scream out when you are touched or move.

My girl friend looked at my ribs and my lower ribs were poking way out, I told her that it was probably because of them being fractured. That week I went to the hospital 3 times and they never took an x-ray, they decided that I wanted pain pills, the first of that week I began napping to get out of pain for awhile, and I was very tired, the first day I laid down and slept about 3 hours, the next day, I did the same thing but I slept about 6 hours that day, on the 30th I laid down and I did not get up for 18 hours.

My brother came by to check on me, and he found that I was not breathing, and the rest of this story in this book, so is all that happened after this point in my life, I just wanted to give you some background on my life, I really wanted to prove to you that I was a bad person, for a reason though, I want you all to know that God's Grace is for all of us, no matter what you have done in your life,

I wanted to prove to you anyone can be saved, and that God loves us all dearly, it is just that I never knew he loved me, until this point in my life, please read and enjoy this book, and allow it to give you hope, and allow it to prove to you no one is above or below Gods love and Grace.

One last thing that I want to say to you, that wonderful song called Amazing Grace, believe it or not it was written by a slave trader, he was the captain of a ship that went and captured slaves from all over the world, and by his hands thousands died, he killed thousands of people in cold blood, and he was the Author of the song called Amazing Grace, so he finally was saved by the grace of God, that sort of makes the rest of us seem like boy scouts doesn’t it.

Thank You

Norman L Bowman