Quora看到的一个问题：你经历的最糟糕的事情是什么？
下面是其中一个回答：
我忘记关掉车里的灯，导致电池没电。
那是上周五早上的事了。熬夜过后我睡着了。当时我是一位无业老师，刚刚离婚，没有健康保险。由于我背脊骨间的软骨层撕裂，我的腿一坐下就疼，需要动手术。
那会儿我准备出去玩几天，带着我的皮划艇到加拿大，在一个偏远的小岛野营几天。好好思考人生。快速地跑几下。去远足。试着忽视身体的疼痛、灵魂的空虚以及不存在的未来。
下午我提前打包好了一切，这样我可以一起床就上路，因此当我拧动钥匙发现发动机没有反应的时候，我感到十分恼火。我试着打开灯，没有反应。我试着按喇叭，它发出了微弱的响声后就没有反应了。电池完全没电了。
我只好放弃原先的计划。
我嘟囔着从车库拿出了电池充电器，并将它插到了电池上。在等待的一个小时里，我坐在家里检查电子邮件并上网。
我的收件箱里有一些垃圾邮件，包括一封纽约州公立学校教师招聘启事。一个多月了，我没有在这个学校的官网上看到什么有用的信息；当时已经过了春招，而秋招还没开始。启事的正文没有任何内容，但我一时兴起点了查看详情。
在列表底部有一条广告，招聘物理(化学/生物)老师，有五年以上经验的有限，截止日期是下周一早上八点。不知怎地我错过了这个职位空缺，它已经空缺快一个月了。我看了下地址，那是一所乡村学校，距离奥尔巴尼半个小时车程，位于一个丘陵地带。是我喜欢的地方。我看了一下路途时间，大约需要两个小时。
如果我可以在一个小时内拾掇整齐，准备好专业材料并发动我的汽车，那么我可以在他们下班之前赶到。如果没有意外，那么我可以参观一下那所学校，我确信我的求职申请能在周一早晨的截止日期前躺在校长信箱的最上面。
我的汽车充电了一个小时才能启动，因此我在孩子们蜂拥着出校门进校车的时候，到达了那所学校。在校门口，和我聊天的第一个人正好是校长。他注意到了我汽车上的皮划艇，鉴于他也是一名户外爱好者，我们立即达成了一致。接下来是我人生中最棒的非正式面试。我是最合适的那个人。
“我们明年准备换掉三分之一的员工，我们想要有经验的人。”
“我教了十一年书。”
“这是一所乡村学校，和在城里教书不一样。”
“是啊，我之前教书的学校就在阿迪朗达克山脉中部，实际上它比这里小得多。”
“我们的招聘启事上写着要物理老师，但我们需要的人还得教另外一门科学才行。我们不确定另一门是化学还是生物。”
“这不是问题。我有这三门的教师资格证。我还有地球科学与普通科学的教师资格证。这些课我都教过，实际上我教过好几次。”
我在这里待了一个小时，走的时候我已经找到了一份非常不错的工作。此前的坏心情都消失无踪了。我已经工作了十年，至今我仍旧认为我是纽约州最幸运的人。我有一个不错的部门，一个不错的社区，一群很好相处的孩子，一群出色的同事，一个不错的工作环境，不少材料及物资，以及创新的自由。每天早晨我起床就能呼吸到新鲜空气，欣赏美丽的山景。上班开车只需要五分钟，骑自行车只需要八分钟，走路只需要十分钟。我出门不需要锁家门或者车门或者自行车。我住的地方离城市很近，购物很方便；我住的地方离城市又足够远，不需要忍受都市生活的缺点。
十年后，我依旧认为我找到了一份完美的工作。
如果我的汽车在那天早晨启动了，那么我将与它擦肩而过。
What is the luckiest thing you've ever done?
I forgot to turn off the lights in my car and killed the battery.
It was a late Friday morning, I’d slept in after a late night out. I was an unemployed teacher, newly divorced, no health insurance, fighting against admitting that the pains in my legs were sciatica due to ruptured discs that needed surgery.
The plan was to get away for a few days, take my kayak up to Canada and go camping on a remote island. Think about life. Run a few rapids. Hike a little. Try to ignore the pain in my body, the emptiness in my soul, and the lack of a real future.
I’d packed everything the afternoon before so I could just get up and get on the road, so I was very annoyed when I turned the key and didn’t even get a click from the starter. I tried the lights, nope. I tried the horn, it made a weak squawk then died. Totally dead battery.
Crap.
Grumbling to myself, I got the battery charger out of the box marked “garage” on the porch of my apartment and hooked it up to the dead battery in my car. With an hour to kill, I went inside to check e-mails and cruise the net.
There was the usual pile of low priority semi-spam in my inbox, including a notification from the NY state public school teaching job message board. I hadn’t seen anything useful on the site for over a month; it was past the main April/May hiring time and before the August panic. The body of the message didn’t show anything, but on a whim I clicked on it to check out the full listings.
Near the bottom of the list there was an ad for an opening for a Physics(Chemistry/Biology) teacher, 5+ years experience preferred, deadline for applications this coming Monday at 8 AM. Somehow I’d missed hearing about this opening; it had been on the board for almost a month. I checked out the location… rural school, about a half hour away from Albany, in the foothills of the Green/Berkshire/Taconic mountains. My kind of place. I checked out the travel time… about two hours away.
If I could get cleaned up, get my professional things together and get my car to start in less than an hour then I could just about make it there before everyone left for the weekend. If nothing else, I could take a look at the place and I could make sure that my application was on the top of the pile in the principal’s inbox for the Monday morning deadline.
My car didn’t start until after a full hour on the charger, so I got to the school just as all of the kids were stampeding out the door and onto the buses. The first person I talked to out in front of the school just happened to be the principal. He noticed the kayak up on top of my car, and since he is an outdoors-person we hit it off immediately. What followed was the best non-interview interview of my life; I was the man with all of the right answers.
“We’re replacing a third of the staff next year, we could use someone with experience.”
“I’ve been teaching eleven years.”
“This is a rural school. It’s not like teaching in the suburbs.”
“Yeah, the school I taught at was in the middle of the Adirondack Mountains… much smaller than this place actually.”
“The listing says Physics, but the person we hire will need to cover another science. We’re not sure which one right now, either Chem or Bio.”
“Not a problem. I’m certified in all three of those. And Earth Science. And General Science too. And I’ve taught them all. Several times in fact.”
It went like that for the entire hour that I was there, and after it was done I drove away with a very good job in my pocket, the day before it was going to go away. After ten years in this job I still think I am one of the luckiest teachers in New York State. I have a great administration (both are former science teachers), a very supportive community, easy students to work with, excellent co-workers, a great workspace, lots of materials and supplies, and the freedom to innovate. Every morning I wake up to fresh air and a view of the mountains. My commute to work is 5 minutes by car, 8 minutes by bike, and 10 minutes by hiking through the woods. I do not need to lock my house when I leave, or lock my car or my bike on the end of the commute. I live close enough to a city that I can get a dose of culture or find things that I need when I want them, but far enough away that I don’t have to deal with the drawbacks of urban or suburban life.
Ten years later I still think that I’ve found my perfect job.
And if my car had started that morning, I’d never have found it.