not in my job description

Vignette #2

The morning the orchestra left town we dropped Brian off to ride the bus and the kids and I came home where Elliott proceeded to watch way too many hours of TV while I ran around like a chicken with her head cut off packing a bag, doing dishes, throwing stuff out of the fridge, sweeping the floor, packing up bottles, formula, baby food, and diapers, pushing the trashcans out to the curb, making the beds, etc., for the next several hours. Why did I not start getting ready earlier? Like days before? Oh wait because all that stuff you have to do right before you leave and with one person doing all the work and 2 little people interrupting, it takes forever. And no I will not leave on vacation with unmade beds. Then we went to Lowe's where I repeated the name of the tool Brian told me I needed to take the bike rack off the back of the car. I went home with the tool and looked at the tool, looked at the bike rack, looked at the tool, looked at the bike rack. Hmmmmm. I really wanted the bike rack off the car to help with gas mileage and I'm just so sick of it being in the way of the trunk. After a few frustrating minutes, I was able to undo the bolt that held the huge bike rack onto the hitch under the car and I triumphantly carried the bike rack to rest in the garage. I am woman. Hear me roar. Brian was way impressed. He didn't think I'd be able to do it.

We were finally on the road (well after a trip to Kohls and Target of course) and things were going smoothly...except for the time Elliott had to go #2 and we had to turn around and head back to the nearest town to find a bathroom and then he proceeded to take his sweet time in that gas station bathroom. Oh the glamors of mommyhood.

We were about half an hour from our destination and I started hearing a weird sound. I'm kind of a hypo-car-driac. I often hear sounds that suggest imminent failure of the car. Do I have a flat tire? Nah, it would be louder. It must just be the wind or the road surface. Keep driving. We're almost there. You don't want to stop or the kids will wake up. Several minutes later a car next to me honked. The passenger rolled down her window and yelled, "You have a flat tire! You need to pull over!" Shoot! Panic panic panic! Frantically I pushed buttons on the gps, wishing there was a help me button! The car pulled over so I pulled over behind her. She got out of the car and so did I. At that point my back left tire became completely flat. We were in the middle of nowhere. Forests of pine trees lining the freeway. She told me that I was almost to the town of Dover and hopefully there would be a service garage there. She said the town wouldn't even have a stoplight. She said good luck and drove off.

Just up ahead, I could see a little building on the other side of the highway. I gunned it and turned onto that side street that pointed to Dover and right there, on the side of the highway, that little building was a garage. A no name place, that offered state inspections. Praise the Lord. I walked into the garage and saw 2 grandpa type guys and said, "I need help." These 2 nice men came out to the car, jacked it up, took the tire off, put air in my spare (because we never had, so it only had 4 pounds of air in it), and put the spare on. They asked where I was coming from. "Cary." As soon as I said it, I felt like I should be on the cast of the Real Housewives of Cary or something like that. All of a sudden I had turned into a dumb, helpless, suburban wife who didn't know she had a flat, ruined the tire by driving on it, didn't have any air in the spare, and couldn't change a tire. I just never planned on being on my own when I got a flat tire. Changing a tire just isn't in my job description guys. The guys were really nice. I asked what I owed them and the owner said, "Five dollars." I handed him a twenty and he started reaching to give me change and I said, "Oh no you don't! I don't know what I would have done without you guys!"

Seriously let's review these blessings:
tire with huge staple in it held up as long as it did-maybe that was helped by not having a heavy bike rack on the back?
nice stranger told me to pull over
there was a garage literally across the highway in this expanse of Carolina forestry
there were nice men able to change my tire and air the spare
this happened at around 4:30pm, what if it had happened at 5 and they weren't there?
I made it to New Bern to meet Brian where he took the car to get a new tire the next morning

I was so watched over and protected! I smiled that evening as my Book of Mormon fell open to a verse I had underlined years ago, "...blessed be the name of my God, who has been mindful of us, wanderers in a strange land." (Alma 26:36) Amen.