I'm baaack!!

I know, I know! I've been on a loooong vacation from blogging! I'm blaming it on the ease of Facebook (although if I'm 100% honest, I have to admit that being busy with my family -and laziness- had something to do with my extended hiatus).   Please welcome me back with the love you used to have for me and I will thrive once again on your motivation, support and encouragement, aka: comments! ;-)

First, I'd like to say that I hope to fill in some of the missing months with random posts that (for the sake of my OCD) will be back dated, so I hope you don't miss them. In the meantime,  read on about the last two days in my life and the wonderful miracle that I experienced.

Rewind to Thursday, the first day of junior high (jump start) at Encore for my third son, Garrett.  You may not know this, but this young man suffers from severe anxiety (that's important to the story). After an hour-long parent meeting my friend and I (who’d rode together) met up with our sons at 1:00 PM and headed to the parking lot expecting to hear all about their “jump start” experience, what they thought of the campus and how they felt about being in junior high on our way home.  Instead, the car wouldn’t start.  Garrett began to panic but somehow found the strength to search the parking lot for good Samaritans with jumper cables to try and give us a jump.  He found a group of volunteers and after attempting to jump the van from two different vehicles without success we came to the conclusion that something other than a dead battery was ailing our primary means of transportation.  Quite frankly I’ve never really been in this situation before so I had no idea what to do. So I prayed.  As I was praying, I found myself rummaging through the glove box and found my insurance card.  I dialed the number and found out that our insurance includes towing; they dispatched the tow truck driver who was a mere two blocks away.  He arrived swiftly and got right to work doing things in his routine order.  He checked the battery and it tested good (it should!  Did I mention we’d just replaced it with a brand new battery Sunday, only 4 days earlier?).  After, although he’d heard of the good Samaritans’ previous failed attempts, he hooked up his cables and gave it a whirl.  Nothing.   He tried multiple times with the same disappointing result.  Refusing to give up, knowing that if he had to tow the car, three of us would be left behind because his tow truck was only a two-seater, he began fiddling with the gear shift, scrolling the stick through all the gears and shoving it back into park followed by some wiggling and turning the key in the ignition.  Still nothing.  He tried twice more to no avail, I was beginning to stress.  He then slowly turned the key in the ignition one last time and a miracle occurred: the engine roared to life!   As he and I stood frozen with amazement we finally shouted out simultaneously, (me) “That was God!  Praise God!” (him) “Whoa!  There is no reason that should’ve worked!  I can’t believe this car just started!”  As the others cooled off in the glorious air conditioning the tow truck driver and I handled the paperwork before parting ways.  As he walked toward his truck to leave us I heard him snicker, “The next time I’m in a bind, I’m calling you!”  I told him not to call me but to call on God to which he responded, “Thanks for the reminder,” and then jokingly concluded with “but I think you might have a stronger, more direct connection!”  After dropping the boys off and getting my friend’s car she followed me to the dealership's service department to find out where the malfunction originated and begin the repair process.

Now, fast forward to today. I'm not even going to get into the details of how stressful of a day it was aside from not having my own transportation, putting someone else out, not knowing what's wrong with my van, if it's covered under the added protection plan we purchased or if not, how much this was going to cost us and how we planned to pay!  We find out that the vehicle had a secondary alarm installed by the previous owner that was pulling too much power from the battery and needed to be removed. This was not covered. After some other unnecessary-to-go-into-details-about conversations, I found myself frustrated with no way out of this financial bind. But once again, I was given favor by my Father and the dealer discounted the service cost to a number just barely (but) affordable -and less than 24 hours later, I was behind the wheel of my own van once more.


Aside from God who sustained me in every way,  I must give secondary thanks to my husband for suggesting I add towing to my insurance policy, to my friend for sharing in my burden and carrying me through and to my son who set aside his fear and implored strangers for help. I love you all!