January 11, 2008

A mile past stupidity - or Another reason to praise God

Today was pretty much our usual Friday routine, except for one small bit. And I really believe (and believed as I sat there) that it was actually one of the BEST parts of my day personally (my husband wouldn't TOTALLY agree, but I know within it, I got one of my prayers answered.

As with many other Fridays, T asked me if I wanted to go for a drive with him, which basically means that with the money he's got from his portion of his paycheck, he's got a few things he wants to go get or take care of, this on the days he didn't cash the check at one of our local grocery stores. Even though I had things I needed and wanted to do (like the last 4 rows of Rosa's afghan), I said sure. I can't pass up a chance to have time just me and him (and P), and to spend his money (hee hee). Besides, due to how he set the withholding from his check and how much he worked last week, he didn't have a small paycheck---it wasn't as big as with the time he worked on Christmas, but it was still good sized, and I happen to know he's got money left over even now.

So, off we went to cash his check, pay the cable (and phone and internet) bill, stop at WalMart for a few things, then off to drop off some money so the EZ-Pass is taken care of (one more trip up the thruway would cause them to take $25 more out of our bank account, and this was that trip), then we headed up to the reservation to get some gas.

Only problem with that was that unlike most of the other times, when the gas tank started dinging to let us know it was nearly completely empty, we (read: T) drove around town on it without even putting a little bit in it. I'm sure I'm in part to blame too...T said he did blame me because just before we got on the thruway, he asked me if I thought we'd be able to make it up the 30 miles on the thruway. Most of the time we are....

But not this time. The GREAT thing about it is that we weren't even 1 mile from the off ramp, and we have a small gas can in the trunk. We've had that thing for YEARS. It was obvious that T was going to be the one to walk that mile, then another mile, but I can't tell you exactly why. He can walk much faster than me a lot of the time, and I'm sure P would have loved to stay with his dad (who would have let him out to play instead of insisting he stay in the car seat). But, T set out in the slight cold and dampness/rain, and I sat in the car.

I was amazingly patient, if you ask me. I would often, in past times, be flipping out a bit...I've always known I'm one who is big on keeping control of the situation. In fact, I'm a bit surprised that before we got on the thruway I said "no I think we'll be fine" even with knowing how much we had driven around, instead of "you know, just to be sure stop and get a gallon or so."

But I thought for a few minutes while I was first sitting there, and I realized that I had a great opportunity to take some time just me and God (and P), and do some talking. It would have been nice to think about other things, but I think I got some practice in praying either way.

I was rather specific in my prayers. First, I thought about it, took account of how far we were and how much time it might take to walk that distance and back. I figured that if he returned before noon, I'd be surprised. We got on the onramp at just about 11am. Then I told God I knew he was with us, and that I can depend on Him, and that He will get us through this.

Then I started on a small repetitive prayer---take care of T, me and P, and get T a ride! I remained rather calm---in fact, if you had looked in the car while I was sitting there, you would have thought I thought I didn't have a care in the world. I just sat there, knitting and praying to myself, trying to keep P calm by pointing out all the semis that drove by while we were waiting. He got a large board book for Christmas from my parents with 3 books in 1, and big trucks of all kinds are in there, plus trains and emergency vehicles.

I was extremely surprised---T showed up at just before 11:40---and he had gotten a ride from some one in a red car. T said the guy was up from Pennsylvania, had seen someone who he thought was walking with a gas can already, but when he got back around to that person, he found they were just walking. Then eventually he saw T, and he was the 3rd or 4th car after T said "boy, it would be nice if someone stopped and gave me a ride about now." :-|