God's Provision Comes in Unlikely Packages

Before we left for our 800 mile trip to South Dakota, my husband worried that he might forget something important. He checked the oil. He packed the toolbox. But when we got 70 miles down the road, he realized we didn't have a tire iron. "What if we get a flat tire?" He then discovered that he could use his wrench-set in a pinch to fix a tire.

He's not usually so neurotic. I didn't think much about it until day 6 of our trip. We wound around mountain roads, looking down into deep valleys and twisting and turning our way through gulches and canyons. Finally, we arrived at Mt. Rushmore National Monument. The second I closed my van door, I heard a distinctive hissing sound. The tire was losing air quickly. We had run over a screw somewhere along the way.

What if our tire had blown out as we turned around a curve with a huge drop on one side to the valley below? What if we hadn't had the equipment to fix that flat?

My lifetime lover got to work happily. He saw it as a gift from God. One: he was prepared (unusually so). Two: it happened in a benign spot.

A couple of touristy families (complete with Hawaiian shirts, wide-brimmed hats and video cameras) hopped out of their cars in the parking spaces right next to us. They went on their way without a word as my guy crawled under the van to get to work. A few more family men in short-sleeved button down shirts walked by us as we tried to get the tire loose using makeshift tools. They said not a word and went on their way. (Sounds a little bit like a story I remember hearing in Sunday School....)

Thankfully, we were able to get the spare on without much trouble, but it was disturbing to see how little other people cared about our plight. They were too busy being on vacation to care about anyone else's needs.



After we viewed the majestic mountain carvings, we headed off to find a repair shop. We found a little old shop in Hill City, SD which was inhabited by a gold digging, mountain man biker. He looked kind of rough around the edges.

He hummed as he took our tire and immediately began to patch it up. He charged us a reasonable price (I was shocked!) and handed us back the tire with a smile on his face. I tried to compare his attitude with the skull and crossbones, menacing blades and other biker paraphernalia around the shop. Singing while you work: not what I expected from him.

We began to put the tire on in his parking area. He quickly suggested we back up the van so he could help us do that with his hydraulic tools. Just because he was a nice guy.

You just never know how a "nice guy" might look!