Prayers / Blessings

Thank you to each of you who have

kept my family in their prayers.

Traveling up north to assist with hurricane

relief has been a great opportunity, but

not without challenges.

Mainly, it's a long way.

And our trucks are old.

And the loads they have been pulling

are HEAVY!

(Kyle figures he weighs in around 26,000 pounds)

It's an 8 or 9 hour drive one way, and then they

work long hours doing mental and manual labor.

Kyle says it's exhausting work, even though he

is sitting in his air conditioned cab...

Other people's inexperience around heavy equipment

means they are constantly walking in front, behind,

beside, under his loads, etc.

He has to keep his head on a swivel (even with the 

back-up camera) to make sure he isn't going

to run over and crush a person, animal,

car, building, what have you.

Rod doesn't get to sit.

I've been learning to drive the "Tank".

Running it around our farm a little.

It's fun.

But standing on that little platform

while it bumps and jumps and hops

over all the ruts and hills and dips

is HARD on your knees and legs and

hips and back.

But they have certainly been blessed during this time.

They have built friendships and relationships

with the other members they are working with.

And we realized a huge blessing yesterday.

When the guys got home Sunday night, they were bushed.

We had some rain here and our ground is a little soft.

Kyle pulled his big rig around to back it into his spot

and promptly got stuck.

He was going to have to unload his tractor.

And he was just too tired.

(It was 10:00 at night... after a full day of work

and travel.)

Monday he mostly rested.

And then in the late afternoon he went out,

unloaded his tractor and gave it a good bath.

Put it away in the cow pasture.

And went to move his truck.

Only to find his batteries (big diesel trucks have

TWO giant / oversized batteries...)

DEAD as a DOOR NAIL.

He and Rod ran over to the local auto guy

to get them tested, but they didn't have 

the right equipment to test these big boys.

Tuesday morning he headed into the city

to the Interstate Battery folks.

Yup.

Dead.

One was still under warranty.

Which is good, because not only are they big,

they are EXPENSIVE.

Turns out it has been 33 months since he changed them last.

We are so blessed and grateful they held out

until he was here.

Not in the Panhandle.

And not on his ranch where his only form of

transportation is his... tractor? UTV? Feet?

So thank you again for your prayers.

The Lord answers and protects.