This past weekend, I had the amazing opportunity to meet some of the amazing men and women of God that I will be serving with this year. Let me tell you, ouR Squad is awesome.
With that being said, God started to prepare me for some of the moments that we might experience on the race. It wouldn't be a World Race adventure without an eventful travel day, would it?
On Saturday morning, I began my 7 hour drive to Michigan from West Virginia. I woke up an hour earlier than I had planned and couldn't fall back asleep! (I should've known then that God had something in store for me because I can always sleep) So I decided to just take off earlier than expected to pick up Erica in Ohio and begin our journey to Michigan.
The night before, I had put air in my tires because my air pressure light was on but I didn't think much of it because I don't really drive my car that often so I just figured they'd gotten a little low from just being parked. About 3 hours into my drive, my light came back on and I just had a feeling that it might be more than a little leak. When I got to Erica about an hour later, my tire was completely flat so I filled it back up and we decided to keep on driving.
We left to get back on the turnpike but there was a car blocking the way I needed to go so I was forced to head East instead of West and find a turn around farther down the road. After we finally turned around, my light had come back on again. I looked at Erica and told her that we needed to get it patched before we drove the remaining 4 hours on our road trip.
Luckily, we were still in her hometown and her parents picked us up and treated us to breakfast. While we were at breakfast, I got the phone call from the mechanic.
"Ashlie, at least 3 of your tires need to be replaced but we don't have a matching tire, so we'll have to replace all 4. It will be around $500"
I pushed my waffle away and told him i would call him back. I called my mom, asked for advice and by the time I called back with my answer of change the tires, he had decided they couldn't fit me in for the day and I would have to wait until Monday or they could put my donut on and I could be on my way.
Luckily, Erica's mother is the best. She called the local shop that they always go to and explained the situation and they squeezed me right in 30 minutes later. My tires were changed and $500 later, we were on our way to Michigan to meet some amazing people.
When I look back at this, God was just shining through the entire time and all of the pieces really fit perfectly together.
I had been praying for safety for our drive and Erica said she had too. When I asked that prayer, I never thought that I was driving on tires that were not fit to be driven and could blow at any minute or that God keeping us safe would involve a 3 hour adventure in Streetsboro, Ohio waiting for tires. When I woke up an hour early, I was frustrated just wanting to sleep but God was giving us plenty of time to safely arrive at our destination. When I started to go East instead of West down the turnpike, God was making sure we didn't get too far before we finally decided it was time to get the problem checked out.
He delievered us safely to Michigan only an hour late and we were blessed to meet some of the most amazing people this weekend. I know that this is just the beginning of travel adventures and disasters on this race but it's nice to realize that in those moments, He knows so much more than I do.
