75 Sunday Morning Breakdown

It was one of those lovely fall weekends when Sandy and I decided to visit her mom, Erlyne. Erlyne was always a lot of fun and we had a good time visiting her and Sandy’s little brother Steve.

The weekend fairly flew by, as they always seem to, when you are enjoying yourself, and before we realized it, it was early Sunday morning and we were already entering the town of Pasco well on our way home. We had barely slowed down on entering Pasco when the clutch went out without any warning. There was no sudden noise, or vibrations, or anything, it just meant that with the gas peddle to the floor, we still coasted to a stop.

What a bummer to break down early Sunday morning in a small town in the middle of nowhere. I figured our chances of finding somebody doing business were pretty slim, especially on the weekend. But miracle of miracles at the nearest filling station we were told of an auto wrecker who fixed cars.

He was quite happy to tow us over to his shop where he immediately started to work on the car. He was an all right kind of guy but I always feel kind of queasy at those kinds of places because of the type of characters that can be hanging around. There was not much to do in the little town of Pasco on a Sunday morning in ’62. Most things were closed, as everybody was probable in church, so we just sat there in their grungy waiting room while they repaired the clutch.

What worried me was that we really had no money. Except for a few dollars in our pockets there was virtually nothing in our bank account in Walla Walla. We just sat there with a hollow feeling inside, thinking about how we were going to pay the bill. We finally decided that all we could do was to just write him a check for whatever the amount. What really had me worried was that he charged $5 an hour, and at the time I thought what an outrageous amount, especially when I imagined what the final bill would be when he added on the cost of the new clutch and the tax. After five hours he finally broke the sad news that we owed him $50 for his troubles.

With a sinking heart Sandy wrote out the check and as she handed it to him he looked us both squarely in the eye and said, “Your check better be good because I am also a Sheriff and I’ll come and get you.” And he then hauled out a Sheriff’s badge. We both looked him squarely in the eye and I said, “Yes sir! We have never written a better check.”

Don’t get me wrong we have never written a bad check before or since, and we weren’t sure of the exact plan, but figured we could somehow get funds into the bank before his check cleared the bank.

God honors those that honor Him, and even though I have not always been faithful as I should, I’m sure God honors a person’s faith such as it is, because, Monday in the mail was a check from Sandy’s grandmother for $50.