I hope this doesn’t become an ordinary day. It wasn’t a bad one, just well…here’s what happened. I got a call from the car dealer yesterday saying the missing part was in (what missing part, I think). So, I brought my car in at 9:00 this morning. Across from the dealer is the Spice mall and usually I would go over there for the time it takes to attend to the car. But they said it would be 2 hours, so I decided to take the bus/tram home and then have someone from the office take me back when the car was ready. At 9:40 I was one stop from home and my phone rang. “Your car is ready.” Should I go to the office and see if someone can drive me back. No, it will be easier to hop back on the tram to the bus stop and back out to the dealer (which is on the way to the airport –important later.) Sounds easy, but I have never taken this bus out that way, only back into town. I usually take the express bus. It stops right in front of the car dealer. So I realize I have no idea where to get on the bus. It should be easy – on the other side of the road from where I got off. Nope. I walked around for 20 minutes (it’s now after 10:00) and finally found it, one minute after it left that stop. The next one would be 30 minutes later. So, I found a coffee shop and had a real cup of coffee, with caffeine and a sweet roll! I got on the bus, heading the right way even and felt pretty good about knowing the right bus, etc. It’s now 10:40. I left the dealer at 9:00 and still haven’t accomplished anything but walking and riding. I relaxed in the bus and thought it was all over. This is not the express bus however and it takes some back roads. I wasn’t sure where we were but I was sure that we would suddenly come out at the right place, until we came to one vaguely familiar stop. In the distance I could see flags from a car dealer and thought, ‘maybe this bus doesn’t stop there. I better get out and walk from the next stop.’ At that moment we turned on to the highway and headed to the airport exit – no bus stops for a very long time. Still, I wasn’t panicked. In fact, I was amused! I thought I was so smart. There is one stop halfway between the highway and the airport. It’s in the middle of nowhere but across the road is the stop for the other direction. I got out, once again pleased with myself for figuring this out. Except, the bus stop was disserted. I didn’t want to stand there and watch buses pass me by, so decided to walk. It wasn’t that far to the dealer. Well, first the road to the dealer is a highway. You can’t walk on it! Second, it is far! I took a back road heading in the right direction and hoped that it would come out in some familiar place before it dead-ended. My only other choice would be to walk all the way to the airport and get a bus headed in the right direction. Oh, and yesterday I left my boots at the office so was walking on snowy, slushy, slippery roads in street shoes. Eventually I did come out near the highway and saw another bus stop with the right bus number on it. I had to wait 15 minutes, but it did come and I eventually (11:45) arrived at the dealer. Quickly picked up my keys and headed to the office. I never did find out what they replaced and at that point I didn’t care. The thing I kept thinking was ‘this has nothing to do with Latvia. It could happen anywhere in the world – especially to me!’ My friend Linda said, ‘you have never had a normal life had you?!’ It’s true.
This afternoon, Linda and I went to Iecava for their Home and Family meeting. Linda to translate, me to do the program. I decided to do a little presentation on my travels to Bible lands – Israel, Greece and Turkey. It was really fun to look back at pictures and notes from those trips. God has really blessed me with incredible opportunities. And I thank God for The Salvation Army who made them possible. My program was pretty random but they seemed to enjoy it and even smile at my little ‘funny’ comments. They are a group of mostly elderly ladies who are very sweet and make me feel special. Linda and I had wonderful conversation on the way home. Since training started I haven’t had a chance to talk with some of the young women from RHQ/Riga 1 much. So, I was glad to have an hour or so with her. We ended the evening with pizza. Not an ordinary day at all, but a good story!
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