My Jeep quit running at the bottom of the hill yesterday and wouldn’t run again.

That’s a bugger.

It’s a bugger when everyone (seemingly…..more on that later) who could help me was busy.

It’s a bugger, too, because the cellphone service is kind of sketchy in that area unless I walked down the road some.

When it stops running in the middle of a mail day is more of a bugger.

It’s a bugger.

But, as I was sitting there, wondering why a fuel pump that’s a year old would quit on me like that, I was pleased to see how many people wanted to help me.

I had people pass me who turned around and drove back to try to help me.

I actually saw some unfamiliar faces, too….strangers who turned into new friends when they asked if I needed any help.

Finally, my co-worker who was on her way to Gatlinburg on vacation stopped and let me use her mail Jeep to run the route for a couple of days while my Jeep was in the shop.

They stopped to help me on their way to their vacation.

Man.

So…..there’s a thing that happens if you’re lucky.

You can go from feeling like you don’t know what to do, that the day is going to be a bad one and that everything has really hit the fan this time, and that you can’t feel that there’s a whole lot to be grateful for….to remembering that the final conclusion that the circumstance “dictated” isn’t really….right.

I heard on an audio book that I was listening to the other day that Stephen Covey said something about the millesecond between event and reaction being where everything important happens.

Let’s see if I can find the quote, because I’m sure he says it more eloquently and clearly than I can…..

Awwwwww….I can’t find it.

Anyway, I don’t always find the best route to take in-between the two things.

That’s my point, I guess.

Yesterday, though, it was a really pleasant thing to see how many people wanted to help me.

There is room in every circumstance for gratitude.

You don’t have to be an obnoxious Pollyanna about it, either.

My Jeep is in the shop getting fixed today.

It was the fuel pump….and, hopefully, even though it’s 13 months into a possible one year warranty, they’ll cover it and I’ll save at least a little bit of money on the repair.

It’s not raining.

I have so many strong reasons to be ecstatically grateful.

I live in a state of grace….even when I’m sitting by my broken mail Jeep.

Even then.