tim’s thought property

Sarah and I had planned on visiting Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump, out in southern Alberta, as well as Frank Slide on the Friday. This was supposed to be an adventurous day, being educated as we learned. You know, presumably about herding buffalo and how a town can be spared from a frightening disaster. After the time of learning, the Clan and us would meet up at Mill Creek Baptist Camp, to pick up Aruba, Sarah’s teen-age sister. She was also getting baptized that afternoon, at the camp, so it was going to be an action packed day. But our day took a different twist of action than expected.

We had decided to leave the house by 10:00. Her father and brother, Alfie, had made plans to drive out to the foothills to get dead fall for the firewood pile that took up the back yard, like some rude and intrusive beaver dam. So, the guys left at ten o’clock with the van, trailer, gas and occasionally working chainsaw. Sarah and I had less of an easy time getting out, since we had to scramble to make our lunch, upload our pictures from the day previous, rustle our cds and get everything ready. Our pursuit was accented with gentle promptings from Sarah’s mom, trying to usher us out as to not miss our sites. (Yet really in secret, her and Pip were planning on constructing a birthday cake for me, which was made in the shape of a Pirate ship. Oh man! was it something else!)

So as the two of us left at 10:48, we had to stop into Safeway for some fruit, as our time was already on the late side. As we hit Hwy 3, the Concord was travelling along fine. But about ten minutes outside of Lethbridge, just after Coalhurst, the cruise control shut off and Sarah had to bring the car to a halt on the side of the road. It wasn’t just the cruise at fault. The car wouldn’t start, the engine wasn’t turning over. So she popped the hood, and I went out to look. I told her that it wouldn’t really help, unless the engine was on fire or some other visibly wrong thing happened. I’m really inept when it comes to engines. As we tried starting it again, I suggested that perhaps we’d pray. I was hoping that GOD would come through in a way that would get us on the road quick, and not cause us to miss Aruba’s baptism. (At this point I would like to state that Aruba is not her real name, neither are Pip and Alfie the proper sibling monikers. This is just a form of anecdotal sharing, in which I practice the freedom to re-name them for privacy’s sake.)

So as I returned to the car, after my prayer, Sarah and I began to muse about how long we’d have to wait for help. She looked up in the rear view and sees a van so strikingly similar to their family fan that when it pulls over in front of us, she sees that the driver talking on the cell phone is none other than her father, and the passenger is none other than Alfie. Remember how they left almost forty minutes before we did. We passed one of those surprised glances to each other as we left the car to greet them. Dad was already calling home, and then to the Dempsey’s for assistance in retrieving the car. Alfie was quite pleased that now our situation granted him someone else to chop wood with, that someone being me.

Well, we recounted our tale of events leading to the Concord’s failing, and then they related their story. They drove out in the morning with the realization that the chainsaw was beyond usable quality and had to go to a rental store. So the time they took to get there occupied them for a few minutes. As they were making their way to Hwy 3, Alfie had to really go to the bathroom. So “Dad” found a Tim Hortons to stop at and also decided to get a coffee. By the time they pulled out of the parking lot and begun to actually drive to their destination, they saw a purple Concord not unlike the family Concord pulled over on the side of the road with the hood up.

This is where many could say co-incidence plays it’s hand. I don’t think so. I don’t think too highly of co-incidences.

We all drove out to the camp together, then Sarah and I got the van to try to get to Head-Smashed-In. It wasn’t feasible, so we picnicked at Fort MacLeod instead. As we drove back to the camp, we hit a wrong road, and were taken ten minutes out of the way. We arrived at the camp twenty minutes after the baptism had begun (as we were told to be there at 4:00 sharp), but graciously enough, the baptism did not begin for another fifteen or twenty minutes after we got there. It was beautiful to see.

So yes, we had an adventure that day, though not the one originally planned or expected. We had a day all about seeing GOD work in many different ways.