"EVEN ME LORD, EVEN ME"
I guess almost anyone is capable of a profound "dumbness," now and again, even me. I hear you, I hear you, you almost said it aloud, and I almost heard you almost say it aloud, "no way, not WADE!" Yes way, yes Wade, to quote the immortal pundits, Bill and Ted, who like Donkey Hotie, once went on a great adventure. As a writer, you know I love to have fun with other folks' faux pas, since turnabout is fair play, I feel compelled now and then, to bring forth, 'splain, confess, and share a few of mine so you won't feel as dumb as you are. It is a public service as a Christian man, to embarrass one's self at times, so you will know that I too have feet of clay. Confession is the "mud sill" of obedience, not meaning to sound like James Henry Hammond, because he was it seems, a pervert. That is neither here nor there. So, given that I may blab my stupidity for your edification, which is the utter hallmark of a humble man, and that I am, let us continue. I gift these to you in furtherence of my humility, it being such a point of personal pride for me...or whatever. Where shall I start? How about when I was just shy of being two years old? Yes, I can recall a good of my life from that age. We lived in a small house in Swainsboro, on a street that was residential, and had only light traffic. My baby bed was in the small living room, and at night I was alone in the room. You know how automobile headlights passing down a street will pass through light curtains and go around the upper walls of a room, as the vehicle passes. I was not old enough or smart enough to correlate those lights that skittered across the walls at night to the passing vehicle. Nope, I was sure it was Santa Clause watching me while I was sleeping, just like the song said...hey, lighten up, I was TWO, okay! Now let us skip forward about fifty years. I came to New Beginnings in Christ here in Garfield in March of 2008, to heal and recover from alcoholism and pill addiction. Donald Atkinson, who was an old friend of mine, let me move out of "program housing," about two weeks after I came, and move into the one bedroom mobile home that had been the office for the farm and crop dusting business. It was about three miles from Garfield and the NBIC campus, in the pecan orchard of Grey Mule Farm, which Donald and Mr. Sam Smith farmed in partnership, with their other ag properties as well. Let me tell you, that was a cold place! It had been abused by a series renters, it was poorly insulated, several windows were damaged, such that it was hard to heat. It had an electric Intertherm brand central heating unit. The first cool night of autumn had me wanting to see just how well the unit worked, so I clicked the thermostat on to hopefully enjoy some heat in my tiny abode. I moved the thermostat switch to "on" and nothing happened. I tried it over and over, nothing happened. I removed the cover from the unit, looked at it and saw no reason for it not working. I was sorely disappointed. I bought a portable electric heater, it barely made a dent in the cold, when nights were frigid. I bought another type, it did its best, but I was still cold. Eventually I was running four electric heaters, I was still cold and my light bill was astronomical. This went on for two long winters. On that fateful first frigid day of the start of my third winter living there, I repeated what I had done the first two winters, I clicked the switch on the thermostat to "on," prayed over it, and of course nothing happened. My telephone rang, and I walked over to answer it, did so, and began talking to Bryan Sparks. I was listening to Bryan and then started to walk over to turn that %&*# thermostat off, when I suddenly heard a whoosh of air, and the distinctive hum of a electric central heating unit. I checked a vent and yes, warm air was issuing forth in abundance. It had a bit of a delay and I had never once given it a chance to start before turning it off again at the thermostat. I lived there for ten more years, and gave away all of those heaters!
Fast forward a few years, I had moved to the other side of Garfield, and shortly after moving there I bought the 1988 Ford F-150 that I still have and I know will be the last vehicle I will ever own, I love it, and it is paid for, and that is a great combination. The truck had been sitting for a couple of years after my friend who owned it passed away. After buying it, and driving it for the first time, I saw that the voltage gauge showed a very low voltage. That indicated the alternator was barely charging, so I called "Lil" Chris, a friend who has always been a very good shade tree mechanic. I had him replace it with a new alternator. That one was also defective so I had him come replace it with another new one. AGAIN! That one did the same thing...uhm, okay, I was wrong. You see, many years before, the dashboard gauges had a different layout, where any gauge was in its optimum position showing normal would have its indicator needle oriented at various directions depending on the gauge. A few decades before, Ford had changed the layout and position of its dashboard gauges, such that across the board, the normal operating range would have the indicator needle at about 12 o'clock, or straight up at the center of the gauge. My truck was a 1988 year model and still carried the old style gauges. It was charging fine, the whole time. I never told Lil Chris or anyone else about that one, so keep this one to yourselves, please.
I will close with a more recent one, and some of you might recall that I reported it to y'all when it happened early last year. One of my battery cable ends broke, so I bought a new pair, red and black painted ones as seen here. Red on the positive cable and black on the negative one. It had been starting just fine, but when I installed the new ones, it would not even click! I looked it over and could not see where the problem was. I called another friend, Henry, a fellow NBIC graduate who moved his family here and has a mobile mechanic business with a couple of helpers, who is a good guy and good mechanic. He came over and only about three minutes after I heard him drive up, he called me from outside and said it was fixed. Yep, it was an easy fix, the new ends were dipped in paint and that included the inside surface that contacts the lead battery terminal. The paint was an insulator! He had peeled the inside of both terminals with his pocket knife, voila! Fixed. He laughed and only charged me five dollars. But in my defense, they usually are unpainted on the inside, as seen here, and those were an exception, but it should have been obvious to me when I was installing them. I reckon those chinese have a sense of humor too.
This reminds me of when I was three years old and asked my mama what a genius was, she 'splained it to my lil ole self, and I replied, "that's what I are!" Proving then and there that I was not! .... wade
Great story!