If there is ever a time you’ve longed for community, it’s in times of need. We’ve been having those a lot lately, no drastic, but frustrating. Ours has particularly been related to car trouble.
Our amazing and wonderful Honda Civic 1995 coupe, with an engine swap, that has gotten 36mpg on average for the life of the car, which was an awesome car in the Nashville winters, is struggling. A couple of occasions have been due to me leaving the lights on and the battery dying. Which, the effect of draining the battery, is probably the reason the car has had a hard time cranking over in the mornings. This has resulted in us asking the neighbors for jumps on two different occasions, complete strangers for jumps on others (again many times this has been completely my fault for leaving the lights on), and has resulted in three taxi trips to get to our destinations (yesterday was my first taxi trip ever). Needless to say, it’s been quite frustrating.

What’s been terrible is that we are in a new place and we really lack community. There is one person in the neighborhood whose phone number he have and I’d say 90% of our calls to him have been because of car trouble. You don’t want to strain your new relationships with problems, and yet it’s hard to no where to turn for help.
It’s given me some perspective on what a great many people in our communities face on a constant basis. Lack of financial resources often leads to unreliable transportation. I don’t know what the statistics are, but I know quite frequently the instability in reliable transportation leads to being fired from jobs, creating further financial strain. It’s a tough position to be in, especially when your unsure of where you can turn to for help. I pray my experience gives me sensitivity toward others in similar situations.

The lack of community has created such a strain on us as a couple and individually, feeling at our wits end, that you start to wonder how people make it on the day to day with so many constant unknowns. But, lest you are worrying about us, you should know, this story has a happy ending.

After our taxi drive getting us safely to our destination, the community we had been lacking slowly formed around us. A kind lady at the class we were at offered to give us a ride home. From there a couple gave us a ride to the community group, connected to a local church, that we were hoping to attend. We mentioned our car troubles and offers for help started pouring in. Right now someone has lent us their car. We were able to go to church this morning, and by God’s grace, we got our car started this afternoon, and will hopefully be able to get it to a shop tomorrow.
We love our car, and I’m hesitant to try and replace it. If we can make it through the winter, our car is the coolest, most efficient car you can find around. I also love that it took a broken down car to bring a community around us.