Deserts are Hot

Started in: St. George, UT
Ended in: Barstow, CA
Pandora’s Status: Purring like a kitten.

At one point today, I found myself thinking: Why am I still doing this; this is taking way too long. I did not expect to be here, standing in a garage in a trailer park, while a man was hardwiring an extension chord into a wall socket. Oh ya, I remember, I promised to stop and help anyone that seemed like they needed help...

It was early in the morning, and I was driving through the mountains of Northern Arizona. It was already pretty hot (at least for a dislocated Minnesotan). I rounded a corner and saw a truck pulled over on the side of the road with a man standing by it looking confused. I pulled over onto the large roadside. The man did need help. His rear tire was completely mangled, he had no jack or other tools, and he could not speak English.

We used some rocks to stabilize the axle and then we removed the rear tire. We strapped the mangled tire and his unmounted spare onto the back of Pandora. Then He, Gage, and I took of for the next town down the line.

About 10 miles later, we found a small gas station. The station did not do any sort of repairs, so we asked some of the locals for the nearest garage. They said it was closed because it was Saturday. A man buying some groceries overheard us and said we could follow him to his house where he would help us remove the mangled tire and then mount the spare. He was wearing some sort of blue uniform with his name sewn on it. The name was one letter, "J".

As we were strapping the tires back on to Pandora to leave the gas station, another man came over to us and offered to haul the tires for us in his truck. So J, J's baby daughter, some local with the tires, the stranded guy, Gage, Pandora, and I took off for J's house.

We did finally get the spare tire mounted and inflated. The stranded guy paid J, and then I took the stranded guy back to his truck so that he could become "the guy".

Thank you to the woman in China who changed my view on helping others when she spent the whole day helping my daughters and I.