College Happenings

Sometimes when I start to think I am so smart and so great, God likes to send me a message to humble myself. I got a message yesterday.

I went to Idaho to get my 9-month-old nephew Rady for the weekend. His mom and I had planned to meet half way between her house and mine. It should have been about a 6 hour trip total. Two and half to three hours there, depending on the road conditions and the same distance back.

I left my house at about 10:30am. My trip was going pretty good. The mountain pass was snow packed, but I got to drive past a ski area, so I didn’t mind. I day-dreamed about skiing and slowly made my way.

I got to Salmon, the birth place of Sacagawea, ( I just learned that) and stopped to get gas. Before I stopped I saw a highway sign and thought I paid attention to what it said. After getting gas I got back on the road and went straight. I knew the town we were meeting in was 63 miles away.

So about an hour down the road I started to wonder if I was going the right way. There were no signs of a town anywhere. Just open road. No cars, no signs indicating a town, nothing. I started to look at the highway signs and they said Idaho 28. I was supposed to be on 93. But I thought maybe 93 ran into 28 and I hadn’t noticed. Of course I didn’t bring a map so I had nothing to consult. I started getting pretty nervous. I began looking at the signs going the other way and I saw one that said Salmon 75.

Crap, I thought, well I really thought oh F-word. I slowed down and turned around at a point of interest. It happened to have a map and I saw that I was on the wrong highway for sure. I had gone 75 miles in the wrong direction! I was furious! I thought “you idiot Jaime.�? Then I started thinking about how long Rady’s mom was going to wait for me. I was in the middle of no where with no cell service. So I had no way to let her know what was going on.

I started driving about 90 mph back to Salmon, praying the highway patrol was not around. I was completely freaking out now. I was thinking oh man, she is going to think I wrecked and call my brother and he is going to call my mom and they are all going to think something happened and really it is just that I couldn’t read the road signs.

Finally I got cell service and called Rady’s mom. My call went straight to her voice mail. I almost started to cry. I was sure she was going to leave. I thought I was going to get to where I am supposed to be and she is going to have left. Who would wait two extra hours.

Fortunately she is a patient woman and she had gotten my frantic message. She waited for me and still let me have Rady.

Having a 9-month-old is a whole different story.