angel mechanic - part 2

the saga continues, and I'm starting to think that this guy isn't going to go away. my internet patience and attention span is running short. but there must be a reason for all this.

so I show up at his place this evening, and he found a problem with the headlight, which was apparently the root of all this evil. but he can fix it, no charge. oh yeah he also got a ticket at one of the republic lots when he came downtown to find me today. add $6 to the tally.

at 8:30 he pulls up, and he says he accidentally blew the bulb, will have to get another tomorrow and install it then. everything else is apparently running better than ever. he tried to fix the gas gauge too. and the loose mirror. I find myself having to constantly tell him NOT to fix things. and he's doing all this on the butt-coldest day of the winter so far.

Michelle's out to see Cold Mountain with friends. So I invite him in. Feed him a cupcake. He uses the phone. He uses the potty. Uses the phone again (long distance). He talks about his family. Too much information perhaps. I even learn that he's recently been in jail a few days because of an unpaid ticket and failure to appear (in Rossville). He's got 4 kids of his own, but divorced. nasty custody battle over the oldest, who is 16. Apparently he's spent all their money trying to get his daughter back, and their car blew up on the way home from the court in georgia or something. His fiancee has 2 school-age kids too, and tomorrow is their first day at schools here in TN (they just moved from GA). And he doesnt know the bus schedule. After skirting and aplogising, he comes around to asking me to borrow the truck to take the kids to and from school. They're getting their car back from the body shop on Friday.

How can I say no? All his stories make sense, and he's proven himeself trustworthy quite a few times within the last 24 hours. He's saved our butts with the truck, and yet my suspicious heart wants to cut him loose. But I can't. There must be a reason why. So I make some calls arranging a ride into work and to borrow Dave's car to make the Dr. appointment. So the truck is his for a while longer. Michelle's not going to be too happy, but hopefully she'll trust me with this. I can't shake this feeling that there's a purpose for all this. At times I suspect that he really IS an angel. Maybe I'll ask him.

I gave him another $20 for the work on the truck. That makes it $123. Plus the $6 parking ticket. Less $5 in gas he put in the truck, and less about $60 in parts. Still not a bad deal. And it looks like I'm making a friend that I definitely wouldn't otherwise make. He saw our porch and he wants to come fix it this weekend. He wants to check the Honda to make sure I didn't screw anything up. He's as generous with his time as Scot Redpath, and that's saying a lot. And Scot knows a thing or three about cars too.

Henry said he talked to his mom last night, and she was apparently praying for him yesterday because he's without a car right now. Based on how he told the story, he doesn't seem too keen on prayer. But he said, that's when I met you. As if I'm the answer to HIS problems. You know what I prayed when the truck wouldn't start? First it was "sh*t!" every time I unsuccessfully turned the key. Then a pathetic, "Please God!" which probably qualified more as "in vain" than a prayer. But he sent Henry: the nicest, if not oddest, stranger I've met in a long while.