The Road Trip

"As pressure and stress bear down on me,
I find joy in your commands." Psalm 119:143 NLT

Yesterday Joey and I was driving up to Santa Rosa to our monthly homeschool meeting. I always go Hwy 99N to Lodi and hit Hwy 12W, with a short stint on Hwy 80, where we catch Hwy 12W again. I can do that with my eyes close practically. Well, we get to Lodi,we're on Hwy 12W, we go under the I-5 overpass and BAM! Road block. We are informed by a nice CALTRANS lady that the road is blocked from there to Rio Vista. Here's the map for the detour.

Well, as you can imagine, I was not a happy lady. I was a nervous lady. I don't like detours. I like my regular routine. I know what to expect. I know how long it should take, I know where I am going. Detours mean strange places, unknown situations and heaven knows about timing.

So, I call George, he says come home. Yeah! I totally agree. I don't have to take the detour. I call Laurie, my homeschool coordinator, and explained the situation, expecting her to understand my dilemma, release me from my obligation and send my home. But no, she didn't.

Oh, she understood and she was very sympathetic, but she said, "Come along. You can do it. You have a map, don't you? Let's pray and I'll see you this afternoon." So, we prayed and I called George, told him the new plan, with the promise of if anything weird happened, I was to come home.

Long story short, I got lost. I had got it in my head that I needed to get onto I-5S to get the detour to Walnutgrove. So here I am on I-5S, crying and talking to the Lord about being TOTALLY out of my comfort zone, and I am not very happy and please make all of this go away.

All the while, Joey is in the backseat. Of course, I am not letting him see me crying or upset because it upsets him to see me cry, so he is totally unaware of my crisis in the front seat. As we are driving through Stockton--again--I hear him say, "Mom, are we almost there yet?" Well, that did it. All my adult, mother composure went out the window. I wailed," Nooooo, Joey, we are not. We are lost and we need to pray for insight." So we did.

I know I said long story short, but there is so much God in this. So I apologize ahead. As we got off the interstate and headed back towards Lodi, hoping to find the detour before we came upon the Hwy 12W exit, which we didn't. I was at my wits end. I had to take the Hwy 12W exit--again. I just said "Jesus, what should I do?" I realize I needed gas. He had me pull into the Shell station. It was huge, about 15 pumps. I spotted this lady and the one on the other side of her wasn't being used and I felt I needed to go there. I just had the feeling to show her the map and ask her if she lived there. She said she didn't. She said that she got trapped in the road block also but on the Rio Vista side. She told me that I needed to go I-5N and then everything is well marked. I could have squeezed her with joy. I did hug her, but just ever so gently.

We got back onto the interstate and sure enough, a couple miles UP the road, there was the sign and we made it. What a flood of relief and joy and peace!

I need to finish this for today, but please check in tomorrow for the lessons learned.