So, last night about 10 pm, I realized I had not eaten, and it was necessary to step away from the keyboard in order to prevent going blind from lack of vitamin A.
I hopped in the truck and ran to the local essential food merchant, where I bought copious quantities of ice cream and chips, all the necessities of life for a single man. After I lugged my purchases to the truck, it failed to start.
I am not a mechanic. After a bit, I gave up cursing, and walked home. Unfortunately, I had to sacrifice the quart of ice cream, as it was not going to survive the journey (it was very tasty). Bloated and alone, I trudged forlornly through the night.
This morning I returned to the scene of the crying, and discovered once again that the truck would not start. Out of reasonable options, I undertook what was left to do, and started pushing the truck. It was a half mile to the local mechanics.
Now, I am an old man, and even though my Rabbit pickup is a small vehicle, it remains a significant mass possessing inertia that is challenging to overcome. About every 100 feet I would stop, wheeze, and sweat until the spots faded back out of sight, returning to the aether from whence they came.
After a couple legs of the journey, Steve came out (observing me trying not to pass out in his driveway) and added his power to mine, considerably easing my way for a couple more legs of the trip. After thanking him, I continued on my way to the mechanic's.
At the intersection where the mechanics place is off the highway, there is a slight incline, maybe a ten foot rise over 100 feet. While this is practically unnoticeable in other circumstances, it was a significant impediment to my solitary progress, and I was barely able to make 10 feet at a time before dry heaving my intestines out, and pausing to tuck them back in.
A passing masseuse named Heidi asked if I needed help. Roman came out of a restaurant where he had been taking breakfast with a friend and offered his assistance, and Dave saw the crowd, and pulled his rig over to add his 1/2 horsepower to the impromptu engine.
With my new friends, the last 50 feet to the mechanics was actually the easiest leg of the journey.
This is community. Those people that see their neighbors struggling, and step up to get them through. None of them needed to take time out of their day to help some damn hipster looking idiot trying to push a solar panel bedecked pickup truck uphill, but they did.
I think all of you are that kind of community, and that's why you are here now, reading this. You care about your neighbors, and so the kind of concerns I have shared in my posts has resonated with you. It's an uphill slog, making headway against inertia that can seem too much to progress against, here on Steemit, as well as in RL.
Your boosts make it possible, and without it I'd be left gasping on the side of the information highway, with my foot stuck under the tire to keep from rolling backwards.
It is community that makes living worth doing. Even though I don't ask for help much, and try to do stuff no sane man would take on alone, I get a push along from you when you see I can't make it on my own, and that makes all the difference.
Thanks!
Edit: There's a little bakery I passed by on my human powered journey this morning, The Grateful Bread. Just a few minutes ago, the mechanic having told me spark was good, but no fuel was getting out the injectors, I grabbed a gas can and trudged to the local gas station, known to the locals by the name it had two owners ago, Crawford's Corner, and dropped a Hamilton.
I packed the fuel back and was preparing to try to get most of it into the truck when a gal that works at the bakery pulled up behind me. She brought me some biscuits. The staff had seen both my journeys, and thought to just do something nice.
Honestly, I am almost in tears now. I didn't know her, or any of the people that helped push this morning. I never asked anyone for any help, and they just came out of the woodwork.
God bless 'em!
