Grateful

Last month I got a phone call from Aaron shortly after he left for work. He told me he had been in an accident, and at first I thought he was joking. He wasn't, though, so I dropped the children off at Lisa Mason's house and drove to where the accident happened. Aaron told me the story of what occurred. He was driving down a hill on Issaquah-Hobart (a 2-lane road) when a guy in a County work truck was oncoming and about to turn across the road in front of Aaron. He must not have seen Aaron because he started turning and was halfway into Aaron's lane. Aaron's immediate thought was that they were going to have a head-on collision. He tried to brace himself and he was able to swerve to the right just enough so that the left side of his car swiped the front left corner of the guy's truck. His steering wheel locked up and he went into the grass in front of the firestation and took out a large wooden sign before he came to a stop. If he had been even a few more inches to the left, it may have been a fatal head-on. Right before he left for work, we had a quick family prayer and asked for protection--our prayers were definitely answered! :) We were obviously SO happy and grateful for his safety, but we were also bummed about the car because even though it was old and well-used, we loved not having any car payments, plus my parents gave it to us so there was some sentimental attachment to it.

Well, we spent several weeks looking for a car, and we came very close to buying a Toyota Sequoia.



We really like that model and they're SO nice! Our favorite one had pretty low miles, a DVD player, beautifully-maintained leather, etc. etc. We came very close to buying it and were pre-approved for a car loan and everything....BUT we just couldn't do it. Just before we moved to Washington we bought a brand new Honda Odyssey with all the bells and whistles, and we had to sell it in order to get our home loan. We lost a fair amount of money on it and didn't want to make another big car mistake.

We decided to find a car similar to our totaled '95 Toyota Camry. We found a used Lexus on Craigslist that looked very promising. A guy in his 20's was selling the car for his dad. We picked him up and drove to his dad's apartment complex to check out the car. His dad is Russian and doesn't speak much English, and they both stood outside the car smoking while Aaron was looking it over. I was in our car feeling very suspicious. Something just didn't feel right, and I remembered hearing that there is a big Russian Mafia ring in Seattle that buys and sells cars in "questionable" ways. Aaron pulled out his laptop and plugged the VIN into Carfax. The guys looked kind of nervous while it was pulling up the information. Aaron told them that the mileage showing on the odometer didn't match the mileage on Carfax. Carfax showed that the mileage three years before was like 20,000 miles over what it showed currently. The guys acted all surprised, but drove off together really fast after Aaron told them we were going to hold off on buying it. I felt very grateful for modern technology so that we could check things online before spending $3500.00.

Aaron and I were both feeling frustrated with our car search, and it would've been SOOO easy to just give in to our desires and buy the well-maintained, low-miles Sequoia from a reliable source. We held out, though, and shorthly thereafter Aaron came across a '95 Camry just listed really close to us. We called on it, met the guy at McDonald's to test drive it, and cut the guy a check on the spot. There was a very positive feeling about the whole experience, and we didn't fear any deception about the deal.

Bottom line: our 1995 Camry had 250,000 miles on it when it was totaled, and the County cut us a check for $3500.00 after the accident. The 1995 Camry we bought to replace the other one is the same car with a few minor differences, but it has 174,000 miles on it, and we bought it for $2900.00. So after taxes and registration, we "made" like $200 on the accident, plus we got the same great car with a lot fewer miles on it.

I took the time to detail this experience and titled the post "grateful" because this seemingly small experience really made me feel blessed. The way that we got this car was not a coincidence, I'm sure of it. I felt very blessed and grateful. I had the overwhelming feeling that God was pleased that we bridled our passions and didn't get ourselves into debt.

Shortly after this experience I taught a lesson in Relief Society from the General Conference talk by Elder Hales called "Becoming Provident Providers Temporally and Spiritually". At one point he says, "Of course some debt incurred for education, a modest home or a basic automobile may be necessary to provide for a family. Unfortunately however, additional debt is incurred when we cannot control our wants and addictive impulses." It made me feel relieved that we didn't buy the fully-loaded car!

Something else Elder Hales said really touched me. In reference to debt he said, "Money we could have used to care for ourselves and others must now be used to pay our debts." The economy is in rough shape right now, and too many people we know are in financial trouble. Money IS better served to care for ourselves and others.

This is the hill Aaron was driving down:



That is the County truck on the side of the road. The fresh tire marks in the grass are from where Aaron went off the road:



The sign that Aaron took out with the back of the car:



The side that took out the wooden sign (Aaron had just barely replaced the antenna):