The funeral, the truck, splitting up

Mama and I spent a good portion of the day yesterday at the funeral for Peggy; both at the church service and at the graveside. It was a really good sending away for Peggy. Lots of very good memories, funny stories and sincere goodbyes. Those of us acting as pallbearers were taken to the gravesite in a very nice limo. It was not the party kind with a circular seat and tv’s but it was a stretch limo that easily seated eight. It was pretty nice to have the police escort to the gravesite - about twenty miles away. We did not have to stop at a traffic light or a stop sign the entire way there. All intersections were blocked for us and TXDOT even stopped all roadwork en route so the procession wound not be interrupted. It was well done on the part of the funeral home. Other motorists were very respectful of the funeral procession. Many pulled over a stopped, removed their hats and waited for the entire motorcade to pass before they continued. You don’t see that everywhere.

I rode home with Mama and the Walker family. It was a much better trip than on the way there. With the funeral over and the proceedings taken care of there was a relaxed spirit in the van on the way back to the church. With the Walkers it is always a relaxed spirit. They were very interested in coming to the farm to see our fainting goats. Mama had told them about the goats on the way to the cemetery. Many people have never heard of such a  thing. The next time they are here for Vacation Bible School  they are definitely planning a trip to the farm to see if they can get any of our poor terrorized goats to fall over. I will have to try to get a video of that.

When we got home Mama and I got changed and started to take the truck to the mechanic in Bowie. I did not make it very far. I only got about half way down our road before I turned around and took the truck back to the house. It was running so rough that I was pretty confident I would not make the thirty mile trip without serious trouble. We thought about calling a tow truck to take the truck over but eventually decided to wait until Monday or Tuesday. Meanwhile we headed to the dairy for milk and feed but that also proved to be a less than expected trip. There was no feed to be had so we had to improvise getting food for the chickens at Victoria’s house. It worked out okay but I probably would not have made the trip for milk only. Mama had brought a couple dozen extra eggs we were going to trade for some feed but she ended up selling them to a lady who was there getting eight gallons of milk. Instead of getting her regular price from the lady - who did not have any cash on her - she let the two dozen eggs go for a dollar each. It was all the lady had on her. She was paying for the milk with a check and we did not want her to have to write a check for $2.

Today, Mama and I split up. I dropped her and the mower off at Victoria’s where she was meeting Grandpa and I headed to church to do bus calling - visiting the homes of the children that ride our bus on Sunday mornings. I figured if things worked out as it usually does I would be getting home about the time Mama was getting finished up and I could get changed an go get her and the mower. I was pretty close but they finished up a little bit before I got there.

As I was talking with Grandpa about the problem we were having with the truck he made a suggestion on how to reset the electric controllers in the truck so I tried it when we got home and it worked. It did not take the problem away entirely but it made the truck run much better. At least we will not have to call a tow truck to get us to the mechanic.

I can smile about that.