Careful what you pray for

I once was supposed to meet an ex-girlfriend of mine after having broken up a few days earlier.  A killer storm happened to hit right as I was about to leave and I decided not to go, texting her "I can't come because of the rain."  However, as life and auto-correct do, they played a cruel trick on me and my sentence was corrected to "I can't come because of the pain"... Didn't hear from her for a while...  

I have always known that during the rainy season in Africa you have to be careful where and when you go places because the roads you go in on may not still be there when you want to leave.  However, one would think it safe to assume they would be in tact in a time of drought, in a tough 4wheel drive 1980's Landcrusier.  However, as you can guess, one would be wrong.  We left late one evening just before dark (first mistake) I disobeyed my first rule, don't go out at dark in Africa.  However, I had made an exception because the wife of the family that was hosting us had been away for quite some time with her new baby and had not yet seen her mother.  And as all mothers can attest, I have heard this is a big deal (see ma, such a good boy you raised)!  So we left semi-late just to stop by, reunite mother, daughter, and granddaughter, have a cup of tea and return home.  Soon as we started to pull up to the house the rain started. This was an answer to prayer, as we had been praying for rain the whole week, the Maasai were in severe drought, animals were dying, malnourished, no grass was to be seen, and there was not a lot of water for people in some areas; this was a great thing.  That was when the heavens broke loose with torrential downpour. We sat and waited and waited. About two hours later we decided we were going to have to leave because the rain was not going to stop.  

The father assured me, he too had a 4x4 truck, I would be fine with the Landcrusier.  In fact, it would probably be best not to even take the road back because of the deep ruts, take my shortcut instead...(second mistake) Anyone who has seen a bad horror movie knows that is how it starts.  The man we were staying with said he knew the path so instead of asking the father, I loaded up and headed on our merry way taking my directions like a champ.  My friend David will love this, knowing how well I take directions, and how much I pride myself in my off-roading ability.  Having been to Kenya and experienced this first hand, taking directions from a Kenyan is no easy task.  My mother won't believe this but off-road I am actually a good driver.  I take it slow, I avoid potholes, ravines and the giant craters in front of me. I maneuver around the giant acacia thorns.  But Kenyans don't see it that way, any slight deviation to avoid something in your path that changes your direction from where they want you to go they will tell you, "No not that way, this way."  But I just want to turn 3 inches left to avoid that giant rock and then I promise I will turn back - No not that way!  Okay but there is a giant hole there -yes, that's right, that way.  It can be very distracting, especially in a downpour, in the dark...

So as I am taking my shortcut following directions I get a glimpse in the dark of something that seems to be two large ravines filled with water coming together at a point.  So I ask the question I knew the answer to, "Are we sure this is the right way? It seems these ravines on either side of us are joining together." "Oh, we must have gone the wrong way, can you turn around?"  "Can I turn around?" To answer that question you need some context.  The Landcrusier I am driving was aptly nicknamed the white buffalo and is neither fast nor graceful.  It has no power steering and had no chance of making a neat 3 point turn in the 15 feet allotted to me, on pavement, in the best conditions, much less in the terrential downpour and mudslide of 3 inch deep wet black cotton silt soil, between two giant ravines filled with water.  But as always I am up for a good joke so I will give it a try.  But alas after much trying, praying, and rolling around in the mud, getting both myself and the drivers side thoroughly disgusting everyone had given up besides me.  Big surprise right?  Finally I was convinced it was indeed time to stop trying and move on (I could have gotten it though...probably not).  

So we gathered my wet and muddy self, Audrey, the couple we were staying with, and the baby, covered ourselves in a shuka (piece of thin cloth) because only the guy had a jacket, and used our cell phone as a flashlight, because none of us had one of those (man I would have made a bad Boy Scout) and headed towards the house. It was a mere 2 miles away through the mudslide in ill equipped shoes that were either sucked off by the mud or collected an extra 10lbs and grew to twice the original size of the shoe.  Initially there was crying, then hysteric maniacal laughter, and I was afraid we might have had a pschotic break, but it turned out to be okay. When faced with the ridiculousness of the situation, and that we were safe, it became quite the funny sight and story.  I told this to my Maasai friend as we were walking, "This is a story to remember". "I don't want to remember this one," she said.  However, I think now she would. As I said despite the circumstances, we were safe. I returned and retrieved the car in the morning and pulled off about 30lbs of mud of the bottom.  This reminded me that even when we do stupid things, and wind up very stuck, beyond ourselves, we are in His hands, that God answers prayer, though it may not be in our timing...