Small Things

It was all my computer’s fault, actually. Over the last three weeks, it has developed an intermittent electricity allergy. Sometimes plugging it in produces power. Sometimes not. But by Tuesday night, that allergy wasn’t intermittent anymore and deprived of energy, my computer soon slipped into a coma.

Not good. Equivalent, in fact, to your car dying, if you’re not a cybercommuter. But I work at home…on my computer.

On Wednesday morning, I called the manufacturer. Good news: my computer is still under warranty. Bad news: the repairman concluded that it would need a new motherboard. Drastic, time-consuming surgery.

But that’s not what made me want to hide under the covers when I woke up on Thursday morning. This did: the nearest official repair shop is forty-five minutes away. Did I mentioned that I have never driven in the big city, in all of the seven years I’ve lived here? Ironic: I blithely get lost on buses in Jerusalem, but blanch at the very idea of driving in city traffic.

Not that I wasn’t prepared. My mom gave me detailed directions. She drew me a map. She sent my teenaged brother with me, just in case. And when I asked her if the roads were going to be scary ones, she said, “Yes.”

So my trusty highway buddy and I took off in our little blue Honda. We missed a turn on the highway. That blessed boy (the one with the head for directions) told me how to get back. I drove on, intent, but unruffled. In fact, I never did find those “scary” roads (or drive through the city), but I did find the repair shop.

Inside I found a barren sort of waiting room, where to get someone’s attention, I had to speak into the intercom. While I waited, several neatly printed signs warned me to expect a four to seven day repair time. Foreboding visions of undone work flitted through my head.

A middle-aged man soon showed up, took my computer, and said, “Let’s start with simple things first.” So he plugged a new cord into it.

And it worked!

The cord to motherboard connection was pronounced healthy, but the converter, well, the converter was fried. Probable cause: a seven month exposure to wattage just 10 volts under the limit. Oops.

Within ten or fifteen minutes, I was despatched out the door with my computer and a loaned converter to tide me over until my new one arrives.

Driving on the not-scary roads, and returning with my not-broken computer: two small things that have affected the rest of my week profoundly. If God did this, I keep thinking, then surely He can do that. Surely He can do greater things yet. Maybe not for a while, but He certainly will! I can count on it.

Ye trusting saints, fresh courage take:
The clouds you so much dread
Are big with mercy and shall break
In blessings on your head.