Disaster Or Grace?

Last week, what a whirlwind ... a week which went from one extreme to the other, from nonstop disasters to the heights of pure joy!
Disasters?  Or was it really an abundant outpouring of God's grace?
Mike's cousin Julie came to town for five days and what fun we had together!  She had to be at work a good bit of it, but we got out to eat and shop, and had lots of visiting time at home.  Now I'm all excited about visiting her and her family in Pennsylvania first chance I get.

The chain of disasters began three days before my son was to be married!  My grand dream of dancing at my son's wedding was threatened because my back was out!  And it didn't seem like it was in any hurry to heal and quit hurting.

Then fast forward to Saturday, the night before the wedding.  All of a sudden, the kitchen sink plugged up and, in the midst of trying to fix it, the pipe blew.  What a mess!!  So Mike at least got it to where, if used very delicately, it would last the night, and then he'd work on it in the morning.

We were watching the weather pretty carefully because it rained Friday and Saturday and there was a 30% chance of rain on Sunday too.  But the sun was out and it looked like we might luck out, especially since the wedding was outdoors.

Three hours till Joe's wedding.  Everything was back on track and it was time to get ready to go.  That's when it started.  My hair spray bottle wouldn't spray so I had to hunt down another spray bottle and use it instead.  It worked.  No problem.  After curling each section I sprayed it.  Big mistake.  But how am I supposed to know how to use hair spray?  I've used it twice in my life.  While trying to smooth and blend the curls with a hairbrush I ended up with one giant hairball that felt like it was all tied together with bubble gum.  I was crushed!  And so was my hair!  What choice did I have?  I got a great big comb and somehow managed to get through the whole mess, and then curled it again with the curling iron and hoped it would hold.  It wasn't the best it ever looked, but it was better than the cotton candy from a half hour before.

Somewhere in the middle of the hairdressing mess, there came massive wind, rain, and hail!!  It was a cloudburst, maybe a microburst or some other similar storm phenomenon!  In the 50 years Mike has lived in Phoenix vs. my 40, we have never seen anything like that.  We couldn't even see the trees in our front yard because of the wind and rain.  While Cubby isn't normally afraid of storms, this one had him a little rattled because of its intensity.  And then the power went out!  Normally not a big deal for me because I never have the lights on anyway ... unless I'm right in the middle of trying to repair a wardrobe malfunction with a needle and thread!!  I hated leaving Cubby alone in the dark house in the middle of a storm so I prayed for him and hoped he'd be okay; it should've only been an hour or so till Julie would get back to the house to stay with him.  Now, to get out to the van without getting totally drenched.

Only after we were well on our way, several minutes later than we planned, did we realize we'd never make it in time.  The streets were flooded, traffic lights were out, trees were ripped right out of the ground and one was laying right in the middle of the street with traffic backed up trying to get around it.  I called Joe and told him about it and asked him to request a ten-minute grace period from the wedding venue.

But then we got on the freeway and everything dried out.  It was barely raining and we made it to the country club with ten minutes to spare.  We figured no way they'd have things still set up outside, but they did.

I think my heart skipped a whole bunch of beats when I saw Joey appear, hand in hand with Dana.  She looked like an honest-to-goodness princess.  They walked the aisle together and, funny, all the freaky disasters we had for the past three days all faded away like they never happened at all.  My heart bubbled over with joy ... pure joy!  It stayed dry all the way through the ceremony, and only afterward when we were all going inside for the reception anyway did it start sprinkling again.

My sweet son ... he made one of my fondest dreams come true that night.  A mother-son dance!  It really did happen in a heartbeat, my boy became a man, all I ever dreamed of, smiling back at me.

As soon as we got home, we got Julie packed up and took her to the airport.  By then the storm was passed and traffic was moving well again.
Now, here's the amazing grace part. Once my mind quieted enough to really think about it, I was in awe of how God got us through it all!
---Over those few days, my back felt much better and I barely even knew it was hurt by Sunday evening.
---Mike was able to fairly easily repair the sink himself; no need for a plumber.
---I had a brand new spray bottle in the closet and the whole hair spray bottle crisis lasted less than a minute.
---Okay, I really had a major problem with the rest of the hair spray debacle.  But had the power gone out just five or ten minutes earlier, I wouldn't have been able to use my curling iron to fix it.  And it looks like the damage I did to my hair when desperately combing it out is minimal.
---I believe with all my heart that the idea of how to fix my dress came directly from God!  It was easy and it worked!
---Our storm damage was limited to a small part of the roof on the barn in the back yard.  No big deal at all.  But just a mile North of us several steel warehouse buildings were flattened like a bomb went off there.  And just two miles South of us the canopy at a gas station blew down, taking with it all the gas pumps on the islands.
---The tree blocking the road was blocking the other direction so we were able to move slowly but surely.
---The wedding was a little late getting started, as several others were having trouble weathering the storm, but then it all fell into place.  Not one drop of rain fell on the ceremony, and even the wind had quieted.
---Cubby was fine.  As soon as Julie came in he settled right down, even though they were in the dark till well after we came home.
---We got home in plenty of time to help Julie pack up, and the power even came back on so she could look around and make sure she got everything.
I hope I'll always keep vivid memories of October 18th and remember that, even though "everything is going wrong" I don't have to rush around, fretting and freaking out like a crazy person.  God has everything well in hand.  And now I can get on with things, like enjoying my new daughter and grandson.