Here’s an inside peek into an area of low-level difference of opinion between my wife, Pat, and me. Not a deal breaker, but a subject for banter, friendly disagreement, sometimes laughter in the end. First, let me give you a little background on my near obsession with cool sounds!

When I was about ten years old, our family came into possession of a ‘49 Mercury. The first thing my father did was put a special exhaust on it that really enhanced the dual exhausts. From the first time I heard “the pipes”, I fell in love with the sound. It was a sound seldom, if ever, found with any muffler system except on a car with a V-8 engine. To this day, I’d love to own a ‘49 Mercury with similar pipes.

As our young children grew, we owned a ‘69 Chevy. I didn’t put dual exhausts on her (lack of funds), but did put it on the grease rack at a friend’s gas station and installed a Cherry Bomb muffler. That was one of the proudest days of my life! As “Old Blue” and I chased coyotes and raced to the scene of numerous fires, we really bonded.

When I got my first Tonka truck in 1984, it only had four cylinders. Not much potential for sound there. However, when Tonka 02 came along, it had six cylinders. Our son, Tim, who lives here in Sarasota, was owed a huge favor from a friend who happened to work at a muffler shop. Tim chose to call in the favor and gift me with a muffler do-over. After a couple of hours, I drove away with pretty close to the sound I wanted. I had a muffler installed that mimicked the deep, throaty ooooogle ooooogle sound I remember from my childhood.

Now, back to Pat. Her first comment dealt with the reasoning behind taking a perfectly fine, QUIET muffler off the truck and replacing it with one that already sounded like someone had poked multitudinous holes in it with a huge screwdriver. I tried to explain that the sound came out BEHIND Tonka, so she probably wouldn’t even be able to hear it. Well, truth be known, we both hear the sound. We do have different levels of appreciation! (g)

Well, yesterday, the tail pipes had to be replaced. Rust, you know. I downloaded Sparky and sat in the shade, watching everything the three men did to replace the pipes. What an interesting hour it was.

Each man knew exactly what was expected of him. One brought out a long length of straight pipe. He took it to this magnificent machine. The others measured and chalk-marked the pipes. This took many trips back and forth between Tonka and the machine. The pipes were bent, then bent again, time after time. They had to route the pipes around the spare tire and various structural features under the truck. When they were through, I had a pair of beautiful pipes coming out the back. The sound? Superb! Even better, if possible, than before. Of course, if you ask Pat what she thinks about my “fix”, she may have a different opinion! (g)

As I sat there, watching and thinking, thinking and watching, here’s what came to mind: the hydraulic Bending Machine is kinda like life. Living brings pressures into our lives. These pressures bend us this way and that. Sometimes we end up with bends in the wrong places. What makes the difference between good bends and bad bends? It’s all in the hands of The Bender! If we don’t resist AND totally trust Him with the twists and turns of our lives, He’ll put the bends in the right place. We’ll come out not only looking good, but with the sweet sound that only comes from a job well done.

I’d like to hear from you about what the Lord might say through these thoughts. Just use the “Leave a Reply” box below!  Your responses are very important to me!

– My folks actually had that old record (made for the old wind-up Victrola) when I was a kid. It was quite a long song and the part you used went: “Mister, why don’t you fix your roof?” “Well, when it ain’t rainin’ it don’t need fixin’ and when it is rainin’ it’s too wet to fix it”. “Mister, you ain’t very far from a fool, are you?” “Nope, just about three feet between us”.

– Just couldn’t let this one go without a comment. Seems that your little story hit right on the head where I’m at in my life. Patch, Patch, Patch (I’ve heard that’s what happens after you turn 40).

     Seems like I keep spinning my wheels from one Band-Aid to the next. One little problem solved and more come in. It was amazing how much I could r elate to the leaking roof. Your insight (even though it isn’t directed just to me) continues to amaze me. Please, keep up the good work and I thank God for your gift.

– A very good piece! It reminds me of the advice that you gave us about setting boundaries with people in our lives who take advantage, something I’m getting better at because I sure don’t like just patching up the relationships all the time. I want the “whole” relationship to get better and sometimes if you take the shingles off and work on the real problem it is better for everyone the whole way around. Of course, just like a roof—it is more work. But praise God a LOT of worthwhile things take a little more work!

– Wow, Jerry. This one hits me right where I live. I have struggled with self-esteem issues for years, and the Lord has been gently leading me to a place where I could finally stop putting on Band-Aids and invest the time and emotion needed to ask for healing at the source. I had always known my father was involved somehow, and I began to ask God to help me forgive him for…and this is the funny part…I didn’t even know what! My priest (and spiritual director) suggested I hold my father in prayer at least daily, and I did that for weeks.

     When I was tempted to give up, I would remind myself about how ineffective those Band-Aids were and how deeply I really wanted to be healed. I stayed with it, and finally God revealed to me that it was my own inability to accept love from my father without trying to earn it that was at the root of the problem. My dad gave me all of his love unconditionally, but I couldn’t see that. I wanted to earn a “bonus package” of love. Well, when you already have all of the marbles there are, a person can’t give you more. I didn’t have to forgive my dad; I had to forgive myself.

     I would guess you can see the next part coming. I had the same kind of relationship with my Heavenly Father for years. I thought I had to earn His love, and yet I knew I couldn’t. I remember the moment about 11 or 12 years ago when I finally realized I didn’t have to be a better person before God could love me, but that He loved me just as I was. It literally took my breath away.

      I am now a firm believer in fixing the roof when the sun (or the Son) shines. The storms seem so much milder that way!

– The first thing that popped into my mind is how we tend to want to patch or cover up our sins instead of getting to the route cause and weeding it out completely. Many like to put it on the back burner and pretend it is gone only to have something happen that throws them into their past mistakes only to make them all over again. It is like those tiles—-clean and pearly white till the problem acts up again. We cannot keep our soul, mind and body clean without routing out the sin and evil in our lives. This is an excellent article. I really appreciate the time and your never ending wealth of ideas and thoughts to provoke our thinking.

– Just read this weeks story. Sure made me think of my very small church. We too kept putting in new ceiling tiles because the roof leaked so bad. Praise the Lord now it is fixed. A new roof was put on this year and a new furnace was installed. NOW if only we could get some people in there maybe we will make it. How long we are going to keep going with only 12-15 I don’t know, but God has the answer. So I guess we just keep trying and praying. I always go back to the verse “where 2 or 3 are gathered together in my name”. I love the small churches just would not feel comfortable in a large one. We are a family of God. God Bless and keep up the writing. I always enjoy reading them.

– Once again, enjoyed your story, and am quite familiar with the the “Band-Aid” approach. I have used it for many years because it was so much easier to cover the wound up versus feeling the pain if I would deal with the injury. To deal with the wound, I would have to endure pain and that is something that I always wanted to avoid at any cost. I thought that the Band-Aid approach worked until came the 40’s (age) and all the cover-ups came undone and lo, and behold, there were so many wounds that were open that I could not cover them all up with Band-Aid. I had only 2 options – deal with the pain in getting my wounds attended to, or just give up and suffer the consequences.

      Well, I decided to attend to the wounds, no matter how painful. In the cleansing process, I recalled how I was “injured” and dealt with the situation, put ointment on (prayer and inner healing) and allowed the “Great Physician” to heal my wounds. Today, I have trouble putting Band-Aid on. Oh, I am tempted, believe me, but I know that it will only be temporary and useless. The one and only true healer is God – and I go to Him for help.

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