Before we left Mérida on New Year's day, Gerhard went back to the apartment for the cell phone which Bro. Dyer had left with us in case the Temple Department in Salt Lake needed to get in touch with someone here. We had prayer as usual before we started out; this time Sis. Smith practiced her Spanish on the first and last parts and used English in the middle.
On our return from Uxmal, we hit a hole in the road, but until about 10 km. out of Mérida when Bro. Oropeza hit the brakes at a checkpoint, everything seemed fine. Then we began to hear a grinding noise from the back wheel on the passenger side. The men said it sounded like a bearing going out, so we stopped after turning onto the highway into Mérida. That was when the cell phone came in handy --
Bro. Oropeza's insurance has tow-truck rights, so he used the cell phone to call the insurance company's office in Mexico City. These were the reference points that identified where we were-- on the road from Campeche to Mérida, about 3 km. from the city by a bridge.
We waited for about an hour and a half, long enough for the Smiths to go for a walk and say another prayer, before the tow-truck arrived. They had gone on top of the bridge the other direction, and had to turn around and come back to find us.
The car was loaded onto the platform of the truck and pulled up by a winch.
We joked about flying home as we rode in the car up on the truck to the Perez shop where we left the car and took a taxi home. Now the sign is seen from the air :)
A couple of days later, Bro. Pérez brought the keys back to the temple and said that a spring had come loose and the brake shoe was dragging on the drum, so it was all fixed and the story ended well.
The moral to the story is--have good insurance on the car and a cell phone at hand, say your prayers, and keep on smiling, because it's not what happens that is important, it is how you respond to what happens.
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