Living a Tag Line.....In Jefferson, GA

   Traveling yesterday, we took a couple of side trips to catch two more Georgia courthouses. The first one was in Carnesville, the county seat of Franklin County, so named for Ben Franklin of Founding Fathers fame.

   A little farther down I-85 toward Atlanta, we stopped at Jefferson, the county seat of Jackson County, whose courthouse was being renovated.

   We had taken a fairly convoluted route to get into Jefferson, so we stopped at a garage to ask directions back to the interstate. After getting some, and moving on out of town, we came to a spot that I recognized. It was a road coming into us from the north, a road that was the one we had used to get into town in the first place.

   But the directions we had did not include a turn there, so I drove on and then decided I had better ask again, just to make sure. Stopping at the first place I saw, a tire store, I pulled in. Heading for the front door, I heard a voice from my right, "Can I help you?".

   This was probably the manager of the facility, and I told him my dilemma. "No problem, just keep on the road you were on, going west, till you get to a stop sign, turn right and you will cross the freeway in about a mile."

   After thanking him, and returning to the car, my wife said that I should get a towel and some water and clean some smeared dirt from my windshield. Good idea because we would be looking straight into the sun as we traveled on west.

   Again, "no problem". "Marvin", he called out, and another man appeared with water, a squeegee, and a towel. As he cleaned, he asked about the streaks on the glass. I told him that I had let the road film dry on there and, when I tried to use my wipers, it just smeared.

   "Maybe you are just low on fluid in your car", he said as he moved back into the tire bay. Returning to the car with a bottle of blue fluid, he opened the reservoir cap, poured and filled it up. "Now you should be good to go", he said as he closed the hood.

   As I thought all about these scenarios this morning, I realized that the picture I should have taken was that of the tire people that he helped so much. But, alas, that photo is only in my mind, and not there for long I fear.

   So I think about that story in the Bible of Abraham sending his servant to the land of his kin to get a wife for Isaac. When the servant stops at a well there, he asks the girl who comes to the well, Rebekah, to give him a drink, and she says, "I'll do that and I will water your camels also".

   That was the attitude of the men in the tire store, and that action reminded me of the tag line that I use on my emails.

   THE SECOND MILE HAS NO TRAFFIC JAMS

   Indeed, I use that line every day, but not too often do I think about it. Maybe God is reminding me to do more than just use a pithy saying, but live it instead.

   Thanks, tire people, my mind is thick, but I finally got it.