Tara and the Victor's Auto Body crew

I was driving along in Fort Smith yesterday. The fog was thicker than peanut butter. The road was twisty, and the part of town...well there was nary a picket fence in view. All of a sudden, a tall, vicious curb jumped out in front of me and took a huge bite out of my wheel.  That's right, not tire, wheel. We hit HARD.
I will admit, I was freaked. This hadn't happened before. Exclamation points chased single, incoherent words across my brain. I jumped from the running car and ran around the front and stared at the carnage. Dirk's poor defenseless front right wheel had been torn from its hinges by that horrid curb.
I'm pretty sure my eyes were as big as his three remaining good tires and I probably looked pretty scary--the kind of person you see and decide maybe you want to cross the street and walk on the other side.
But nobody did. In fact, a lady named Tara crossed the street to come and check on me. A whole group of men working at the nearby body shop ran over and helped me try and push it out of the road, then hovered in respect for the tragedy when we realized Dirk the Blue Impala was too hurt to even limp to safety.
He is a fleet car, so I was able to call emergency roadside and release my sympathetic mourners from the vigil.
They double-checked that I was okay, then made their way off.
And still, people stopped to check on me. Yes, there was the requisite gawkers, who drove past slowly, eyes wide, glad it wasn't them. But a lot of people stopped to check on me, offered to help, verified that I had someone on the way. More than one even offered a tow (people drive big trucks, so this is feasible.)
Tara, one of the original mourners, stayed with me quite some time. She told me just to pray. And then she told me my car was in really bad shape.
But the first part was so great. Of course. Pray. Why hadn't I thought of that? So as I paced tight circles, called people, and stared at Dirk's ugly wound, I prayed.
And of all of those activities it was the only one that helped.
I think some time around 10 this morning I finally evened out. Dirk will be fine. I'm pretty sure he'll forgive me some day. And I wasn't hurt. There's a warrant out for the arrest of that awful curb...okay, so there's not, but vengeance is the Lord's and all.
In the end, I was so grateful for the kind souls who stopped to check on a bewildered lady in sensible shoes pacing along a sketchy road. It was balm to my wound up soul to realize that while I was by myself, I was not alone. And especially when Tara, my sister in Christ, reminded me that not only did I have the friendly Fort Smithians nearby, I had my Lord as well.