Entering Mexico was sort of like entering a worm hole or something. What a difference a few hundred yards makes. This is revealed in so many ways. I mentioned the crazy drivers, right? Since the speed limit was very low, on some roads 35 kmph you could often be passed by someone on the left or right in the invisible lanes. There are no such things as parking spaces. You’ll find cars parked at all kinds of angles as not one seems to care about anyone but themselves. It’s like Lord of the Flies or something. The main roads are paved, but often with huge ruts in them. Side streets might be paved, and might not.
I’m not sure why we worried about safety. It’s a police state. You have the city police everywhere. The federal police are also on the streets. And the state police come through the area. We saw a few impromptu checkpoints on the way to the church. They said they were looking for drunk drivers, but at really strange times. Either way, it is disconcerting to see police with automatic weapons asking you to stop.
The Night Before
I think Wednesday was another hot cakes day. The breakfasts were starting to blur for me. My back was feeling better, but my foot wasn’t much better. When there was an opportunity to take a ride to the hardware store, I took it. I was wearing my old Ace t-shirt and I thought I’d compare stores. But along the way we were pulled over. The policeman had to have great eyes. He pulled us over because Esteban, in the passenger seat, wasn’t wearing his seat belt. He never does. But the officer saw this while driving in the other direction. Could be he saw 2 Americans riding with a Mexican and wanted to make sure we weren’t up to no good.
It is amazing how much quicker you pray when the officer who asks the driver to step out is heavily armed. Soon our driver was back in the car, without a fine. When told we were helping a church, and doing a Backyard Bible Club, he asked if his son could come. My prayers were answered.
The hardware store reminded me of an auto parts store. There were big ticket and hard to steal on the floor. But most things were behind the counter. It was fun poking around. Now we had locks for the exterior door and could keep our tools up there at night. This eliminated the twice daily caravan from the sanctuary to the work area.
More progress was being made on the sheet rock. We were going over budget on construction supplies. Our pace had slowed, but we were still doing well. For devotionals we talked about the tongue, and ended with an affirmation exercise. Not quite Dan Velker’s hot seat, but it was a refreshing time together.
Turnout for BBC was a little low since the Pastor had been out of town for a meeting. The van had not gone to pick up other kids. But we still had about 25 to learn about Jesus, the Light of the World. Dinner was an unusual dish for us. Whole fried fish. Some people didn’t want that guy staring back up at them. But it was delicious. We spent more time talking around the table, but weariness was setting in.
It would be a long night. I woke up after a few hours and my brain began to work. I was thinking about previous mission trips, and my mind settled on 1998. As I pondered what was one of the roughest years of my life- I once described it as a tornado had run through my life. One of the main themes was “power struggles”. I lost one at work and was out of work for awhile. The trip had been marred at various points by power struggles. One relationship recovered and the other was never the same. I remembered my most difficult client during my counseling internship that year- power struggles each week. I failed miserably in bringing this up as how I experienced him.
Finally I went to sleep again. I think this was the night of the freaky dreams. In one we had adopted 2 more kids and had a house full of guests. CavWife was nowhere to be found as I dealt with crisis after crisis. I would awaken, unprepared for the next day.
Cavman Considers 
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