At the beginning of 2009, as with many starts to a new calendar year, people think about what they hope the new year will bring. Personally I had hoped for 2009 to be a year of happiness, health, and safety for my friends and family. I was hoping that it would be a year of joyous celebrations - not ones of death, or sickness. So far these hopes have been mediocre at best.
2009 has not been a lost cause though. First of all, we are only a day away from finishing the 3rd month of the year. Although it absolutely blows my mind that we are almost in April, as I do not know where the time has gone, it does provide hope as there is obviously many more months in the year to make 2009 a very good year. Above and beyond this though, I find that 2009 has been, personally, a year of self-reflection and growth. It was not an intentional plan... but I think it has been beneficial.

Now for a story about a pebble.

Recently, on the way to a volleyball game, I was turning my car around in the parking lot when my power steering decided to stop working. This was not an enjoyable experience, especially since manually turning a steering wheel is tough work, made only more difficult by an injured rotator cuff (shoulder muscles). I knew that the time to bring my car in for its semi-annual was approaching, so it did not bother me all that much to have to bring my car into the shop. I requested the semi-annual check-up and attention to be given to the power steering. After dropping off the car on a fairly warm Wednesday morning, I headed to school. Five minutes prior to the start of a class I received a phone call. It was the car shop on the other end of the line. They informed me that the breaks and steering column would need to be replaced. The cost was going to approach $1000.00. I hadn't not planned for this in my budget. However, if it needed to be done so I could drive my car - I said for them to go ahead and I would figure out the finances. I was sick to my stomach almost all day with this news. Finally, near dinner time I received a call that my car was ready. When I went to the customer service counter I was given a bill for almost $2000.00!!! I went through a daze trying to figure out if I was going to faint or puke. Turns out that my breaks had to be replaced, the steering column needed to be replaced, the rotors had to be replaced, the tires were suggested to be replaced (but thankfully held off), plus a bunch of other things. Ummm.... my car is fairly new... WTF? My mechanic first of all let me gain a little more stable ground when he reduced the price back to what was quoted to me on the phone (thank goodness for waranties!) and then started to tell me that every once in a while they see something that is so rare in occurrence it is considered a "freak episode". Lucky Me. Oh yah - so lucky, that I managed to get a pebble stuck between my rotor and my break pads, causing a grove to be made, thus causing stress on the other break. The friction and stress ended up breaking the clasps. The tires as a result were affected. Of course a chain reaction of events followed until my steering column was compromised causing the powering steering to disengage.. thus allerting my attention to something being wrong with my car.
So thanks to a pebble, which by the way I never got to see or keep, my car had over $2000.00 in repairs!
Whoever said technology was a good thing? haha