The Healthy Lincoln County crew participated in a surprise team-building exercise after the Bringing Food Home van got stuck in a muddy driveway. (Photo courtesy Michaela Stone)
It’s been quite a week for Lincoln County residents. The powerful storm that arrived in Maine on Dec. 18 knocked out power to over 15,000 residents. Some of these folks went more than three days without electricity. By Friday, Dec. 22, there were approximately 850 households still without power.
Tuesday and Wednesday, schools were delayed or canceled, trees brought wires down and blocked roads, rivers and streams began to flood areas. As you can imagine, traveling was difficult at times. But that didn’t stop our Bringing Food Home van! Twice a month we help out with deliveries for the Waldoboro Food Pantry. Tuesday, Dec. 19 happened to be one of these days. We knew we would probably have some trouble on our route. We imagined downed power lines or trees forcing us to find other routes to reach folks on back roads. We were up for the adventure!
We were pleasantly surprised at the clear roads on our route. The sun was shining, the sky was blue, and the temperature was abnormally warm. One house after another, we were able to drive down driveways and maneuver around as usual.
Until we couldn’t. More than halfway through our route, we got stuck. And I mean stuck, like quicksand stuck, in dirt driveway that deceived us. We pulled in with no problem. We delivered the food, hopped back into the van, and headed out the driveway. The van abruptly stopped, and our wheels were spinning. We turned the wheels, tried to reverse, switched drivers, but alas, nothing happened.
A quick assessment of the situation revealed we were sinking on the passenger side, there was at least a foot of deep, wet, thick, mud. We reached out to our colleagues back at the office, letting them know we were stuck. They quickly offered to help push us out. Once they arrived, we made a plan. A man at the home brought us a shovel and lots of boards. We dug, laid out boards by tires, three of us pushed and one of us drove. Over and over, we tried rearranging boards, turning the wheels, offering suggestions.
We finally decided it was time to call AAA, we didn’t think we were getting out of this. Our last-ditch effort after putting in the call, we had two people sit up front for more weight and the other two pushed. Lo and behold, it worked! Forty-five minutes after getting stuck, we drove out of the mud and cheered. We patted ourselves on the backs, impressed with our team building exercise – we were still laughing and not as muddy as we thought.
The Bringing Food Home van can deliver rain, shine or mud. We’ll keep you posted once the snow comes!
