By Patti Carr, mother

As Jared’s mom, I have struggled somewhat with what I should share. There are so many memories. Jared was our only son, a joy. He was normally a very happy child and grew into a young man we were very, very proud of.

One of the lessons Jared learned from his dad was to work for the things he wanted. He started with his first calf at the tender age of 3. When he earned enough to buy his first bike, he started saving for the “accessories”. He loved to ride and wanted a speedometer to track his speed and miles traveled. One of the first rides he went on after purchasing his new speedometer, he lost it. Apparently the speedometer did not really “lock” into the bracket on the handlebar and when he pressed the buttons to check his mileage it just shot out of the bracket and down the edge of the steep road he was on. He looked for it for quite a while then rode home to tell me what had happened. I knew it meant a lot to him so we got into the pickup and went up to see if we could find it. As those of you who knew Jared know, he was red to green color blind and the speedometer was red, almost impossible for him to see in the high foliage along the edge of the road. After we had searched for half hour we were about to give up when we decided to pray about it. We stood together on the edge of the road and offered a brief prayer asking God for guidance then continued our search. I asked Jared again where he was when it came off the bike and we tried to follow the path it might have taken down the hill again. There it was propped up against the base of the weeds. Jared put a lot of miles on that speedometer. It was perhaps a small incident, but it was an answered prayer for a young boy and a reminder that God cares.