When the Local Preacher Met His Match

Grease Guns, Hardware Stores, and a Preacher Who Formed a Quick Opinion

If you grew up in a tight-knit community, you know that the local hardware store is more than just a place to buy nails and paint. It’s a neighborhood crossroads—a place where people gather, gossip, and apparently, make some pretty wild assumptions.

My mom and her Aunt Edna were practically a double act around town. If there was a project to be done, grass to be cut, a garden to be hoed or a piece of machinery to fix, you could usually find the two of them working on it together.

On this particular day, the mission was simple: Mom needed to grease the fittings on the lawn mower. She had the grease gun, she had the know-how, but she was entirely out of grease cartridges. A quick check with Aunt Edna confirmed they were fresh out at her place, too.

So, the dynamic duo hopped into the car and took a short drive over to the small hardware store at Northside.

They walked through the front doors, entirely focused on their mission. But before a store clerk could even greet them, a familiar voice rang out across the aisles. It was the local preacher, just standing around. For absolutely no rhyme or reason, he looked at these two elderly women and called out:

“Are you ladies here looking for a man?”

Can you imagine that? A local man of God, a leader of the community, seeing two women enter a hardware store and immediately jumping to the conclusion that they must be looking for a husband or some male assistance. It makes you wonder what kind of outdated ideas he was preaching on Sundays, and what that says about the culture of his congregation if the shepherd himself thinks that way.

But if the preacher thought he was going to fluster them, he clearly forgot who he was dealing with. Without missing a single beat, my mom looked him dead in the eye and fired right back:

“Is that what you’re here for?“

The store went quiet, and I suspect that preacher thought twice before making assumptions about the women in his community ever again.

Mom and Aunt Edna got their grease cartridge, the lawn mower got serviced, and they walked out with the best tool of all—the perfect comeback.