On Sunday, June 7th we had a video fireside. I was looking forward to it, because the
speakers were Gifford Nielsen and his wife Wendy. Giff was the BYU quarterback when my family
moved to Provo all those years ago, and he was the first of a long line of
admired football players that I cheered for.
He is also a General Authority Seventy, and the President of the North
America Central Area, which covers the Missouri St Louis Mission. When I first heard of the fireside, I thought
it must surely be going out to a wide audience.
I was surprised to tune in and find it was just our mission. That meant the audience was small enough we
could see all the participants. And I
was embarrassed that I wasn’t wearing a tie, much less a coat, which is
standard dress in the MSLM (and maybe the NAC Area) for missionaries attending
meetings. I joke with Sis Hatfield that
President Bell was obviously a young missionary in England, trained to default
to a suit. Maybe it has something to do
with CES training too, I don’t know. But
if he had been a missionary in Thailand, he would be much more comfortable in
shirt sleeves. I wore a suit coat twice
on my mission: on the way out, and at a
wedding. That was it. We’ll see if the Church’s modified dress code
ever makes it to the MSLM!
Elder Nielsen and his wife had many great messages. But perhaps the message that meant the most
to me was his discussion of labels. We
know each other by many labels. I’ve
been a student, a skier, a BYU fan, and for a long time, a lawyer. Right now I am a missionary and a
grandfather, among other things. All
labels, to one degree or another, are limiting.
Elder Nielsen pointed out that the only label that does not create any limitations
is our first title—children of God. In
fact, that label brings limitless potential.
We are first and most importantly offspring of Heavenly Parents, which
means we cannot be put into any box. We
can do and be anything. Earth’s greatest
accolades do not begin to match the simple description we came with: Child of God.
On Tuesday, June 9th, COVID became a little too
personal. Elder John, a young housing
assistant had not felt good for a couple of days, and on this day, his fever
spiked to 103 and he had a sore throat.
Our mission nurse sent him to urgent care, fearing the worst. The doctors and nurses, following protocol,
actually met Elder John outside, and one after another, shook their heads
grimly. From all appearances, he had
it. Finally, a nurse jammed a swab up
his nose (into his sinus, Elder John is sure), and sent it off for
testing. We would find out in three
days.
Meanwhile, the missionaries that had been with him on P-day were all
instructed to self isolate. The mission
nurse and her husband followed their own advice. Few had spent more time with Elder John than
me the preceding few days, and as luck would have it, Sis Hatfield had shared
his air for several hours in close truck cab quarters on a trip to the O’Fallon
zone two days before. We had to self
isolate too. On Wednesday, we were
having the second day of a mission-wide video zone conference. With a few adjustments, we could participate
from our apartment. We went into the
office early before anyone would possibly be there and got our notes, carefully
wiping surfaces as we left. Not many
people went into the office that day, under the circumstances. After the video conference, we did as much
work as we could on our laptops. But I
finally got antsy, and frankly, a bit frustrated, because my work is pretty paper
records intensive, so there is only so much I can do. So about 7 pm we walked the mile and a half
to the office, feeling confident that anyone that might have been there would
have left, and worked at our stations for several hours, then walked home in
the dark.
By Thursday noon, we were starting to feel grumpy and a bit trapped. Even after the short couple of days we were
starting to see the frustration that was building as we felt fine, but were
limited in the work we could do. Sister
Hatfield is the main switchboard operator for the mission, after all. How do you do that without being at the
phone? The list of restraints seemed
almost endless. We were skirting around
the edges of our responsibilities. And
it is really hard to feel motivated to get up and dressed and going when there
is no where to go. I had much greater
empathy for the isolated missionaries.
We have been spoiled in having an office to go to pretty much throughout
the COVID time. We have been socially
restricted, for sure, but at least we had another venue to go to. Finally, the call came. Elder John’s test came back negative. He didn’t have COVID, and neither did
we. Whew! That was an experience I don’t want to
repeat. But we probably will. Health experts say that 60-70 percent of the
population will need to have immunity before this slows down.
Having the all clear was all we needed to get right back to work. RaDene headed for her desk at the office and
me and the housing assistants, including Elder John, who felt remarkably well
by now, headed for Shilo West to prepare one of the few apartments still vacant
for missionaries. It had gotten the time
and attention of the missionaries that had lived there last, so I was hopeful,
but alas, on inspection, sure enough, it needed some senior missionary
effort. As was our pattern, I directed
the housing assistants in pitching useless stuff, and donned the rubber gloves
to get down to the nitty gritty. It took
much longer than planned, and in the end, I had a list of things I would need
to procure and bring back to make it habitable.
I also tried calling the landlord to ask if there was an empty unit we
could swap for and get some better floors and finishes. No luck.
But they were somewhat sympathetic that the mission has been in the unit
continuously for more than eight years.
That long will take its toll on carpet, linoleum, paint, etc. no matter
who the resident is.
Have I related the story of our recently wedge shaped trailer? A couple of weeks ago, Elder Everton, the
vehicle coordinator came to me one evening and said, has anyone called you
yet? As it happened, no one had called
me, so I didn’t know quite what to say other than, no, I haven’t gotten any
calls this evening. It was a very
ambiguous question, but he said nothing more.
Later that night I knew what he was asking about. The housing assistants called. Elder Scheurman had forgotten he was towing
the trailer and had run into the concrete beam of a parking garage. The garage won the fight. The truck got through, but the trailer was
too tall. About 3-4 feet of the top of
the trailer had been mashed down. They
got it unstuck, but some seams were pulled apart, which is a problem in
rain-prone Midwest weather. Maybe worse
from my perspective, I couldn’t stand up anymore. And I about scalped myself on the bent and
twisted roof ribs. Elder Scheurman felt
terrible. He wanted to know what to
do. He wanted to know if he should tell
President Bell. I calmed him, and we agreed
that it was best for Pres Bell to hear it straight from him. And we duct taped some of the gaps, making it
somewhat more protected, at least towards the back of the trailer. It’s a big deal to the missionaries because
they are told that there is a one strike policy on avoidable accidents and
driving privileges are revoked.
We figured out where the trailer had been purchased a few years ago and
with some effort, I made an appointment to go see them to get some bids on
repair or replacement. The damage was
enough that the yard couldn’t do the work, but they took pictures and sent them
to the factory in Arkansas for a repair bid.
One thing we had learned in the process of the trailer folks looking
over our trailer was that the axel hubs needed tightening. Knowing that there was a fair chance the
Church vehicle department would not want to bother to fix the trailer (I had
already seen how hail damage could qualify a car as a total loss), I didn’t
want to run up a big bill lubing axels and tightening hubs. Still, we needed to make some long trips with
the newly wedge shaped trailer setting up apartments. I didn’t really want to do that with wobbly
wheels. With a few tips from the trailer
store and a YouTube tutorial, Elder John, who is quite mechanically inclined,
joined me in the task.
We got up early on Friday, June 12 and had a little Indy pit crew
practice. I had new missionary training
to be ready for, and then a staff meeting, but right afterwards we needed to
hit the road for the Columbia zone, which was almost guaranteed to be a long
trip. So we started the day jacking the
trailer, pulling tires and wheels, tightening axel nuts, and lubing the axels
and hubs. That would at least make me
feel safe and more responsible about taking the trailer out all the way to
Moberly, Macon, and Columbia setting up apartments. We did get a recommendation for a barbeque
restaurant in Macon. It felt strange,
but the housing assistants and I sat down in a local establishment and splurged
a little. In places like Macon, it seems
like the social distancing was never observed quite like the national
authorities would have expected.
On Saturday, June 13th we were still pressed for time,
knowing that missionaries were coming next week and another zone that needed a
lot of housing set up. Yes, we are in
the stage of bringing back missionaries to well past the number we had before
COVID. I persuaded the Elders to meet me
at my new favorite mattress warehouse, which really is a warehouse, meaning
they have stock on hand (yay!). We
bought five more beds and frames, put them in the trailer, and hoped it
wouldn’t rain for a few days.
Meanwhile, RaDene and I celebrated our anniversary early. She had gotten us reserved tickets for the
opening of the Missouri Botanical Gardens.
It was a lovely day, sunny and warm but not steaming hot. Many of the corners of the garden were
closed, and it was obvious that many beds had not been attended to. But the main path, nearly 3 miles in length,
has so many glorious gardens: English woodlands, Japanese, rose, lilies, ponds,
streams, and on and on. The collection
of stately trees, some going back to the founding in 1859, is magnificent. Also on the property are three period
houses. The benefactor Henry Shaw’s
garden home, his gardener’s home, and Shaw’s city house relocated to the garden
after his death. We look forward to
exploring more, and sharing it with anyone who might visit!
Hungry, we tried sandwiches at the garden café, but they were lacking. We had a solution for that—ice cream. I don’t know why, but St Louis seems to have
more than its share great ice cream, and there is a great shop not far from the
gardens in the same historical district.
Because of COVID, we ordered by phone, and waited and people watched on
the sidewalk under a shade tree until our orders were cheerfully delivered to
us. My “rocky road” was undoubtedly the
best rocky road I have ever had. The
chocolate ice cream was so rich, the nuts were mostly cashews (what a great
idea!), and the marshmallows were nothing like what you buy in the bag at the
grocery store. I’m salivating just
thinking about it. We had to hurry home
and get looking like missionaries again to join the Zoom video call to be
introduced to the missionaries coming next week. They are a good looking bunch. I am impressed by these young people who have
the courage and determination to accept a new assignment, somewhere different
and perhaps less exotic than their original calls. It would have been so easy to have ended their
missions with no questions or expectations of additional service. But here they come to strengthen us, like
reinforcements to Helaman’s stripling warriors.
Alma 57:6.
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