THIS ‘N THAT

April 20, 2011 Wednesday

Monday night at the senior missionary FHE at the mission home, we met the new senior missionary couple that arrived in Perth on Saturday: Elder and Sister Curtis from the Cottonwood Heights area of Salt Lake. This is their 2nd mission. They did their first 5 years ago, a humanitarian mission to Thailand. They spent the first third of their mission on the eastern border of Thailand, the second third in Bangkok, and the third third in Myanmar (Burma). They were assigned here as an office couple, but right now we don’t need anymore in the office. It will be interesting to see what President Cahoon does with them. Crawfords were called on a proselyting mission but have spent the last year working as office missionaries. They only have 2 ½ months before the end of their mission.
Last night we dropped by to visit Brother Read. He’s about our age and does the ward bulletin each week. He does a great job with it. He’s been divorced twice and now lives alone. He’s lost touch with his kids from his first marriage and has none from his 2nd marriage. But he’s just making the best of his situation. He loves to travel and he loves the church. He became involved with the church when he offered a couple of rooms for rent in his home 20 years ago. The mission rented a room from him for the missionaries. It was 6 months before they told him anything about the church. He said it was what he’d been looking for all his life. He even let us download the written conference talks on his computer. What a nice guy!
This morning we dropped by to see Lori Manners. It was the 4th time we’d been there recently and she had been asleep in the middle of the morning or the afternoon. The nurse who told us Lori’s awake a lot in the night woke her up, and I went in to talk to her. Lori let me know that she wasn’t really sleepy but she’s in so much pain it’s just easier to lie there in bed than it is to be up and about. I asked her what we could do for her and she asked us to pray that she can die. I offered to pray with her right then, and I said a prayer I never thought I would offer with someone. She was so grateful. Bless her heart—I just ache for her. I hope she does go quickly.
Tonight we had dinner with Colin and Verian Tomlinson. Stan and Stephanie Rogalski were also there. It was a beautiful evening. After we ate, Stephanie played the piano while Colin and Stan practiced, “Were You There” for sacrament meeting Sunday and then Stan practiced “Gethsemane” for the special stake Easter program Sunday night at the stake center. We then just sat around and talked about gospel principles for an hour or so. Heaven certainly has to include people like that.