2019 in Review
One year ago this morning, just after midnight, we left our house in Washington in preparation for beginning our Missionary Service. We traveled to Salt Lake City and spent 6 days with my sister, Katy before heading to the MTC on January 7.
We began our MTC experience on my mother's birthday. I thought that was an appropriate date and we quietly celebrated her birthday as we moved into the MTC for our 5 day stay.
We celebrated my birthday in the MTC on January 9th and then we left the MTC late in the day on January 11. We spent the night in Monticello, Utah, then on the 12th, we traveled to Tucumcari, NM and spent the night there. On the 13th we traveled to Ft. Worth, TX and stopped for the night. From Ft., Worth we traveled to the Mission Office in Kingwood, TX, met the office staff and then we found the apartment the Housing Coordinators had prepared for us., We live in a "Luxury" apartment. It is 3 bedrooms 2 baths and a large dining/living/kitchen space. This apartment is larger than the house we moved from in Washington, UT. One of the bedrooms is used for mission storage, so we really use only 2 bedrooms.
Before we left Washington to come to our Missionary experience, we purchased a Garmin GPS device. It has saved us a lot of trouble. BUT, we were to meet with the Houston Summerwood Texas Stake Presidency on January 17th. Garmin couldn't find the Stake Center. The address was on the other side of Gateway 8 (Sam Houston Parkway). So we were 15-20 minutes late for our appointment., So much for a good first impression!
In the same week, we met with our new Bishop and ward members., We quickly learned that we would furnish the music for the Jacinto City Ward as there was nobody that could play the piano nor lead the music. They would use a full time missionary whenever there was one assigned to the ward who could play the piano, but it was unusual. When we met with the Bishopric, the Bishop informed us that the ward had prayed us here. We had asked to serve in a Spanish speaking temple, but we were pleased with our assignment to work as MLS missionaries in Houston.
When we met with President Hewlett, President of THE Mission (that would be Texas Houston East) we asked him what he expected of us. We had been told that we would be doing whatever the Mission President asked of us. He said, "You do whatever it is that you do." It took us awhile to figure out it out.
During much of the first few months I was ill. I don't do well with the higher humidity. It is hard for me to breath.
In April, we secured permission from our President to host our missionary District for General Conference on Sunday, April 3rd. We had 8 missionaries here for the two sessions and for dinner between the sessions. It was a wonderful day.
We have kept in touch with our children and some of our grandchildren by phone calls, Facebook, and even snail mail. I wrote to some of our grandchildren in my own handwriting so that they could have a sample to keep in their memory books. The response that I got was, "Your writing is very hard to read." I said, "I know. Sometimes I can't read it either."
We have come to love our people. I conduct a choir in two wards. Jacinto City and Channelview. Both are Spanish speaking wards. We decided to make the choir a bi-ward choir because the people support both wards anyway. Most of these people can't read music, so we teach music reading as well as singing.
In November, my Princess Bride's mother passed away. We took a few days from our labors and went to Colton, California to attend her funeral. Years ago, I was asked by Maxine Gardner to give the eulogy for her when she passed away. During the few days run-up to the funeral I visited with most of Sister Black's siblings asking them for memories of their mother. It was a wonderful time and I gathered much material that I hadn't known before. I have known Maxine for more than 50 years so I had much of my own material as well. I wound up speaking for about 25 minutes. Sometimes laughing, sometimes with tears streaming down my face. She will be missed, but we know that after 24 years of widowhood she is finally back with her sweetheart.
We often host 1 or 2 companionships for dinner in our apartment. We tell our young missionaries that if their dinner appointment falls through they are to call us. Unless we have other commitments we will feed them. So we get to know these young missionaries very well, and have come to think of them as our proxy grandchildren. I would enjoy meeting their parents if opportunity ever arose.
In November, Sister Black began teaching the Church's keyboard course to the people in the two wards. The first week she had about 15 people, but now we are down to 5 students. Hopefully they will stay with the program. On their first day they were able to play a hymn with just one note at a time. The program lasts 12 weeks with the goal of playing the simplified hymns at the end of the course. She will teach it at least 2 more times, if there are students, before we leave in December.
We hosted all 8 of our missionaries for Christmas Day. They came, they ate breakfast, visited, put together a 550 piece jig-saw puzzle, played other games, ate a formal dinner and then enjoyed a gospel discussion before they left for the night. They had been instructed not to go out proselyting on Christmas day, so we had missionaries here in our apartment from 9:00 am until near 9:00 pm. I loved it as did Sister Black, but she was pretty tired at the end of the day.
About every 2-3 months we have a Senior Missionary event, where all of the Senior Missionaries in the mission get together for Dinner and sometimes we go on field trips. We went to the Circus soon after we arrived in January, but we've also been to NASA, the George Bush (41) presidential library. We are planning to go to the Rodeo in March. We'll see how that goes.
We love our assignment and we love the people we serve., Sister Black has learned a little Spanish, but not enough to be real conversant. She surprises me often with her ability. She spent about 6 months with a MTC tutor using video chatting software.
At any rate, we've had a good year! We hope each of you can say likewise!
Elder and Sister Black
We began our MTC experience on my mother's birthday. I thought that was an appropriate date and we quietly celebrated her birthday as we moved into the MTC for our 5 day stay.
We celebrated my birthday in the MTC on January 9th and then we left the MTC late in the day on January 11. We spent the night in Monticello, Utah, then on the 12th, we traveled to Tucumcari, NM and spent the night there. On the 13th we traveled to Ft. Worth, TX and stopped for the night. From Ft., Worth we traveled to the Mission Office in Kingwood, TX, met the office staff and then we found the apartment the Housing Coordinators had prepared for us., We live in a "Luxury" apartment. It is 3 bedrooms 2 baths and a large dining/living/kitchen space. This apartment is larger than the house we moved from in Washington, UT. One of the bedrooms is used for mission storage, so we really use only 2 bedrooms.
Before we left Washington to come to our Missionary experience, we purchased a Garmin GPS device. It has saved us a lot of trouble. BUT, we were to meet with the Houston Summerwood Texas Stake Presidency on January 17th. Garmin couldn't find the Stake Center. The address was on the other side of Gateway 8 (Sam Houston Parkway). So we were 15-20 minutes late for our appointment., So much for a good first impression!
In the same week, we met with our new Bishop and ward members., We quickly learned that we would furnish the music for the Jacinto City Ward as there was nobody that could play the piano nor lead the music. They would use a full time missionary whenever there was one assigned to the ward who could play the piano, but it was unusual. When we met with the Bishopric, the Bishop informed us that the ward had prayed us here. We had asked to serve in a Spanish speaking temple, but we were pleased with our assignment to work as MLS missionaries in Houston.
When we met with President Hewlett, President of THE Mission (that would be Texas Houston East) we asked him what he expected of us. We had been told that we would be doing whatever the Mission President asked of us. He said, "You do whatever it is that you do." It took us awhile to figure out it out.
During much of the first few months I was ill. I don't do well with the higher humidity. It is hard for me to breath.
In April, we secured permission from our President to host our missionary District for General Conference on Sunday, April 3rd. We had 8 missionaries here for the two sessions and for dinner between the sessions. It was a wonderful day.
We have kept in touch with our children and some of our grandchildren by phone calls, Facebook, and even snail mail. I wrote to some of our grandchildren in my own handwriting so that they could have a sample to keep in their memory books. The response that I got was, "Your writing is very hard to read." I said, "I know. Sometimes I can't read it either."
We have come to love our people. I conduct a choir in two wards. Jacinto City and Channelview. Both are Spanish speaking wards. We decided to make the choir a bi-ward choir because the people support both wards anyway. Most of these people can't read music, so we teach music reading as well as singing.
In November, my Princess Bride's mother passed away. We took a few days from our labors and went to Colton, California to attend her funeral. Years ago, I was asked by Maxine Gardner to give the eulogy for her when she passed away. During the few days run-up to the funeral I visited with most of Sister Black's siblings asking them for memories of their mother. It was a wonderful time and I gathered much material that I hadn't known before. I have known Maxine for more than 50 years so I had much of my own material as well. I wound up speaking for about 25 minutes. Sometimes laughing, sometimes with tears streaming down my face. She will be missed, but we know that after 24 years of widowhood she is finally back with her sweetheart.
We often host 1 or 2 companionships for dinner in our apartment. We tell our young missionaries that if their dinner appointment falls through they are to call us. Unless we have other commitments we will feed them. So we get to know these young missionaries very well, and have come to think of them as our proxy grandchildren. I would enjoy meeting their parents if opportunity ever arose.
In November, Sister Black began teaching the Church's keyboard course to the people in the two wards. The first week she had about 15 people, but now we are down to 5 students. Hopefully they will stay with the program. On their first day they were able to play a hymn with just one note at a time. The program lasts 12 weeks with the goal of playing the simplified hymns at the end of the course. She will teach it at least 2 more times, if there are students, before we leave in December.
We hosted all 8 of our missionaries for Christmas Day. They came, they ate breakfast, visited, put together a 550 piece jig-saw puzzle, played other games, ate a formal dinner and then enjoyed a gospel discussion before they left for the night. They had been instructed not to go out proselyting on Christmas day, so we had missionaries here in our apartment from 9:00 am until near 9:00 pm. I loved it as did Sister Black, but she was pretty tired at the end of the day.
About every 2-3 months we have a Senior Missionary event, where all of the Senior Missionaries in the mission get together for Dinner and sometimes we go on field trips. We went to the Circus soon after we arrived in January, but we've also been to NASA, the George Bush (41) presidential library. We are planning to go to the Rodeo in March. We'll see how that goes.
We love our assignment and we love the people we serve., Sister Black has learned a little Spanish, but not enough to be real conversant. She surprises me often with her ability. She spent about 6 months with a MTC tutor using video chatting software.
At any rate, we've had a good year! We hope each of you can say likewise!
Elder and Sister Black
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