One Week At A Time

O.K., I promised last week that we would talk about our first week of fall Institute classes, but first I just want to mention the wonderful concert we were able to attend tonight at the Temple Visitor's Center. There is a "Mormon Choir of Washington, D.C." that performs at various events around the District. It is made up of members of several stakes (all volunteers, of course). Tonight, they performed a musical program in commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. The music was stirring and the remarks thought-provoking. Elder Bruce A. Carlson of the Quorum of the Seventy spoke. As an Air Force General, he was in his office in a different area of the Pentagon when it was hit by the third plane. Living here, it is easy to imagine the terror of that day and to be grateful that nothing resulted from the high terror alert here this weekend.

In the Wakefield Ward, where we attended Sacrament meeting today, the bishopric counselor who was conducting admonished everyone to make a stop at the meetinghouse library for a copy of the ward's emergency plan. Said he, "Now that we've survived the earthquake and the hurricane and the flooding, we hope you'll be sure to pick up your folder before the locusts arrive." We all laughed -- but not for very long....

On a happier note, we LOVE our Institute classes and especially the students. We have had a fifth class added to our weekly schedule, so our week goes something like this:

SUNDAY - We have been told to ward hop (unlike the young single adults who have been told to stay put...). We are usually in a different building every week, meeting new people and spreading the word that there are Institute classes available for young single adults.

MONDAY - We add audiovisual materials and put the

finishing touches on our lessons for the week. We also put together food for "munch & mingle" activities after three of the classes.

TUESDAY - We meet with our CES Supervisor for an hour or two in a staff meeting during the morning. By 5 p.m., we are on our way to Crystal City, near the Pentagon (a 45 minute trip), to teach our first class of the week. The "23rd Street Chapel" is a refurbished office building that was just dedicated this past spring as the meetinghouse for three singles wards. There are three Institute classes taught there every Tuesday night. In our class, we have about 30 Young Single Adults, most of them pursuing graduate degrees or working for the government or in government-related occupations.

WEDNESDAY - We teach two classes. First, we travel about 20 minutes east to George Mason University to teach a class in the Student Union Building. It's a "brown bag" affair for students on campus. Everybody brings their lunches and we meet for an hour between noon and one. We have about 10 students, including a pair of missionaries who are the first set of elders assigned specifically to the campus. They've been on campus about a month and have three investigators already. We hope they will accompany the elders to class. In the evening, we travel about 30 minutes in a different direction to the Annandale Stake Center, where we teach about 20 young single adults who are still mostly living at home, working, or commuting to various college campuses in the area. They are a sweet, humble bunch of students.

THURSDAY - We make the 45 minute trip back to the 23rd Street Chapel to teach a lunchtime class to about 15 students whose schedules allow them to spend an hour with us in the middle of the day. Some work from home or at a near-by business, some are going to school. Then, in the evening we drive just 10 minutes from home to the Centreville Stake Center (in our home ward boundaries) to teach our last class of the week to 20 or so students who are working locally or attending area community colleges while living at home.

FRIDAY - We spend the morning catching up on cleaning, grocery shopping, etc., then devote the afternoon and evening to lesson plans for the next week. If we're lucky, we sometimes take an hour or two off to go out to dinner.

SATURDAY - It's our day to see the sights! We often take the Metro from the Vienna station into the District and explore all the wonderful sights we have hurried through when we've been here before. This is the day we have time to go to the temple and to see Amy and Colin. We have taken some trips together to some great historical sights. Our mission president and our

CES supervisor have both told us to take one day a week off, and we love it!

We're keeping busy, but it's been great. We are so glad to see our students each week. We've definitely wrapped our hearts around them. All-in-all, our students are very diverse in their cultural backgrounds, in age (anywhere between 18 & 30) and in the life goals they are pursuing. It's a great challenge to adapt the subjects we teach to their individual needs, but we are loving it. Lots of work, lots of fun. ~Pat~

Trusting God

It's been a sobering week for us as we've contemplated some of the events that are taking place in our neighborhood at home. Our hearts have been reminded once again how very fragile life can be - and how little influence we really have over God's great universe.

Our friends, the Southwicks, lost their daughter-in-law, Cami, in her sleep last week to a suspected ruptured cerebral aneurysm. Cami was a 30-year-old wife and mother of four very young children. As young-marrieds, Ryan and Cami lived in our neighborhood for awhile. Our hearts go out to the entire Southwick family.

For Don and I, this hits very close to home. Why, in possibly very similar situations, was he spared and Cami taken? In our estimation, there could be nothing more important to God than to allow a faithful, loving mother to raise the four sweet children He gave her. Couldn't He just have intervened with a simple miracle to make sure that happened? What could be more important than that?

It's been a year since other friends in our neighborhood, the Calls, lost their son, Griffin, in an unexpected and tragic accident. We still haven't made sense of that experience, either.

As we began the fall semester this week, teaching five new Institute classes, we were asked to introduce ourselves and tell a little about our background. One of the things we felt impressed to share was both our brushes with death: Don's from his aneurysm and brain surgery, mine from cancer. We remembered the visits the Southwicks made to be with us in the hospital when Don was fighting for his life. It gave us reason to revisit the whole issue of why some are permitted to live through illnesses and accidents, and others not.

And then, over Labor Day weekend, we welcomed our Jenn and Iain for a three-day visit. It was so wonderful to have them here for a few days and to spend some time exploring the District together! Interestingly, our first stop was the deeply moving but heart-breaking Holocaust Museum. We hadn't been there for a long time - since before we met Esther, the beautiful 82-year-old Auschwitz survivor who told us her personal experiences in that death camp when we met her quite by accident there, in Poland, in 2008. The Holocaust Museum was much more personal for us this time as we thought of her and her family - those who lived through Auschwitz and those who did not.

We also happened onto a temporary exhibit of artifacts from 9-11 on display in the Smithsonian's Museum of American History during our weekend with Jenn and Iain. Another sobering memory of a day some lived and several thousand did not.

A long walking tour of Arlington National Cemetery reminded us yet again of the price of war in American lives -- over one million three hundred thousand courageous lives lost, beginning with the Revolutionary War.

Life can be so fragile. This is when I am grateful that I KNOW without any doubt that there is a God and that He loves us and He is in charge and He will make all things right and fair -- and worth what we go though. He loved us enough to send His Son, Jesus Christ, to earth to take all the sins and pain in the world upon himself in the Garden of Gethsemane. He knows how to help us conquer the trials we face because he has already carried them for us. We can put our lives in his hands. We can trust him. He knows us better than anyone else ever will. He rejoices with us in our happiness and He sorrows with us in our darkest hours. We can turn to Him when we are on top of the world. We can turn to Him when we are broken and worn out and afraid. He has already born our grief and carried our sorrows. With the benefit of 64 years of experience, I have weathered enough trials to know that if we will turn to Him and humble ourselves and keep His commandments and listen for His guidance, no matter what we face, no matter what happens, in the end it will be O.K.

President Howard W. Hunter put it best when he said, "If our lives are centered upon Jesus Christ and his restored gospel, nothing can ever go permanently wrong. On the other hand, if our lives are not centered on the Savior and His teachings, no other success can ever be permanently right." It's true. Trials are never easy, but they are all temporary when we lean on our Savior, Jesus Christ.

We like to think we are in charge of our lives. We make choices; we take control. But things can change - and in the end, we are not really in charge. Just witnessing the power and force of nature here in Washington, D.C. the past few weeks has reminded us of that. Earthquake... tornado... and today... torrential flooding and a high terror alert due to the 9/11 anniversary Sunday. We changed our route home from an Institute class we were teaching near the Pentagon at noon to avoid the roads flooded out by massive thunderstorms during the past three days. Tonight it's still raining... hard. We pray that Sunday will be calm -- throughout the nation.

But the sun will shine again. It is easy to forget the many days of sunshine when we are watching claps of lightening overhead during a massive thunderstorm. It's easy to think the rain is never going to stop, but it will. And life will return to normal. Roads will dry out. Hearts will heal. There will be more good days. In the meantime, we will keep our eyes focused on the source of light and truth - the Son. ~Pat~

Post Script: Next week we promise to tell about our fun first week of Institute in the new fall semester.

Flying High

Gratefully, the title of today’s blog does not refer to what happened to us during Hurricane Irene. Our hearts are heavy for the states north of us that suffered so much damage. We came through just fine. A lot of wind and rain, but only one tiny downed tree limb and a bunch of ants who decided they liked our front entry better than floating away. We were very fortunate. The hurricane did pack a big wallop in some nearby areas, though. While we didn’t lose our power, over a million others in Northern Virginia did and some of them will not be getting it back until Thursday or Friday this week. There are about 20 schools in the DC area that are still closed.

The biggest inconvenience for us was when we showed up for church at a chapel near George Mason U. on Sunday morning and the parking lot was completely empty! We don’t have a home ward. We are asked to visit Young Single Adult wards and home wards with Institute-aged students in a four stake area. The empty building we visited Sunday morning had no power. It houses the Fairfax and Wakefield Wards. The power came on later in the day, though, so both wards in the building held a combined meeting that we attended.

The Fairfax and Wakefield Wards are in the Annandale Stake. Sunday we met both bishops and were able to spend some time with their stake president - President Bush. One of the other stakes we work with is the Mt. Vernon Stake. Their stake president is President Nixon. President Bush and President Nixon in neighboring stakes in Washington D.C.! Who says God doesn’t have a sense of humor???

Now back to the title. We’re flying high for a bunch of reasons:

• 1. We’re flying high because it’s official: we’re finished -- with the summer semester, that is. We taught our last classes last week and had a great experience getting to know many wonderful Young Singles - so diverse and full of enthusiasm.
• 2. We’re flying high because now we’ve got a week off... well, not really. This week, we’ll be writing a syllabus and lesson plans for the new classes we start teaching next week after Labor Day. (We’ll tell you more about where they are held next week.)
• 3. We’re flying high because we are looking forward to teaching the new fall semester curriculum. It’s going to be a great blessing to us, personally, to prepare to teach:

· Receiving Personal Revelation: Conference Messages That Will Change Your Life

· The Power of the Word: Using the Scriptures To Meet Personal Needs

• 4. We’re flying high because it now seems like home to us here in Centreville, Va. It’s been a month since we arrived and we feel content here. We love our townhouse and we love our assignment. That doesn’t mean that we don’t think about family and friends every day, but it does mean that we feel very comfortable here and can find our way around the DC metro area. (Only got lost twice last week….)
• 5. We’re flying high because we are in the flight path of Dulles Airport. Ordinarily that’s not such a good thing, but the craziest experience has happened to me (Pat). The sound of all those planes landing and taking off makes me happy! What’s up with that? Well, it’s because I grew up just 1¾ miles north of LAX. I could have walked to the terminals as a child. The sound of majestic aircraft soaring overhead is strangely comforting to me. It gives me a sense of peace. When I hear those planes, my heart carries me back to all kinds of wonderful memories from my childhood. It’s the same thing your sense of smell can trigger when you smell a particular aroma. Isn’t that odd?
• 6. We’re flying high because we have been told to take off one day a week and explore some of the incredible landmarks around. Our sense of pride in our country’s history is growing stronger. These photos show a couple of places we’ve seen lately. Do you know where they are? (Hint: George Washington had a lot to do with both places.)

If you ‘d like a peek into our mission, click on this link: http://video.pbs.org/video/2098967332 . PBS was recently given special permission by the Church and local priesthood leaders to film an eight minute segment about Single Adults in the Washington DC area, and specifically the church building in Crystal City that houses three singles wards. This remodeled office building was just dedicated as an LDS meetinghouse in March and has garnered quite a bit of media attention. We teach two of our classes there and often attend church with the young men and women in the video. Even though PBS didn't do a great job of representing the ethnic diversity in the wards, we really like the report. Way to go, PBS!

Earthquakes, Tornadoes and Hurricanes - Oh My!

It's been quite a week! A little unnerving here and there. It always is when you face off with Mother Nature....

So, the 6.0 earthquake WAS a big deal around here and the topic of conversation for a day or two afterward. "Where were you when the earthquake hit?" "How did it feel where you were?" I (Pat) was in the basement of our three-story townhouse working on my Institute lesson. I could hear things falling off a shelf upstairs, but chose to stand in a doorway and wait it out. It felt like standing on top of an off-kilter washing machine. When the intensity began increasing, I wished I had run upstairs where at least I would have been on the top of the rubble.... Don was out running errands when it happened, stopped at a red light. As the car started to rock, he first thought it was a bad wind storm. He and the other drivers just sat there and looked around at each other, trying to decide what to do next. Then it was over - and all that was left was a pounding heart and grateful spirit.

We taught our regular Institute class that night in Crystal City, near the Pentagon. Our students were caught in various places during the quake. Some felt it, some didn't. Many were at work in high rise buildings. One young woman was on the Metro and had to endure a 10 m.p.h. trip home while the rails were being inspected. Another was in the middle of a temple session and afterward saw the tops of the four spires that had been snapped off. The Washington Monument and the National Cathedral were also damaged. After Andrews AFB was evacuated, Colin (Amy's husband) and fellow engineers had to remain on the job to inspect all buildings on base - inside and out - for cracks and damage. There was little damage and business is back to normal, but they take these kinds of things very seriously around here because there are so many millions of people packed into this area. Living in this burgeoning metropolis, everything comes to a screeching halt when the unexpected happens. (Especially the traffic: once this week we spent an hour traveling just 6 miles on the "belt route" in D.C.).

Luckily, the earthquake was just enough to shake everyone up and close government buildings, businesses and schools for the afternoon, but it gave us a lot to reflect on, especially with the hurricane (and attendant tornadoes) coming this weekend. PREPARATION. That's what's been on my mind. As long as we've been married we've followed the prophets' warnings to store food. Over the years, we've added a generator, some barrels of water, a heat source, etc. There is a great peace that comes from being prepared.... Unfortunately, our preparedness stayed in Draper when we came here. We brought along our emergency radio with a hand crank and one 72-hour kit for both of us. That's it. It's a lot harder to wait out a hurricane when you're not prepared.

As I picked up a few things at the grocery store this morning, I wondered which items on those shelves I might wish I had this weekend when it really hits. If I had a generator, some barrels of water, and some shelves stocked with food in the basement, I'd feel a lot more confident! I think I know how the people of Noah's day felt when the rain started....

On a lighter note, Kristen found and posted the following spoof on Facebook. I love it!

"The Weather Channel says yesterday's east coast earthquake was caused by an unknown fault line running under D.C. and through Virginia. It is now being called OBAMA'S FAULT, though Obama will say it's really BUSH'S FAULT. Other theories are that it was the Founding Fathers rolling over in their graves or that what we all believed to be an earthquake was actually the effects of a 14.6 trillion dollar check bouncing in Washington."

Thomas Johnson "Stonewall" Jackson

The Manassas National Battlefield Park is located a few short miles from where we are living in Centreville, Virginia. It is located in a peaceful, pastoral valley of rolling hills and forests. We made a visit there last Friday on our free day and learned about the Battle of Bull Run in 1861. As the Confederate lines began to crumble under heavy Union assault in this early Civil War battle, Commander Jackson provided crucial troop reinforcements, stood firm on Henry House Hill and didn't back down against the opposition. His ally, Brig. Gen. Barnard Elliott Bee, rallied the beleaguered troops by shouting, “There is Jackson standing like a stone wall.” The name stuck. Stonewall Jackson’s brigade stopped the Union forces, causing them to retreat.

The statue memorializing Stonewall Jackson made me think about the Young Single Adults we are meeting in our Institute classes. They are terrific young men and women who daily face a battlefield of competing ideas, values, philosophies, and lifestyles -- many that run contrary to the teachings of the Lord. Their battles are intellectual, social, spiritual, and physical. These students are strong and capable, but the battles are intense. The goal of our Institute classes is to fortify them and help them build a stone wall of moral and spiritual strength to counter the influences that could weaken their resolve to follow the Savior and keep His commandments. Institute is a safe haven for friendship, learning, and connection with the spirit, a place that empowers students to stand firm and triumph against the adversary. It's a place for crucial reinforcement. It's a great place to be. ~Don~

Spreading Our Wings

During the first official week of our mission since arriving in Virginia, we’ve had some amazing opportunities to learn new things. Most days, we learned MANY new things. We are definitely stretching and spreading our wings. What a busy, exciting week!

• Throughout the week, our exceptional CES Coordinator, Brother Devin Toma, took us to visit the four different Institute classrooms where we will be teaching, including the 23^rd Street Chapel in Mt. Vernon, the Annandale Stake Center, the Centreville Stake Center, and Student Union Building II at George Mason University in Fairfax.
• Tuesday, we were inspired by the teachings of Elder David Bednar as we participated in a worldwide CES satellite broadcast. We learned that teaching is not about talking and telling; it’s about listening and individualizing as we get to know our students and prepare to teach by the Spirit.
• Thursday, we saw missionary zeal in action when we got to attend the Washington, DC South Mission transfer conference. We met President & Sister Albright and heard inspirational talks from him, the zone leaders, and the APs. The mission reached a ten- year high of 62 baptisms in July. The enthusiasm and energy of that conference was exhilarating, and brought back strong emotions and memories from my mission to Switzerland some 48 years ago.
• Thursday evening we taught our first Institute class - at the Centreville Stake Center - on the life and teachings of Joseph Fielding Smith. We are already meeting some terrific Young Single Adults.
• Friday, we had a great time in the District with Amy and Colin, walking the Mall and visiting monuments, memorials, and Smithsonian museums.
• Saturday evening we were overwhelmed, once again, at the beauty of the stately Washington D.C. Temple as we had the privilege of attending a session.
• Sunday we attended Amy and Colin’s new ward at the old colonial LDS chapel on the banks of the Potomac in Mt. Vernon.

There’s a lot for us to accomplish on this mission. We’re ready to spread our wings and fly….

~Don~

Building A Nest In 7 Days or Less

- The birdhouse in the tree next to our new front door -

During the past several years while we've been traveling in many different countries with Clog America, I've noticed a fascinating phenomenon. No matter how strange the new surroundings are, after about one week in a foreign place, life begins to take on a sense of normalcy. I've seen it happen over and over again. Experiences and circumstances that seem so peculiar and unusual during the first few days begin to seem completely ordinary much sooner than you'd expect. And it's happening again.

Until last Friday, we'd never seen Centreville, Va., even though we've visited Washington many times. Centreville is a townhouse-populated suburb about 45 minutes from the Capitol and it's sandwiched among suburbs that stretch farther than the eye can see in any direction. There are townhouses packed pretty much everywhere except where there's a shopping mall or a busy street. Even though Don and I grew up in Los Angeles and Berkeley, respectively, we had no idea so many people could be crammed into one small area! That feat is accomplished by building up instead of out. Our townhouse is only about 15 feet wide, but it is four stories high (which, of course, means THREE flights of stairs inside).

All the townhouses look alike, which led to an interesting experience the night we arrived. Exhausted from the long drive, we had managed to find our way to a neighborhood grocery store and returned home after dark with enough food for dinner and the next morning's breakfast. As I was getting a few bags out of the car, I looked up to see Don trying to unlock the front door... of the townhouse two doors down from our own. Everything looks the same around here! Luckily, he caught his mistake before the homeowners came to the door.

We love our townhouse and it is quite comfortable, but it is definitely taking some getting used to! Everything is on a different floor. The family room where we study and prepare lessons is in the basement; so is the laundry room. The kitchen and a little sitting room are on the main floor. Bedrooms are upstairs, then there's a loft with another bedroom above that. I guess you could say it's a heart-healthy house. By the time we had carried all our belongings in and put them on the right floors when we arrived, we were already in better shape than when we got here! Now that we've unpacked boxes and hung a few photos, it's starting to seem like home.

Getting around is another story, though. We've only gotten really lost twice so far (and that's WITH GPS), but even when we know where we're going we can never figure out which direction we are headed in. Where are the mountains??? How can you tell if you're heading north, south, east or west without the Wasatch mountains to look at???

Amy and Colin have arrived from Alabama. We're so glad to have them stay with us for a few days while they find housing somewhere near Andrews Air Force Base. Maybe they'll help us find our way around....

Right now, we've only been here four days, but by the time we've made it to a week, I'm sure we'll feel downright comfortable here! And this is the week we begin our Institute assignment. Can't wait to meet our students! ~Pat~