What Next?

Bonjour everyone - Have yourselves a great day today!

It's when I blew up my breakfast oatmeal that I kinda knew what sort of day we would be having! We had an 11 o'clock appointment with Sister Walter to take her the sacrament, and had to leave by 10 to be on time. As we drove into her yard, we were surprised to see that her car wasn't there. That was very strange, so we got out and knocked on her door to make certain, and . . . NO answer. While Jack wrote her a note, I walked around her large back yard looking at the crumbling out-buildings made of those old piled up stones that you see everywhere; and sure enough, the 'mortar' seemed to be dirt that I could easily brush away with a finger. Her near-dead dog roused himself with great effort, and began to do his duty by barking at us, so we gave him the satisfaction of having "chased us away" by leaving, after placing the note in her mailbox. We'd been back home only a few minutes, when I looked for my bag, and couldn't find it anywhere. My heavy, clunky, ever present bag, with all my stuff: my quad de englaise, my scriptures de francaise, my hymnbook (with translated titles . . . the only way on earth I know what I'm singing), and not at all least - my journal! EEEEK! Yes, I really did leave my bag sitting on the back stoop at Chantal's house; I was sick! Jack said, "Don't worry, don't worry, we'll be going back for it." Then the phone rang, and it was Chantal calling to apologize for getting her dates wrong; she thought we were coming the next day, and to tell us "the news" that she had my bag. I mouthed the "news" to Jack . . . "I NEED my bag!" So he told her we'd come by later to pick it up. Then Carole called us to move our meeting with her back by an hour and a half because she was swamped with work, so Jack grabbed me and said let's go right now. We dove into the car and took off once again to Chantal's little commune, Le Pruneau (love that name); because if you feel naked without your bag, you must have your bag, right? We got to meet her son, a young man in his 20's, who was there to help her fix some water damage from an earlier storm, and told her we'd be back in the morning.

Then, we were off to our appointment with Carole, who is such a different person from the timid, stand-offish woman we first met a year ago. Their place of business is clear on the far side of Angouleme, so it seemed like we'd been in the car for hours. We got off to a good start with my small offering of her personal favorite: lemon bars, a treat she cannot refuse! Jack felt that she needed to understand about opposition and agency, having been the victim of a crime, so we read and discussed 2 Nephi 2, which talks about why God allows his children their agency to act and how they are responsible for the consequences that follow. She read the verses, then reread them, and discussed them with Jack. It is a hard concept to forgive someone who has hurt you or a loved one, but she is trying to come to terms with it. I snapped a quick picture of her and Jack, and she told him that she's gained some weight back, and is up to 50 kilos now. At her low point a few months ago, she was at 47 k.; bound and determined to get down to her "magic" number of 42! Fifty kilos is just over 100 pounds, and she is about my height. Jack and her fiancee, Dominique, worked so hard to get her turned around, to realize that she was "losing" her beauty by becoming a scarecrow, not enhancing herself as she seemed to think. It finally seemed to dawn on her, and she has lately had much more spark and liveliness, and we are so glad for her because health is everything. Carole seems to just drink in the knowledge of the gospel, and is reading the Book of Mormon. When she gave the closing prayer, she said something that thrilled us so much, "Father in heaven, please help me so that I can be baptized." It was great.

I was called on to give a different kind of service than usual when we came an hour early to FHE, and set up a barbering station in the kitchen for the Elders. I first tackled Elder Chlarson's hair, which sticks out straight all over his head. It has a coarse, heavy texture that I'd never dealt with before, but he was desperate enough to allow me a free hand and took all the buzzing and clipping and "oopses!' with a determined smile. Then Richard Humblot snuck in, hoping to save himself the 45 euros that a haircut costs him at a shop. His bald pate needed shaving, then I mowed the sides and especially got rid of the heavy, curly forest that grows down the back of his neck. I thought his hair was white as snow, but there are plenty of black ones sprinkled throughout that surprised me. Next came the fussy Elder Hill, whose close cropped, curly, short hair hardly looked like it needed cutting. At first he directed me to just trim some off the sides mostly, but soon he said just take it all, that his hair could never be too short! So, I got after it, and to me it looked the same after I'd finished as it did before; every person is so different from each other! It was his birthday also, so after our lesson he got to blow out the 20 blazing candles on his chocolate brownie cake (what else?), and we all pigged out as we played our rousing UNO games with cheers, groans and great gusto (especially when our resident funny man, Bro. Bourdicheux wins and celebrates triumphantly!).

We honestly never know what's next around here, but the journey has been worth it because of all we have gained along the way. Take care of yourselves, we think about you, and love your place in our lives.

Til we meet again,
Sister Mom (Joanne) Gran'ma