San Carlos to Blackfoot Week 11-How It All Ended

This is NOT how I envisioned our mission ending.  As each day went on, we heard about more missionaries being sent home, mostly from Europe and overseas.  It was obvious things were getting serious: quarantines, schools closing, businesses shutting down, and with all church activities canceled, we had an abundant amount of free time.  We drove to Mesa to stock up on some items (Diet Dr. Pepper etc.), took our time cleaning the church on Tuesday morning, I was able to sew a new quilt top together, Quinn made cinnamon rolls, and we killed time watching old reruns of Burn Notice on Hulu.  The missionaries were here to eat the cinnamon rolls on Wednesday night when we got the call from President Andrews that we were being sent home. Even though we had discussed this possibility and knew all signs were pointing in that direction, something about the finality of it just overtook me.  This mission has dominated my thoughts, plans, and life for almost a year and suddenly it was all over and I wasn’t willing to let it go. It felt too unfinished, and there were things I still wanted to experience. I couldn’t seem to stop crying that night (or yet).

Thursday morning we still had to attend district meeting in Globe.  We planned to go and say our goodbyes to the other missionaries. We found out the senior sisters had received the news to leave that morning, and that Elder Robinson would be leaving immediately too because he had hit the 21 month mark. We also got a call that morning from Sister Bay setting up an exit interview with President Andrews for late afternoon in Mesa.  After we left the district meeting, we met up with Sister Gourdin the branch Relief Society president to hand over the six quilt tops and say goodbye. We drove our final time to "the valley" as the locals call it, met with a very tired looking president, and ate a good meal at Jalapeno Bucks which has no indoor seating.

A 9-patch made out of all plaids.  My last top for the branch.

Sister Harston from Rigby, Idaho. We were in the MTC together and she came out with us. Sister Satersmoen from Minnesota.  She was lively and funny and had no filter.  

Elder Belnap from Ogden, Utah.  He was here the whole time we were and his mission was cut short by three months so he will go home the first of May.  Elder Austill from Georgia but his family moved to Utah right before his mission so he will go home there.  His mission ends early September.  These two were San Carlos missionaries so we saw them the most.

Elder Robinson who has already served 21 months and will go home soon.  Elder Davila Aleman who was raised in Peru? and I don't know when he leaves.

Sister Davis and Sister Flores.  They served in Globe and Sister Flores came from the Philippines so I made her make a video to send to Peachy talking in Tagalog.  

Finally I got a shot of the waterfall that formed this spring from all the rain.  It is on the drive through the canyon on the way to Superior.

This is Mt. Picketpost and is near Superior, AZ.

I took this picture for the pink flowers along the road, but it is also a good view of Mt. Triplet.

Before we left on Friday, it was important for us to tell some of the branch members ourselves that we had been sent home and say our goodbyes.  Quinn made a batch of bread and I made some pies and one last loaf of banana bread. We made the rounds to the following:

John Sanchez and his half sister Karen Martin. 
John is the facilitator for our ARP and has been sober for over 29 years!  I love to hear him talk and tell his story.  He is an inspiration for others.  He also has a funny sense of humor.  Karen would come and bake the birthday cakes in the trailer and take us around.  We missed doing it in March because she got sick with bronchitis.  She went through a difficult patch and strayed from the church but found her way back.  She has also overcome alcohol.

Veronica, Anthony (Gordo), Alyssa Bonilla and Michael Valentino (Tino) Garcia. 
The three older kids were in our seminary class.  

Patra and Freddie Lupe--lovers of banana bread.

Sister Woodie
She was on the Indian Placement program and has been active all her life.  She lost her mother recently and a daughter in November.  She is raising her daughter's two youngest sons now.

Sister Curley
She is the grandmother to seven of our seminary kids.  She has three living daughters and they all live on the reservation with her 20+ grandchildren.  Her son has health issues and she is caring for him herself rather than putting him in a facility.

Sister Shorten
She was also put on Indian Placement as a girl.  She graduated from BYU and served a mission in North Dakota.  She is sister to Sister Woodie.  She teaches the Sunday School lesson and gives a powerful testimony of the Book of Mormon.

David Wood and Mary Early Bird
Her kids are grown and then she was 'given' a baby to raise.  The little girl, Summer, was taking a nap when we were there.  Summer isn't walking yet.  She has outlived two husbands ("I didn't kill them.  They just got tired of me and there was no other way out.  I also wasn't a good cook.  That's why David won't marry me--he doesn't want to be #3.")  Can you tell she has a sense of humor?

This graffiti is on the youth center and the missionaries like to take their picture by it.  We also visited Will Hadley but I can't get his picture to download and Sister Boni who is featured in an earlier blog.

       When we got back to the trailer, Elder Belnap and Elder Austill were there to say goodbye before we got serious about the task of trying to fit everything into the car.  In a matter of hours we packed, cleaned the trailer, wrote out instructions for the next occupants of the trailer, and we were on our way. As we were stopped to lock the gate behind us one last time, the neighbor across the street Darrell was out picking weeds in the yard with another guy.  Darrell had come asking for food a couple of times and I had visited with him in his yard. He was a very soft spoken sweet man. I had Quinn take him and his helper some cold bottles of Dr. Pepper and tell them we were leaving. As we drove off, he gave us a big farewell wave.

We drove home by way of Show Low, AZ.  We had never been on that road and it takes you through Salt River Canyon which reminded us of Going-to-the-Sun Road in Glacier Park because it is so steep and vast.  Beautiful views, but too narrow of a road for me. We stopped to get pictures and followed a little path that lead to a CLIFF! I was way too nervous to get as close as Quinn did, so he took some of the pictures.  Then we went through Snowflake so I could get pictures of the temple we never got to attend. Next, was Winslow, AZ, which carried NO significance at all for the elders when we told them we were going that way. These elders are such babies!   At least our bishop understood when we sent him a picture on the way home. We stayed the night in Kanab at the same hotel we stayed in on the way down. The next day we had an uneventful trip home. We arrived to find all was well with a festive greeting thanks to Katie and Matt and some food in the fridge thanks to Audrey.

Views from the drive at Salt River Canyon.

Quinn at the end of the trail.  In front of him is a drop off that I refused to go near. 
He took the next picture looking over the edge!

Snowflake Arizona Temple

One of the corners in Winslow, Arizona.  Another one below.

What we saw when we arrived home.

       I think San Carlos was saying goodbye to me without my realizing it.  Our last night at the Detention Center went very well with two inmates asking for blessings from Quinn, our last seminary class was the best one we ever had with them actually interacting with us, the red bird showed back up and was flying from tree to tree as I walked around the parking lot for the last time, and we had one last beautiful sunset: 

San Carlos Week 10-March Coronavirus Madness

Well, this week sure didn’t turn out the way I was expecting.  It started fairly normal. Tuesday the elders planned a service project at Moonbase to pick up trash.  There were four sets of missionaries and we gathered trash for about an hour and a half and then Larry Brown (the resident manager?) served us lunch of deli sandwiches with pop and chips which was very nice of him.  He is a gentle, well traveled man and he was complaining about the Apaches and their dirty trash and how embarrassing it is (he can do that).  

Wednesday night at seminary we had six of the cousins show up on time!  I greeted them as usual and they ignored me and didn’t make eye contact as usual, and then I said, “So have you been keeping up on the coronavirus?”  That’s when everything changed. Heads came up and they started talking. Quinn (who had run back to the trailer to get something) walked in and was shocked to see them engaging!  You could tell it had been discussed in their homes and at school, because they had stories to tell. Jack, who never talks and acts like he hates us, was smiling, commenting, and was trying NOT to call us “white people” but couldn’t at first think of the word caucasian.  He was telling us about the San Carlos Hospital and who they would and would not admit (meaning us white people). We then moved on to their high school baseball teams because the night before Quinn and I had stopped to watch the boys play since we had some time to kill before picking up our passenger for ARP.  They had lots to say about the teams too. It was so fun to have them talking with us, we went on for 25 minutes, then we played a match game I had made and by then the three Bonilla kids showed up. After the lesson, they ate all the chocolate chip cookies Quinn made and we were in amazement at how well the night had gone.  I guess the takeaway from that experience is even the coronavirus has its positives.

Thursday we were in the trailer planning our lesson for the detention center when we got a text from Amber with the church’s announcement that all church services and activities had been canceled until further notice.  Whoa! Lots of phone calls and discussion about how to notify the members of the branch since they don’t all have cell phones, voicemail, internet, or email. The missionaries spent the next two days going to as many members as they could and we went to some too.  Once again, news somehow travels across this reservation in mysterious ways. Many of those visited already knew. We were supposed to have a baptism on Saturday for a nine-year-old girl named Heaven. They could have gone ahead with it, but I think everyone was too stunned by all the changes and hubbub going on that they decided to wait until next week. 

This was the paper products aisle at Fry's. We were looking for Kleenex, but no luck.

Friday I made four loaves of banana bread and we shared one loaf with the elders and took the other three to members (one being Freddie Lupe since he had called and requested more bread) .  We also gave the Lupes a ride to the Marketplace in downtown San Carlos. Most people go there to buy the fried chicken. When he got in the car we asked him if they were going for the chicken.  He said no, they were just going to smell it until they got full. Freddie has the corniest jokes: Why did the toilet paper roll down the hill? To get to the bottom. Saturday I made a big pot of chicken noodle soup.  I gave about half of it to Karen since she has been very sick for about two weeks with a hacking cough, and then shared the rest with the elders and Will.  

Today the mission president allowed us to get together as a district to have a short sacrament meeting.  We held it at our building since it is so very handy for us. Just six of us were there since the senior sisters had already flown to Idaho to attend a missionary farewell that didn’t happen.  We had singing (luckily the organ can be programmed to play on its own), prayers, the sacrament, listened to Brother Peter Johnson’s conference talk Power to Overcome the Adversary which seemed to have some pertinent points considering the current condition, and we were done.  Quinn and I had our own Come Follow Me study session, fed the elders, went for a drive, and now we are wondering how next week is going to go with no meetings to attend and no lessons to prepare. What will we do?  

 Got these two quilt tops done this week. The lower one still needs a border. I loved working with all the plaids so much, I have already cut all the pieces for a 9-patch quilt with just plaids. I should thank my friend Connie Tabor for giving me these suggestions on how to use up scraps.

I took this picture to show the hill BEHIND the sign is covered in purple flowers.  They don't show up very well.

Driving through the canyon to Mesa we saw several new waterfalls that have formed from all the spring rain we've had.  There is so much traffic on the road I can't get Quinn to go slow so I can snap pictures:(

More signs of spring. I am loving all the flowers blooming along the roads and everywhere. I wish I could get a picture with all the different colors and kinds of flowers.

This last week I missed a memorial service for my Aunt Connie Watson McCarrell who passed away in November.  I was sorry I couldn't go and see my Uncle Buddy and my cousins: Dean, DoriLyn and Dewey.  It has been many years since I saw them last, but at least I have been able to connect with Dori on Facebook. 

Took this picture on our drive today.  It is in Miami, AZ, and is a caterpillar truck inside the bed of a larger caterpillar truck.

Look at this beautiful grandson of mine!!  Can't wait to hold him next month.

The roadrunner seems to have accepted our presence here.  He often comes onto the church lawn while we are walking in the morning.

On this national day of prayer, I pray for peace and calm to permeate our lives this coming week.

San Carlos Week 9-Signs of Spring

I know spring has officially arrived when Quinn swings a golf club.  This happened Monday when we went to Apache Stronghold driving range.  Some other signs are the blooming trees, the hillsides covered in poppies, and the barrel cactus growing blossoms.

 This statue overlooks the first hole of Apache Stronghold Golf Course.

 

 A barrel cactus above that I hope will soon bloom and this pretty tree in Globe.  The hillside of poppies is hard to capture because if I get back far enough to see how they cover hill after hill, it loses the appearance of flowers, but the hills are alive!

Tuesday I went back to the dermatologist in Mesa for a follow-up appointment and we were approached in Walmart by a woman who said she’d been “looking” for LDS missionaries.  She was a baptized member, had become inactive, but had a month old baby and wanted to get back involved. Did we know if some missionaries could come by? We took down her information, sent it along to the mission office, and I am pretty certain she will soon get a visit by two missionaries if she hasn’t already.  If only every contact was that easy! 

Quinn made bread to take to the detention center on Thursday.  It was a real hit--especially with the men. We only had eight (the attendees are very fluid as far as who comes in and who gets out) so everyone got two slices with butter and jam.  They could see there was still some left in the container so someone mentioned, “Just keep buttering it until it’s gone.” Then they each got another half slice. That night, for the first time, two inmates asked for priesthood blessings, neither one LDS.  That tells you their faith in religion and blessings and prayer. Quinn was happy to oblige and they didn’t care if it was in front of the group. They are mostly concerned about their families.  
I haven't made mention of the conversation we had with the director of the DC who lives across the road from us. For some reason, he felt it necessary to tell us some of the darker beliefs, practices, and superstitions of the rez. If there had been a teleprompter across my forehead that printed the thoughts in my head, it would have read: Why is he telling us this? I don't want to know this stuff! I think his point was to tell us to come "prayed up" to the DC. Duh. Like we don't? For a while during his stories, I couldn't tell if he wanted us there or not, but he did finally say there are 33 churches in the area and only two religions come into the DC to teach (us and the Lutherans). As people come in and teach Christianity, the incidents for discipline go down. There is a direct correlation between Christianity and improved behavior of inmates, which reminded me of a quote in ARP by Boyd K. Packer which says, "The study of the doctrines of the gospel will improve behavior quicker than a study of behavior will improve behavior. Preoccupation with unworthy behavior can lead to unworthy behavior. That is why we stress so forcefully the study of the doctrines of the gospel."
Because of the data, he said he is done letting medicine men come in and do cleansing ceremonies and following the "old ways". All he wants is people who come in and teach of Christ. That part made us feel good, because teaching the inmates has been a more positive experience than teaching the seminary kids.

 We drove up to see the "airport".  We couldn't tell if it was still operational, but I did get a kick out of these signs.  The one above says: AIR CRAFT HAS RIGHT OF WAY.  The picture below I showed to the guys at the DC and they said, "Oh yeah, people use to jog up there, huh?"  Not anymore.

 The statue above is in front of the entrance to Apache Gold Casino.  Below are some people getting ready to perform at the Pow Wow.  The feather headdress has a beaded center.

  I got the wall quilt back from the quilters and got the binding on it and hung it in place.  I also finished two tops from the material from the RS closet this week.  The top one is what I did with all the small scraps left over from the blue and red quilt tops.

One of us unknowingly stepped on this scorpion near the dining table.  We didn't notice it until after it was mashed.  It was a good opportunity to try out the black light flashlight and see if they do glow green.  Sure enough.  I refuse to walk in this house without shoes on.  We now have sticky traps out.

Saw this rainbow over Bucket Mountain on the way home from Globe tonight.  We had taken John to ARP.  We sure enjoy him and his sense of humor--he is the quiet type though.  We dropped him off at a birthday party his niece was having for him, his brother, and his sister--all with birthdays in March.  Perfect picture for March/leprechauns/pot of gold.