Jan. 4, 2009

January 4, 2009—Fast Sunday--------------Church, prayers and a cockroach
Just a note about today. We went to both of our branches for church—1st branch @ 8:00AM and 9th @ 2:00 PM. We walked home and got lost which took us 3.7 KM instead of 1.7 KM. But that is alright because we saw a part of PP we haven’t seen before.
Church was good but I got a surprise in the 1st branch when a young man about 22 years old who is getting baptized next week asked me to baptize him. I believe today is the first time I have really met him but I casually talked to him last week. I don’t even know how to say the baptismal prayer in Kamahi. I must learn it this week.
In the 9th branch Sunday school class I was trying to stay awake because I couldn’t understand too much—actually hardly anything—when I noticed something moving across the front wall of the chapel. It was the biggest cockroach I have ever seen! It was just crawling around—first on the crown molding and then on the wall below the crown molding. It was obvious to all in the class but it was like no one cared—it seemed to be a common occurrence to all in attendance but me. Well, it finally fell to the floor up on the stand and I couldn’t see it anymore but at least now I was awake. I was grateful mom was in Primary or I’m sure she would have screamed. Well, the cockroach was gone—back to staying awake. On a sudden it appeared again but this time it flew from where it had crawled on a chair on the stand and hit the teacher who was teaching us on his neck and began crawling around his neck between his shirt collar and his neck! He merely brushed it off (remember this thing was at least 2” long with those big antenna’s) and kept right on teaching! No one in the class made a peep but now I was really glad mom wasn’t with me. Even had she not screamed before, she most certainly would have now. But I was grateful the teacher didn’t step on it because it would have really made terrible crackling, crunching noises and there would have been a big spot of slimy cockroach guts on the tile floor. The critter went scurrying off to the pulpit, up the pulpit, around the pulpit and then flew off to the other side of the room, slammed into the wall and hung there for a while. They aren’t the most graceful flying insect—nothing like a butterfly—more like a drunken June bug. Again it fell to the floor out of my sight. Back to the “I-can-hardly-understand-a word-you-are-saying-in-Kamahi” lesson. But by now class is over and Priesthood meeting has begun.
The missionaries were teaching the priesthood lesson and one of them was translating for me and I was really in to it when, Alas! Here came the cockroach again! It was racing across the floor right for the shoes of the missionary who was teaching the lesson. My translator missionary gave him a “heads-up”; he looked around and saw the monster just as it was ready to crawl up his pant leg. He gave it a kick and it landed on its back about 4 feet away and began trying to upright himself by wiggling his legs and shell. But to no avail—he couldn’t tip himself over and I watched him struggle for about 20 minutes until he died right there during priesthood meeting. Well, was that the end of my lesson on cockroachology? Not really. After the closing prayer in priesthood mom came in, everyone else had left but the teacher of the Sunday School class. I took him and mom with me to the dead remains of the cockroach, feet sticking straight in the air, and mom almost screamed right there. She got all goose bumpy and when the teacher told her how it had been crawling around his neck she got pale in her face and had to leave the scene. We walked home.
End of cockroach saga? Not really. We come home from church, we’re very hungry because it’s fast Sunday and so we kneel to have prayers. It’s mom’s turn and as usual she is praying for quite a while and I’m again fighting sleep when I hear the most amazing words I have ever heard her pray. She brings up the cockroach! This is pretty close to an exact quote: “Heavenly Father, help me to look at cockroaches as one of Thy beautiful creations. Help me to not scream if I were to see one again”. Heavenly Father, please help me to see them only in Thy beautiful outdoors and please, not in our apartment”. Heavenly Father, help me to see them with the excitement and enthusiasm that little Reed would have—to love them as he would for he would see them as one of Thy amazing creations and want to catch them and play with them”. I’m wide awake again! Did I hear what I thought I heard? Was mom praying about cockroaches and integrating it with her prayers over her grandchildren? Yes! That is what I heard—I was not dreaming! Oh, how I love your mother. She prays about anything and everything. I will continue to spray our apartment. Love Dad