Week 9 - Hegsted Mission

 18-September-2022-Sunday:

After watching stake conference via Zoom, we went to the site to work a 12 to 4 shift.  However it was so busy we stayed until 5.  We had another amazing day with the number of people who came through the site.  When we arrived at noon, there had not been a soul there, but that soon changed.

It seemed like it was Utah day at the site as many people had come from Utah.  I took through a group of 6 young men from Cedar City, Utah.  All work construction and wanted to take a roadtrip and considered  both Florida's and New England.  They were amazing young men.  I forget the energy that youth have. I took them to the foundations and they were out taking pictures before I could stop the cart.  They had been to the Brigham Young birthplace already.  Somewhere, someone has taught these young men well.

As people continued to come in, we had a time when all the rooms were filled with people and two families showed up with 9 people each so I just combined them and took all 18 through.  It was like having a bus.  I think people are tired of the Covid restrictions and are ready to travel and thus we are seeing such a good turn out.

President and Sister Ewer want to meet tomorrow to review the script for the virtual tours.  This will help me understand what I need to do for videos.

19-September-2022-Monday:

It was a very long, but blessed day.  We started with our normal Monday devotional at 8:45 in the Ewer resistance.  We had to keep the meeting short so we could be over at the visitors' center ready for a bus that was scheduled to come at 9:30.  We were told two important things beyond the bus announcement.  The lift comes in tomorrow for putting up Christmas Lights and the Wilcox's will leave tomorrow to attend a wedding at home.   The Ewers were meeting with FM/Historical site leaders that had come to visit the site as part of their annual inspections so the Ewers could only meet the bus and then had to go to their respective meetings.  We watched the FM people walk over the grounds, I am sure they discussed issues with Bob our facilities employee.  I noticed that our FM couples avoided the area.  I hope they were able to meet them and that they complimented them on the work they are doing.

On Sunday, the weather report was negative with rain falling all morning, but the rain ceased and did not do much for 2 hours and thus the bus, which stayed longer than normal enjoyed better weather than we expected.  It was sponsored by the daughters of the Utah pioneers as well as the Brigham Young family and many of the people we visited with had been to the site in the past and had served missions.  All in all a spiritual experience was had.

Dede and I left at noon to come home and eat as we had the 2 to 6 pm shift.  The site was quite busy from noon until about 4:30.  Busy in a fun way.  I have noticed that the current crowds tend to have more time to spend at the site and thus tend to linger and ask more questions.  I took two brothers through who were not members of the church.  The younger had been at the site several times and he wanted his older brother to experience it.  As nonmembers they had so many questions and we probably spent 90 minutes talking about the site and answering questions about the church; both its history as well as current practices in our meetings etc.  I am so grateful that we are a historical site and I can visit with these good people without feeling pressure to convert them.  Rather, I can just answer their questions in a kind way and pray that they will feel the spirit and someday desire to know more.  We had some other grand people visit us who were members and who just wanted to stay and soak in the spirit of the site.  This is such a common reaction by those who come. here.

After closing down the site, we went over to the Ewers for a dinner followed by a discussion on the text for the virtual tour.  Sister Ewer has worked so hard on this script and has had it blessed and edited by Aaron at the history department.  My first reaction is, I would have done it differently, but then I realize that it was not my assignment and thus I was not given the inspiration she was receiving as the assigned person.  Thus I will attempt to put my foolish prideful thoughts behind me and focus on my job.  Creating a video to play in the background which will enhance the words, not distract from the text, while helping bring in the spirit.  This is daunting for me.  I have been playing with iMovie for the past few weeks to learn how to create and edit videos.  I wish I had my daughters here to support me.

May God bless me.  May He bless me not to let my frustrations with the video project spill over and impact Dede and also those I work with.  I worry most about Dede as the natural man tends to hurt those he loves first while keeping up an air of competency for the rest of the world to see.  Dede already puts up with much more crap from me than she deserves.  She carries too much of our shared load and she has to deal with it and my prideful ways.  I pray for her that God may bless her with increased understanding and that I will listen to her concerns which will probably be many.

20-September-2022-Tuesday:

A much quieter day.  We had the early shift and took but two couples through the site.  Both were special and had a desire to feel the spirit of the site.  We arrived early to replace video that would not work.  If you take the video with the camera upright, the perspective is wrong in the final video, so we replaced much if it.  Since it had been rainy the clouds allowed for wonderful video up the lane to the site and down to the foundations.  We also took a number of pictures in the site.

We came home and after a walk in the rain, I began working on the video finishing scenes 1 and 2 which I combined into one video.  At least a first draft and then began working on video three.

21-September-2022-Wednesday:

What a lovely day.  After several days of overcast and rain, it was a day without rain.  Not that the area does not need the rain, but regardless I personally enjoyed the break.  It was our P-Day which we started by going to the site to continue to put up Christmas lights.  Dede was helping me when at 9am a car from New York showed up to a closed site, which opens at 10 am.  I sent Dede over to greet them and offer them a tour even though she was not dressed in the normal attire.  What a blessing for these people to be greeted when no one should have been there to greet them.  Dede has such a way with people and her great love just shines through especially as she teaches with the Spirit which is always found at the site.  We have lights on both buildings (visitors' center and President's home) nearly completed.  We still need to put up the high gable ends of the buildings.  I had looked at the lights in past years and felt these buildings were inadequately lit and thus lost.  Thus I ran double strings of lights in the outlines and added more strings on the posts of the porches and covered two or three sides so they will stand out better.  We also decorated a bush by the back door.  It is bright red and it will really stand out because we put a lot of lights on it.  I am enjoying this way too much and I am sure I am too prideful in what I do; wanting everything to stand out and proclaim that this was well done.

We left at noon, went home and ate and went back to Quechee Gorge which as we hoped would be running with more water due to the recent rain storms.  Obviously rain is good when we are working, just not when we are playing.  We were not disappointed and I will post a few pictures of the gorge and the water running over the dam into a waterfall/cascade above the gorge.  It was so pleasant to hike among the tall trees.  The paths are excellent.  It was however obvious that the rain had been extreme as there were places where the trail was partially washed away.  We went back to the bridge at Quechee to view that water fall and watch for a few minutes the glass blowers at work.  The turbine at this places was running with the return of the water.  One can go down and see it and hear it.

We returned home to allow me to continue working on the video for the remote tours.  It is so good to have a script so I can actually know what I need to do to begin putting together pictures and video already taken.  I must admit, that I am stuck between two extremes based on my pride.  At one extreme, I am afraid to even try because I am sure that what I do will not be acceptable to the Lord and  probably more important, to my prideful heart, my fellow missionaries.  The other extreme is I am trying so hard to get inspiration and I worry that I will not allow others to critic my work and send me back to toiling again on the same video.  Pride is such a wonderful tool of Satan and such a debilitator.

We went to the local store in Sharon to get a hamburger and fries.  The store was established in 1815, the year when Joseph Smith Sr left Vermont for New York.  Obviously it is much more modern than what I would imagine was once a small store.  It is also where I try to always purchase gas.  Their prices are good and I am helping a local business, so it is a win-win for us.

As we drove out I turned left instead of right (toward our home) to see where route 14 goes in an eastern direction.  We had driven part of it, but we went all the way to White River Junction, VT and then over the river into West Lebanon, NH.  Since we were there we stopped and bought groceries.  This road is so beautiful as it follows the White River the majority of the way going through a number of towns and villages.  

At the end of the day, Dede cut my hair.  What a blessing.  When it gets longer it is hard to take care of.  When properly cut to missionary length I do not even need to comb it in the morning.  Another blessing for the lazy.

22-September-2022-Thursday

At the beginning of the day, Dede reminded me that today was the anniversary of the day Joseph received the plates from the angel Moroni and was able to begin translation, or least to begin to become familiar with the plates, the new seer stones (U&T) etc.  What a glorious day in our history.

As we had the late shift, I spent the morning working on videos.  There are 15 scenes for which I need to create video coverage.  I have created draft versions for six of these by the end of the day.  The pace is picking up and although it is still difficult, I am getting better at it.  In the evening, speaking to Danielle, I asked her what I did not know about iMovie.  An unfair question, but I received a wise answer.  I am not backing up iMovie anywhere and could lose everything.  Tomorrow when we go to NY for the Hot Air Balloon Show we will stop and purchase a hard drive so we can back everything up.

Some of the scenes for the video are so easy as we have plenty of material to cycle through during the scene.  Some are very difficult.  For example we tell a story about Joseph's sister Sophronia and there is absolutely nothing on site beyond the pictures of Joseph Sr and Lucy which we have already used a great deal to show while telling the story.  This will be followed by the famous Leg story, which is longer and for which we have a single picture to use.  Such are the challenges.  I just need to remember that God is in charge and not to block any inspiration He might send.

It rained all morning.  The missionaries were supposed to come and put up Christmas lights in the lane.  It not only rained, but poured so that did not work well.   I was so glad we worked yesterday morning and put up lights while still having time to do some fun activities.  (Not that putting up Christmas lights is not fun for me.)

We had a surprisingly busy afternoon at the site.  About 25 visitors came through as the sun poked out and gave us periods of beautiful weather.  The mums which we planted a few weeks ago are finally breaking out in bloom and the leaves are just starting to change colors.   I will also post a picture of my burning bush.  I.e. a bush with a lot of red lights we decorated.

One couple was fun and Dede spent quite a bit of time with them.  The rain crushed their plans so he looked for an alternative and ended up at the Goodrich Farm to learn about Maple Syrup.  When Sister Goodrich realized they were members, she encouraged them to come to the site.  She said you could hold your breath while driving here.  Not quite true, it is about an hour, but again I stand all amazed at how God gets people to the site.  I took through a threesome where the daughter was a member and the parents were not although all were from Logan.  I then took through a threesome, a mother, daughter and nonmember friend.  The daughter plans to submit missionary papers so when we got to the restoration room, I let her teach a first discussion to her friend.  It was kind of fun although she needs to learn a bit more about the restoration which she will do on her mission.

23-September-2022-Friday

We worked the morning shift and from 11 on it was busy.  How blessed we were.  I was able to witness the fulfillment of President Campbell's blessing to Dede.  She managed a large number of people giving each group and individual the time and attention they needed.  His words to her was she would be like a 100 missionaries.  Meanwhile, I took through two men who are doing research on Church History.  It was not clear for whom or if just for themselves, but they had lots of contacts in the history department and were texting with some of them while we visited.  Neither had been to the site and I enjoyed sharing photos and those things which I knew with them.  It was definitely not the normal tour.  The weather is changing and may I also say it was downright cold after all our rain.

At 1:50 everyone left and so at 2:00 Dede and I loaded up and headed over to Glenn Falls to see the annual Adirondack Ballon Festival.  It is a beautiful drive through Vermont (note there are no direct roads or interstates that run east to west in Vermont, so it is all highways that are really just local roads.  We went through Rutland so the first part of the road we know well from attending church.  When we left we were worried due to the high winds and that is what we found there and so the balloons did not go off.  

After walking through all the vendor booths and tents we headed to Walmart to buy a backup drive.  Danielle pointed out to me that I was taking a huge risk doing all of this video compiling and editing and risked losing everything if I had a failure on the Mac's drive or the Mac itself.  May I say, I was driven to solve this problem and thus the stop.  I would die if I lost the work I have done.  Yes my photos and raw video are backed up to the cloud, but not the videos I am creating in iMovie.  Again, my life is blessed by my children.

Since we could not see the balloons, we decided to go to the Oliver Cowdery birth site which is in Wells Township near the NY border and about 45 minutes away from Glenn Falls.  Thank you Elder Buswell for pointing this out to me so I would think to go there.  We got to the place just as the light of day was ending, but were able to get pictures.  I thought the Joseph Smith birth site was out of the way.  Oliver's site is really out of the way, up a dirt road and basically at the edge of a yard with a run down trailer.  There is a spot that a bus could turn around, so I could see tour guides taking people there.  Anyway it was great to think about Oliver.  We do not usually mention him at the site, he comes into the picture much later into Joseph's life than Vermont.  However, I have the utmost of respect for this dear man who devoted so much to the bringing forth of the Book of Mormon, both writing and then working on the publishing and had such wonderful experiences with Joseph Smith in the restoration of the Priesthood.

We stopped in Rutland and ate at Five Guys and were reminded of home.  I am sure people thought I am nuts for taking this picture.

24-September-2022-Saturday

Spent the morning learning how to back up my laptop so that the iMovie work that I am doing will not be lost in the event of a mishap with my laptop or hard drive.  I feel much more secure after this action but will need to remember to connect my external drive and allow backups to happen when I come in each evening.  I do not need to lose my 116 pages of manuscripts (i.e. my video work).

Besides taking a nice walk, I spent most of the morning working on videos.  We then worked the afternoon shift and were busy the entire evening.  We had a couple come in at 5 pm so even the last hour was occupied.  With WiFi down at the site, it is harder to work on videos, but I have been pleasantly surprised that I have not been able to work more on the videos due to the many visitors.  I am working on scene 7 of 15, so I need to pick up the pace.

Most of our visitors were from Utah, which has been the case for September.  I think people just want to get out.  We had five people come in which included a 95 year old gentleman.  He was so sweet and appreciative of all that we did for them and came back to thank us after the tour which included a trip down to the foundations.  I hope I can become like that as I age and not become a grumpy old man which is my tendency.