Week 50 - Hegsted's Mission
9-July-2023-Sunday
We arrived at 9 am to Rutland, so Dede could go to branch council meeting. President Stone told us that power had just returned to the building a few minutes before and it destroyed the speaker system. On Friday, Killington got hit with a heavy storm, 2-inches of rain in an hour. Apparently it blocked highway 4 just outside of Killington with a mudslide and a large pile of rocks. We use RT 100, and we came across a place where it appears they had a smaller flood across the road which left trees and lots of mud, but did not shut down the road.
With an extra 1/2 hour, I had plenty of time to practice. This was good because the chorister has every hard song scheduled for this month. The bad news, is I do not play enough and by the end of the hour, my hands were dead and so I was playing worse than at the start. Oh well. I played for primary. The regular primary chorister is back, but still weak from her pregnancy so both she and Dede led. So playing was fine.
When we got to the site, it began raining and rained the full time we were there. At one point pouring, but steady after that. We had the Yule family come in with a brother and his family, so we had 19 there and two other groups of 3 and 5, so it was a great day despite the rain.
Jake had texted us about his daughter's operation and we spoke to him for a few minutes. What a miracle that his daughter is okay and the surgery went so very well. She will not be playing ball for 8 months, but it should all return to normal after that. Again may I say, God is good.
We are home now and nearly ready to eat. We are supposed to get about 0.6 inches of rain today and 2.2 inches tomorrow. It is amazing to look at the White River and White River Brook which runs through the site. When we arrived the River was so low, I could not believe the fish were surviving. The brook was so small, I am sure the trout were all forced out and down into the river. Both are much fuller than I ever saw last year.
Finally I took Dede to the Sharon Historical Society Museum. They have fun pictures, and I will show a few. The first two locate and then show the school where Joseph Smith Sr. probably taught school. The next photo shows a log chain which they stretched across the river to hold logs for the saw mill. Then a picture showing William and Bessie Clifford, who owned the home on the church property.
I walked for about 90 minutes and was later joined by Dede. Faye Brook was incredible. Early this spring there was a waterfall of significant volume. Today it looked like a cascade there was so much water flowing down it. Faye Brook Road was closed just above Clifford Road. They had also closed VT 14 (our route to the site) in Royalton and thus were forcing vehicles at the intersection of Faye Brook Road and VT 14 to go over the bridge to River Road if they wanted to continue north, knowing that VT 14 would be closed after S. Royalton. This closure happened early in the day. The amount of logs and debris floating down the river and the closeness to the banks was amazing. Still it is about 8 foot lower than when Irene hit in 2011. I spoke to man standing by the river in front of his house. The river was about 6 inches from the road and his house had flooded during Irene. He seemed to believe he would not flood this year. Another group had created a "camping" spot right on the river with electricity for their camper. They had lost a tent and were pulling up everything they could and leaving. Several cities in Vermont are totally isolated. Ludlow down south is getting the most press. However last night the roads to Stratford were all closed. I think most there are above the water, but it is not convenient. My car and the puddle in the parking lot. The River. Irene reached another 8 foot to the first section of the piling for the interstate seen here and the emergency vehicles blocking the road.
11-July-2023-Tuesday
Awoke to sunshine this morning, although it did not last long before the sun found a cloud to hide behind. The puddle in front of the car is gone. I saw travel on VT 14, so hopefully we can get to the site for our 10 am schedule. No issues getting to the site and there was a family just leaving as we arrived. We then had 13 people come in after these so we had a nice morning with people who came in.
We had stopped and invited the Arbon's (Camp Joseph camp hosts) to dinner tonight. I also set up with him to take him on the gator trails so he can show his family when they come in July. The Arbon's are such nice people and we had a great time with them during dinner.
I had Elder Arbon leave me at the top of Patriarch Hill so I could walk down the trail and take GPS coordinates at different places. This finishes up many of the places I want GPS coordinates down below. I still need to do some places above the site. But I am getting most of my coordinates done so I can continue with my review, which is actually making progress.
Tomorrow we will go to the temple. The interstate is open and going south is safe. A sister in the branch asked us to do some male names for her.
12-July-2023-Wednesday-PDAY
We left for the temple 30 minutes earlier, needing to get there 30 minutes earlier than normal, but not knowing the impact on traffic hitting the Boston area 30 minutes earlier would have. Basically, it took about the same amount of time, but the slow traffic was in different places than we normally experience. Regardless we got there shortly before 9 am and were allowed right in to do initiatory as other people did not show up who had scheduled appointments, so there was not pressure to get the 4 names done we planned to do.
Other than being hard to stay awake, the endowment session went well and had a few more people than normal. We were delighted to the see the Thomases from Maine. They missed last month, but often do the endowment and sealing sessions with us. Just great people and we had our favorite sealer again today. He is so great. He fell this morning but seemed to be okay. One just worries for people at that age when they fall.
As we were waiting in the sealer's office for everyone to gather for the sealing appointment, a woman walked in who was not scheduled. The sealer asked her if she would rather be doing an endowment, but she said she felt she needed to be in the sealing session instead. After chatting for a minute she asked us if we knew a family in Chubbuck whose child married her child. The answer was no, but then she said she had moved to Rexburg, ID. I asked her if she knew the Arbon's whom we had for dinner last night, but expected no for an answer as they have been there less than a year. To our surprise, she knew them from when she lived in Mass. and he had been her bishop for a short time. She was delighted to know they now live in Rexburg. We told her she needed to bring her grandchildren up to the Site and over to Camp Joseph to have a reunion. She finally stated, "I am so glad I followed the prompting to attend the session." God is so good.
We hit Costco and a super Walmart on the way home. We have not been to Costco for at least 6 weeks. We are getting better and buying in larger quantities just what we need from there and getting everything else local. We were home by 6:30 and decided to drive up to High Falls outside of Stratford. It was our third time there. Last year in late August it was really just a trickle. Earlier this year it was a nice falls. But after all the rain on Monday, it was great. I will provide pictures, but video would be better as the sound adds to the power of the falls. It was a nice little hike after traveling so far. On the way up, the Stratford church door was open so we stuck our heads in to look at their stain-glass windows. Very nice, a a small choir was practicing and they were good. On the way home we saw a black bear. This was an adult, so larger than the last one we saw. I did not get a good picture as he was on the move, but will provide what I got. Now if we could just see a Moose. Vermont has enough signs about Moose you would think one would show up as much as we travel around. It is not like they are shy critters.
13-July-2023-Thursday
We had the morning to work on my review and for Dede to sew. However, Jon had sent me my fly rod with some bass lures. I was good for an hour before opening the package and realizing I had everything but leader. I was ready to dismiss this and Dede said, oh look, we can just run over to the Orvis shop in Woodstock. They will have the stuff you want. So we did and it was closed. I did manage to get some non-fly leader from the general store, but am kicking myself for wasting the time. Dumb me. We came home and ate and ordered what I need from Amazon.
It was interesting to go through Pomfret to Woodstock and back. There were several homes and barns that were flooded. Flooding can be so interesting, where one person's home is impacted while other around see no impact. This was however not the case for Montpelier and Barre, which had several feet of water pouring down main street on Monday and still there on Tuesday. These cities were hit harder than Irene hit them, while our area to Rutland had a milder case. Unfortunately Montpelier and Barre are larger towns with many businesses impacted by the flooding. The cost will be in the $ millions. These cities are about 45 minutes up the interstate from us, but for us life returned to normal on Tuesday. With the exception of the large thunder claps I am hearing as I type. It is good to remember that we never know the pain people are experiencing so close around.
We left for the site early as girls from the Conn. stake were coming at 1 pm to do tours. That was fun as it was a great group and they divided by ward and we took through three separate groups. I tried moving into the theatre. These poor girls have been rained on and when they sat down in the darkened theatre, they struggled to stay awake. Add to that my boring presentation and I was feeling bad for them. Right after that we had a wonderful 4 generational family with grandparents from Peru. I was so impressed. Their English was not great, but their testimonies really were. Elder Buswell had given them the information outside and I took them down below. We then repeated everything inside. It was good to repeat due to the language barrier.
Had two nonmembers. Only wanted a moment. He was however interested in the old rocking chair. He has some knowledge of antiques and gave me a five minute overview of what he thought. I will probably not look at the chair the same way in the future. He wanted to know when the conversion process would start. I told him I did not need to convert him, but had a pond of water when he was ready for baptism so we got over that hurdle. It was a fun visit. Had another single nonmember who has nonmember friends. We do not realize the impact we have on people. Finally we had two families who were just plain fun to have at the site.
The day ended with a brief, but aggressive thunderstorm as we left telling the Arbon's about their friend Iris whom we met in the temple yesterday. I awoke this morning thinking about the miraculous way God can make things happen and that was truly marvelous and yet so simple. No fun pictures today.
14-July-2023-Friday
We had about 45 minutes at the start of our shift to dead-head flowers and do a little weeding. Then we received a steady flow of visitors that did not let up until our shift ended after 2 pm. No groups larger than 5 and several single people. We had both members and nonmembers so it was a great day.
We came home and Dede made dessert and creamy potatoes for our monthly dinner with the missionaries. Always good to get together. Beyond a little work on their review not much happened to day.
15-July-2023-Saturday
Jon sent me my fly rod and some bass flies and I went fishing this morning in the pond at Camp Joseph. I caught one, but finally figured out where the fish were hiding out. Be interesting to see if they are there next time. The pond was absolutely full of salamanders. There were times when I would look over the side of the canoe and see 15salamanders in a 6 foot square of water. I saw two turtles, I am assuming one was a snapping turtle. It was about 18-20 inches across the shell. When it stuck up its head, it was as large as my fist. Very impressive. I think the other was a painted turtle from the coloring. With all the salamanders, I cannot imagine the bass were very hungry. I should have put on a popper once I found the fish and will try that next time. Always such fun to have a bass hit a surface lure.
Home and a shower and then an hour on the review before going into the site. Oh I forgot, we had the best left-overs for lunch. Praise my wife.
When we got to the site, there was a couple with the last name of Pennington who were there to visit the Buswells. He is a convert from Kansas and the missionary who baptized him was Kim Wahlen, my cousin from Aberdeen. Such a small world. He told Dede and I two fun stories. His father was not thrilled about missionaries. He told Kim to leave, but after fretting about it all night, Kim came back. I do not think the father joined, but the 16 year old son did join. He then told Dede that he went to BYU and met Kim and Jan Wahlen and they invited him to come to their home near Aberdeen to visit, probably at Thanksgiving. He was new to the church and did not know anything about how an LDS home should work. At breakfast, Chet (Kim's father) announced it was time for prayer. Pennington assumed he would say grace, but Chet stood up and kneeled by his chair as did the entire family. Chet then proceeded to bless each person around the table including this new convert who had never been prayed for in that manner before. He said it made such a profound impression on his life that he will never forget it. So cool to hear stories like this involving people I know and love.
We had a steady day at the site. My favorite family had 5 children and were from Nevada. They came in and we had three people from Cedar City area. It turned out that they had soooo many common acquaintances that it was just fun to have them together. At the restoration board, the five children came up with the neatest things for which they were thankful. I do not think I have seen young people come up with such thoughtful ideas. Everyone in the room felt the spirit from these young people.
By 5:30 people stopped coming in and so we were gone by 6 pm and headed to Lebanon to shop and then eat at Chilies. It was fun to be with Dede and enjoy a good meal.
Comments
Post a Comment