On Tuesday we had our first trip up toward Yosemite to the
city of Oakhurst. It was great to be in the
mountains! There was better scenery than
the photo shows, but we were concentrating on other things so didn’t get pics
of the most beautiful and mountainous spots.
Len had to back the pickup with the enclosed mission moving trailer
behind it down a hill into a driveway that sloped down in another
direction. He had to hit the narrow
driveway that ran alongside the house without hitting the house or falling off
the other side of the drive. He nailed
it on the first try. So grateful for his
experiences backing the manure spreader into the barn in his youth! No experience is ever wasted.
That was our biggest move.
It was a two-fer where we picked up furnishings from an apartment that
senior employment office missionaries just vacated in greater Fresno and took
them straight to Oakhurst to furnish an apartment for senior Membership and
Leader Support missionaries who will arrive next weekend.
The other photo is of the church/ward we attend on Sundays. It is unusual architecture for an LDS
building. Somewhat dated but the
members are very fond of it and they are a warm-hearted bunch of people. We are glad to get to know them. We have been participating in Ward Choir
rehearsals since they restarted three weeks ago.
Here is an anecdote we heard from a recent Sacrament Meeting talk on the Holy Spirit:
I want to tell you about an experience I had as a young teenager. I was
born and raised in Rexburg, Idaho - home of Ricks College and now BYU Idaho.
For any of you that have had the privilege of being there during the winter,
you understand how treacherous the driving conditions can be.
One particular winter evening on the weekend, I was looking forward to
driving several miles out of town to a friend’s house who lived on a large
farm. We had made plans to have dinner with his family and then retreat to the
game room to play pool and watch a movie. The weather outside was fairly
typical for that time of year as the wind was blowing 15 to 20 miles per hour
and it was snowing steadily. After a minute or two of considering whether or
not it would be wise to head out that evening on the roads, I came to the
conclusion that sitting home bored was much worse than the possibility of
getting stuck in a snowdrift in zero degree weather. In all honesty, I wasn’t worried
and neither did my parents seem to be, (or at least they pretended not to be)
as I had driven safely in much worse conditions. I said a prayer inside prior
to departing, that I would be safe and a feeling of comfort fell upon me. I
departed home and drove out into the storm and proceeded on my way without any
problem.
Along my drive I saw only one other set of tire tracks, barely
noticeable on the road as the new snow and blowing wind had covered the road
almost completely. Every so often there would be a one to three foot barrier of
wind-drifted snow that I very, very much enjoyed driving through in a sport
fondly known in those parts as “Drift
Busting”. Luckily the storm hadn’t been
going for more than a couple of hours, since my vehicle was a old 1976 Ford
Sedan with rear wheel drive, and busting through three foot snowdrifts were
about its limit.
At around mile eight of a ten mile one way trip there is a small canyon where
the country road cuts down along one side and then meanders through the bottom
and goes back up along the other side onto the home stretch about a mile before
reaching the home of my friend. I had all but lost sight of the tire tracks
from the previous vehicle, but caught a glimpse of them momentarily before
coming to the sharp turn that headed down into the small canyon. Just then, a
thought popped into my head as I turned down the steep road into the canyon, “...what
if the vehicle which left the tire tracks didn’t make that curve and ran off
the road and down the side of the ravine?” I thought. I slowed down and thought
for a moment and then decided that for sure that couldn’t be the case because
No One in their right mind would be out driving in this weather... unless they
were familiar with the roads and therefore wouldn’t make that error. I continued on through the ravine and up out
the other side within sight of my relaxing evening at my friend’s home. The thought
then came into my mind again, only stronger and nearly like a slap to the side
of my head. I immediately recognized
that the thought wasn’t my own. I carefully turned around and made my way back
up to the other side of the canyon. I
was still convinced there would be nothing, but I had to show the “not so still
and not so small voice” that in this case I was right. I couldn’t see any tracks going off the road
but I parked and got out of my car with a flashlight and pointed it down the
steep side. I didn’t see anything. My thoughts then told me to climb DOWN the
side. “What?!” my thoughts argued back. In tennis shoes? “Yes, in tennis shoes”, the other thought
replied. So I did and about seventy-five
feet down, there they were: taillights of a car that couldn’t be seen because
of the snow flurries, until I was about thirty feet away. I climbed down the rest of the way to the car
and there in the driver’s seat sat a person, his head slumped on the steering
wheel. I was nervous, but not scared and I tapped on the window when suddenly
his head popped up and made me jump what felt like three feet in the air. I’m still not sure who was more surprised. He
turned out to be a boy, Timothy, about my same age, who used to go to school
with me, but had moved to a smaller town thirty miles away. He had bumped his
head fairly good, but otherwise was just fine. I helped him climb out and up
the steep hill to my car, and then while driving the remaining distance to my
friend’s house, he told me that his home life was chaotic with all kinds of
fighting and strife and that he had stormed out and driven for hours before running
off the road. All the while, I kept thinking in my head what would the result
have been if I hadn’t stopped and this young man had been left to stay in his
car feeling hopeless with temperatures that would have gone well below zero for
the night. I felt very humbled.
Needless to say, my friend and his family were surprised when I showed
up with an extra mouth to feed for dinner. There was even more adventure that
night using a farm tractor to pull his vehicle out, among other things, but
I’ve never questioned since that day how real it is and how important it is to
trust in the Holy Spirit.
