Parkinson's at Navajo Nation: Best of the Rez Week 11

Best of the Rez Week 11 March 27 to April 3

We will call this the week of learning. It is always interesting to start a new life as a missionary in a new country (yes, the Navajo Nation is a sovereign nation) with a completely new culture. After two months of hearing how badly you are needed, we finally learn that half of the ward leadership does not want any help and the other half will just not show up and expect missionaries to rush in and save the day. Only big problem is that Elder Parkinson is on the ‘we don’t want any help’ end regardless of the need, and I am on the ‘rush in and save end’ because the ward primary leaders don’t care enough to show up (which is only perpetuating the problem). The Primary has 2 workers; the president and a counselor. The president has not shown up for 7 out of the 10 weeks. The counselor did not show up for 3 of them leaving the primary completely unstaffed. What to do? Elder Parkinson offered to help with the Aaronic Priesthood but the Bishop said no. He offered to teach Temple Prep—again no. Finally, we called for help and now we are getting an understanding of how the church in Rez land operates. After hearing a ton of different stories, we are going to refind, reteach, retrain, teach seminary, teach piano lessons, and play in our garden.

So, after that big adjustment the week actually was rather slow. Maybe you would say that we were on a Merry-Go-Round this time.

1) Okay, I was scalped and have a complete men’s hairdo. Sunday in church one of the ward members, Sister Curley, stood up and said that she was so thankful for Brother and Elder Parkinson to be here. Elder Parkinson leaned over and asked which one I wanted to be. Brother—I said—I don’t have the Priesthood. I said it had to be the new mando that got such a response.

2) Monday was a garden day. It was so hot we got ourselves royally burned. Now we are two redskin belegana’s in Navajo land. We taught a very nice lady that actually has a grandson waiting for a mission call. We are trying to get him to come and help teach her.

3) Tuesday was more garden day, a couple of no show appointments but finally a fun lesson with the Tsosie girls. They are excited for their baptism.

4) Wednesday, the Zone Leader and District Leader went to lunch with us. Finally lots of actual stories, stories where people are struggling just as we are. I think the big problem with us is that they accepted piano lessons immediately and the position that Elder Parkinson was going to get didn’t materialize and so he felt shelved. Anyway, we expressed a few concerns and got some ideas and support so – ‘all is progressing in Navajo land.’ And Wednesday I teach 4 hours of piano lessons. In the middle of the lessons we got a call that the young Elders were stuck in a sand drift about 15 miles out of town. We went to the rescue and pulled them out.

5) Thursday I tried to find Sister Tsosie to go visiting teaching with, but she didn’t hear me knock because her hearing aid broke. We then had every single appointment fall through. We had invited people over for outdoor grilling and the wind blew so hard we didn’t even do that. How sad.

6) Friday was a bit of fun. We made a big pot of soup for the Curley’s because she lost her sister Wednesday. They came and picked it up. Then I headed for Sister Tsosie. We tried to go visiting teaching—but again—it was the first day of the month—payday. Still we had a lot of fun driving around to people’s homes. She showed me where she grew up and how she would run her horse down the wash and her Grandmother would tell her dad on her. We laughed and laughed. That night I took the Curley’s girls home after piano lessons to discover that their parents were still gone and going to be for hours. I loaded them back up and we came home for hotdogs and chips. Then we put on video’s and watched “Dennis the Menace” and “the Creature of the Black Lagoon.” They also explained how to prepare the mutton for the gathering and I don’t think I am going there.

7) Conference—WAHOO!!! What a wonderful delight. We drive to Chinle and watched it in the Stake Center there. There were the missionaries and three people in the morning session and only missionaries in the afternoon. Many people do have Satellites, so I am going to hope more watched it than it appeared. During the break we went out for Chinese food. After the afternoon session we came home and fixed a lunch. I was going to stay home but the Sisters at Chinle said to come have finger foods. That was fun and I got to learn more about the others missionaries there. Then we got home and tried to get things going for the luncheon the next day. Sister Tsosie called and was so sick and needed a prayer for her nephew. We ended up rushing back to Chinle to give her a blessing. We had the Elders in Flagstaff find her nephew, but he didn’t want a blessing.

8) Conference again—and so good. In the break we had a luncheon and can Chinle Sisters ever put on the feed. Sister Nawahene brought 4 dishes and Sister Bearnson made the best rolls and another casserole. The rest of us made salads and desserts and we had a grand lunch. The young Elders enjoyed it the most. We ran over and got Sister Tsosie for the final session. When the choir would start to sing, she would just cry.
Oh and did I mention there was wind. It blew till we wondered if we could even walk. Our face and teeth were just filled with sand and grit.

And so ends another week. Hopefully we can act on all the things we learned and the wonderful boost that conference gave us. All in all, a rather interesting week.

The Church is True,

Elder Scott was the sweetest,

Our love and prayers,

Elder/Sister Parkinson