Best of the Rez Week 12

Best of the Rez     Week 12     April 3rd  to April 10th

Three months today!  My granddaughter, Katie, said it felt like six.  Since time is measured differently on the Rez—everything is in slow mode—I really couldn’t say how it feels to us.  Elder Parkinson has a new saying for us each morning, “What do you think is behind door # 3 today?”  Oh my, do the adventures get more and more interesting.
I called last week the learning week on the Merry-Go-Round.  This week has been the meeting week with a nice tram ride at the end. 

1)      We evidently loved the drive over to Tuba City because we had to go back.  Elder Parkinson gave our garden away and put in another one in our backyard so we had to go get more supplies.  The Seminary teachers over there and Elder/Sister Meldrum from Raymond, Alberta, CA.  They are the greatest.  We had such a fun visit with them.  And we got to see Sister Olsen, from Star Valley, Wyoming for a few minutes.  She has the best story ever.  She came to the Rez to teach elementary school.  A young missionary baptized her in Chinle.  After his mission he looked her up, asked her out, and proposed on the first date.  Now they are back as garden missionaries and seem to be enjoying it.  I know they are sure working hard.  Anyway, we went out to eat with Meldrums  while Elder Parkinson and Elder Meldrum planned their motorcycle trip to Sturgis.  Then they showed us the dinosaur footprints.  It was a fun day, but we chatted so long (everyone is trying to give us advice) that we didn’t have time for 1^st Mesa.  We are going back in May.

2)      We taught Selena her last lesson and she is both excited and nervous.  She is such a cute little girl that gets so excited about things.  When we asked her who she wanted to baptize her, she asked for me.  When we explained it had to be a priesthood holder (man) she was a little upset.  Then Elder Parkinson went into the corral with her and now he is her hero.

3)      We have had some good lessons this week.  Our family of 6 is progressing nicely but when we said -- we hear you want to get married and baptized -- they quickly said they only wanted baptized.  After all, why marry after you have 4 children and have been together for years?  The Tsosie girls are also doing great and are really fun to teach.  When we tried to teach Sister Begay, she was eating with her daughter and told us to wait.  Then they came and got us and we ended up teaching three families instead of one.  That was fun.

4)      The Chinle Activity night group asked me to teach an aerobic routine.  We put some songs together and made up some moves.  I told Many Farms that I was going to try it out on them first, because I knew them and was more comfortable with them.  So Wednesday was the first try.  It was a ball!!  I had those Indians moaning and groaning all over the gym.  We had everyone from 4 year olds to Elder Parkinson.  They really seemed to have fun—but not near as much as I did.  Unfortunately, I got too excited and couldn’t sleep that night.

5)      A mission miracle of another kind:  Our little Kelsey Curley –our seminary girl and one of my piano students – is also taking a class piano lesson at school.  She came Tuesday with a piece that she was suppose to play for a recital on Monday, 11^th.  “So, how is it going?” I asked.  “I can play the 1^st three lines.”  I look at the piece and see that it is three pages.  I am wondering where they would come up with this music for a beginning class piece.  But we started one measure at a time—first top hand and then bottom hand and pretty soon we were to the end of the second page.  I told her we would only do top hand for a part and then end it right. I also said she could come every night for lessons.  When she showed up the next night, the teacher said it had to be all done, both hands and memorized for credit.  GLORY!  Again, one measure at a time with lots of positive talk and by Thursday night she could make it through the whole song.  Friday she came for another lesson – miracle.  She had played the entire piece, memorized, for her teacher that day and got an A.  I would have never believed it.  She was just beaming.
6)     Meetings week:  We met two hours with the Rez Seminary Coordinator on Tuesday, Brother Watts, a Catawba Indian married to a Navajo.  He is a riot.  Elder Parkinson practices some of his political correctness on him as well.  Brad asked if he spoke Navajo, “no” he answered.  “Well do you speak Catawba?” Brad asked.  Again “no,” to which Brad replies, “Well, you are kind of a poor excuse for an Indian.”  They sure laughed.  On Wednesday we met with the District leader where more advice and friendship was given and we had lunch together. 

7)      Friday we had another Senior Zone Conference.  They really are fun, but we were a bit rushed that day.  We ate at Garcia’s and then had a meeting for a couple of hours.  We had to leave early so we couldn’t get any pictures.  I was sad about that.  It is so fun to talk to everyone and hear their stories.  The Pages have also served in Hong Kong and the Paynes just got home for Mongolia.  They said there are so many similarities; you would think you were in the same county.

8)      WAHOO!!  Selena baptismal day.  Since we had the 4 hour zone meeting, we left filling the font to the young Elders.  You guessed it—they didn’t notice the water turn yellow and thought if they just keep it running it would lighten up.  It didn’t!  Again we get a yellow baptism.  And the wind was terrible—oh my—same as last time.  But by the time everyone came it was just a wonderful evening.  Her grandfather, Edward Yoe, use to be the Branch President but hasn’t been to church in years.  He came and said the opening prayer.  It was in Navajo and a very long prayer.  Her Auntie gave the closing prayer, also a less-active, and it was so sweet.  Her father who is not a member also came and seemed very excited about the whole event.  Then everyone got to see the ugly water and Selena really got scared again.  Very patiently, Elder Parkinson talked her into the water and the baptism itself was really slick.  Then we had chips, cake, cookies and ice cream.  It was a really wonderful night.

9)      We have made mention that our Bishop is really shy.  Well, he conducted the meeting in both English and Navajo for Brother Yoe.  He wasn’t shy then.  After the baptism I pointed to the old baptism bulletin board and said, “Three more.”  “Yes,” he said, “But where are the pictures?”  I told him we keep forgetting to save them on a jump drive and take them to Gallup with us in the two times we had been there.  “Can’t you at least print them on paper like this one?” he asked.  I then told him that I even brought picture paper but that we didn’t know how to do it.  “Well, I can,” he says and starts for our house.  He and Elder Parkinson go into the den and Elder keeps saying, “It just doesn’t work.  It’s all fouled up.”  Bishop just keeps telling him what to do.  Then all the sudden I hear the Bishop say, “You did it wrong.  Didn’t you look?  See, there is an arrow.”  To which Elder Parkinson replied in all his proper politically correctness, “Well, you’re the flippin’ Indian.  You are the one that should be looking for arrows.”  They had a wonderful laugh, and we learned that our Bishop is one SMART fellow.

10)      And Saturday was a complete cleaning day—both the house and the computer.  Elder Parkinson was on the computer for hours trying to get it to work and I was cleaning sand out of window sills.  It was wonderful to go to bed that night with everything clean.  Now the computer was still in turmoil but the Elders helped us fix it while we watched “Praise to the Man.”

11)  And Sunday was Selena’s Confirmation.  As she was sitting down someone asked who was going to do it and she yelled, “Isn’t he here?”  “I’m right here Selena.”  It sounded so fatherly.  Oh, it was a wonderful day. 

And another week, more wonderful than the last, is over.  It seemed a little slow, but ended so great.  Selena is the cutest thing and so excited.  Today, the Bishop came and asked Brad to teach the Priesthood lesson.  Fabulous!!  And all the church songs were played by the youth.  They are learning more and more—great kids—love ‘em to death.

The Church is True,

            Whatever the task, give it your best,

                        Our prayers and love to you all,

                                    Elder and Sister Parkinson

Dinasaur Footprints outside of Tuba City.

Have you been here, Gloria?

They say the water helps show them off.

They really were not very big, but there were sure a lot of them.

This is at a free site by a little pond. 

We saw bright pink gold fish in the pond.

The scenery where we looked for the footprintes.

We are always amazed at the layers of color in the mesas.

Selena at baptism. 
From left to right
Bishop Benally, Sister Yoe (her mom), Selena, Sammy Kee, (her father),
Edward Yoe (her grandather) Melissa Samuel (her Auntie)

And add the missionaries :-).

Selena with her congrats cake.
We all had a very good time.