FINDING A HOME AWAY FROM HOME

When we first arrived in the Maryland Baltimore Mission on September 14th, we were invited by the mission president and his wife to stay at the mission home located in Ellicott City for a few days until we could locate an apartment of our own on the east side of Baltimore (Essex). Since we grew up in this state, Linda and I are generally familiar with the geography of the area. Baltimore City, however, is a totally different place separate from everything else we know from our past with a complex environment that is unique unto itself.

Sister Lindsay & Elder Gibbons check the Baltimore City map

The east side of Baltimore, including southern Baltimore County, contains everything from row housing to modest single family homes; and there are some higher-end residential properties too. Businesses are varied as well with heavily industrialized shipyards at Sparrow's Point in the harbor section of the inner city, small to medium sized factories, shopping malls, plus mom & pop liquor stores right in the residential neighborhoods.

Knowing that we must move forward quickly to resolve our housing issue, Linda and worked with one of the sister missionaries in the mission office to develop a short list of potential apartments to evaluate and then we set off to explore the properties in person. The first property on our list of places to see was downright scary with one of those mom & pop liquor stores located immediately across from the rental office and lots of people just hanging out around the apartment buildings. We could see that the apartments didn't have central air conditioning, and parking was directly on the street. We both felt uneasy about living here and wondered if the tires on our car might be missing overnight. It was obvious that this was not a good place for us to live, so we didn't even bother to ask the property manager to show us one of the apartments.

The Lord was kind to us after that bad experience, and led us quickly to a much nicer place just a few miles away. The Canterbury Apartments are newly refurbished with considerable open space between buildings, ample parking, and central air conditioning. There is a place provided closeby for washing automobiles (Linda likes this feature) and even a fitness center in the same building nearby where the rental office is located. This complex feels very safe, especially with each entryway into the buildings from the parking lot requiring a key.

Moving "our" furniture from the storage area

On September 16th we moved into the new apartment with "our" furniture (mostly borrowed from the mission storage shed). We were ably assisted by young missionary elders who did the heavy lifting and lugging. We even had missionary help putting the bed frame together. We purchased some inexpensive floor lamps and night stands to complement our modest furnishings; and, of course, we bought some food and other miscellaneous household items to get established with our house-keeping.

ODDS AND ENDS

A lot of changes have occurred in our lives since the 1st of September! The MTC was a wonderful experience, and the food was delicious! We learned there how much we don't know about being missionaries. Our 2 district meetings have shown us how much more we need to learn. It's wonderful to be able to be taught by such righteous young men. There are currently 7 elders in our district plus us. Two of them are the zone leaders so they are not always present at our district meeting.

We have a very nice 2-bedroom apartment - one for sleeping and the other for the "communications center" (per Elder Lindsay). Our living room is very large and has 1 blue leather sofa and an end table with a large, pink lamp on it, 1 floor lamp and 1 comfortable chair (comfortable for me). We also have our music system. It's nice to have music playing while we are working. There is a galley kitchen with ample room for 2 people to work in. And we have a dining room with one table and 2 chairs. The other 2 chairs are at our computers in the communications center. There are large windows in all rooms allowing lots of natural light to come in.

Each apartment entranceway is locked. You can only enter the building with a key or if a resident lets you in. There are laundry facilities on the 2nd floor for each entrance - 2 washers and 2 dryers for 12 apartments. We also have a place to wash the car, a fitness center and a large outdoor pool. The complex is more like an apartment campus, very spacious, buildings not on top of each other, plenty of parking.

We like getting mail. Our mailing address is 2 Pavia Court, Apt. 1C, Baltimore, MD 21237.

When we arrived at the mission office on the 14th, we were given a 1-inch stack of papers containing names and comments about over 300 less active members of this ward (Chesapeake Ward), all hand written. We have spent quite a bit of time typing this information into a Word document that we can work with. We are just about finished and will be meeting with the Bishop tonight to talk about our next step with these people.

It has rained practically every day, or night, since we have been here, but temperatures continue to be higher than those in Greensboro.

LIFE IN TRANSITION: SOME NEW CHALLENGES

We've been looking forward to serving a full time mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for more than a decade since Norm's retirement from full time employment with AT&T in the year 2000. With the arrival of our mission call with it's subsequent reporting date to the mission field, we have discovered that there are some new challenges that aren't covered in the missionary handbook or the formal training we received at the Missionary Training Center earlier this month.

Suffice it to say that some things are difficult to anticipate let alone effectively plan for when you are transitioning from being in a fully furnished home with all of the "stuff" you have accumulated over an entire lifetime readily at your disposal and then moving to the somewhat spartan environment of living in an apartment in a distant place with furniture that is mostly borrowed, well-used, and in some cases leaning in the direction of being worn out.

Now add to this equation something that is decidedly outside of most everyone's comfort zone: you can only bring with you whatever you can manage to pack into your automobile (if you are called to serve in North America) or just a suitcase or two should your mission assignment be to another country overseas. With our mission location in the Maryland Baltimore Mission being less than 400 miles from our home in North Carolina, Linda and I were provided the greater option (compared to close Church friends who have been directed to a mission in Japan with only a couple of suitcases to keep them company on the airplane). We were told at the MTC "blessed are the flexible for they shall not be bent out of shape!"

That extra weight makes the car sit lower to the ground!

It would be decidedly more accurate to describe the experience of selecting items to pack into the family car and the actual accomplishment of doing it as something akin to stuffing as many people as possible into a telephone booth, which was a popular college student diversion in the 1960's. I guess that I am probably dating myself with that analogy, because advances in technology might cause some folks to wonder what exactly is a telephone booth?

With the able and loving support of family and friends, everything essential to sustaining life (including our popcorn maker) was successfully shoe-horned into our vehicle; and my wife even allowed a place for me, so I didn't have to run along side the car or be strapped to the roof for the trip to Baltimore. We are beginning to understand even at this early stage of our missionary service, that most material things don't have the same importance in our day to day living if we are willing to stay focused on the spiritual reasons why we are enlisted in this sacred missionary calling to bring souls to Christ.

MISSIONARY TRAINING CENTER EXPERIENCE

Monday, September 5th, was a very special day for us. Having been members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for almost 44 years and following in the footsteps of our 8 sons and daughters who previously had served full time missions as young adults, we finally had our own opportunity to enter the Missionary Training Center in Provo, Utah as proselyting missionaries. Our training program was just five days long, but much was included in those hours of instruction and study. We were very tired at bedtime!

Although there were 38 other senior missionary couples at the MTC with us, our situation was truly unique because our grandson, Elder Jonathan Lindsay, was also there learning Spanish for his own mission call to the Utah Ogden Mission. Following our initial first day orientation with the staff, we went to the cafeteria in hopes of locating him; but before we could find him, I received a big bear hug from behind. Soon we were surrounded by the other members of his training district who collectively asked us to sit with them during our meal time.

Elder Lindsay with his grandparents, Sister & Elder Lindsay

During our brief stay we were able to share many of our meals with our grandson; but he had to be diligent in getting to the cafeteria on time because other members of his district also wanted to sit beside us. It didn't take long before they affectionately started calling us Grandma Sister & Grandpa Elder Lindsay.

The five senior couples who were in our training district have now been dispersed all over the world to serve their missions:  (1) San Diego, CA; (2) Capetown, South Africa; (3) Mississippi; (4) Lyon, France, and (5) Baltimore, Maryland.

Most of our instructors were former Church missionaries who are now enrolled as students at Brigham Young University, which is right next door to the MTC. They are highly motivated instructors who have a great love for the Savior and the sacred work of bringing souls to Christ. At the conclusion of our training, we were told to go forth to serve by "lengthening our shuffle," which seems age-appropriate for senior missionaries like us!