This past week, Wednesday, August 5th, we celebrated our 1 year mark in Quito. This week on Friday, August 14th we will celebrate our 44th wedding anniversary. Amazing!
To begin with, the last year has raced by! It's hard to believe that we have been here for an entire year. We have learned a lot. We've lost a few things - a tooth, weight, hair, and an iPhone. We've experienced two quarantines. Ten days in October 2019 for the Ecuadorean transportation strike and 100+ days from March - June for the COVID pandemic. We've had the opportunity to work with 3 mission presidents and their wives - President & Sister Barlow, President & Sister Baquerizo, and now President & Sister Winters. We've seen 200+ missionaries come and go. And, we've started to understand and speak a little Spanish. It has been a wonderful year!
On a daily basis it seems like our work is rather routine, but before we know it, the week has come and gone, and we are moving into another month. We don't know what the next 6 months will bring, but we are grateful to be here serving in Quito, and we're looking forward to the days, weeks, and months ahead.
If our year in Quito has been a whirlwind, the past 44 years of marriage have been ...... indescribable! We began our lives together with a list of dreams, aspirations, goals, expectations, excitement, love, and confidence that life would be good to us if we worked together and kept God as our focus. We have been blessed! The greatest blessing has been our family. We love our amazing children, their wonderful spouses, and our 29 beautiful grandchildren.
We are grateful for all the opportunities and associations we've experienced. Beginning with our early days as students at BYU to our first job with Conoco Chemicals in Ponca City, OK where we lived for 8 years. From there to Waverly, TN, with DuPont, then on to Delaware and Pennsylvania for a total of 9 years; before our final career stop in Ohio with Sherwin-Williams. It has been quite the journey for two young adults from farming backgrounds in Northern Wyoming who set out together to create a life for themselves. The life we found included.....family, friends, work, school, church service, community service, travel, and more. We look back on our 44 years with fond memories and we look ahead with excitement and expectations for the future.
Our new mission president, his wife, and two of their six children arrived two weeks ago. As of today, they have completed their two week mandatory quarantine. We have visited with them twice in person over the past two weeks. Once to meet them and talk about the mission, and a second time to take them groceries. We're excited to see them in the mission office tomorrow morning!
This last week was transfer week. We welcomed 12 new missionaries. Six are brand new and have just completed their online training. The other 6 missionaries were reassigned from other missions in Ecuador. We also said 'good-bye' to 5 returning-home missionaries, and 'farewell' to 4 reassigned missionaries. It was a busy week.
As part of the orientation for new missionaries, office secretaries give short presentations that include introducing themselves and explaining their office responsibilities. Elder Lewis and I both gave our presentations in Spanish. We are making progress in hearing, understanding, and speaking the Spanish language.
In Elder Lewis' presentation, he made a special effort to teach the missionaries how to withdraw their money from an ATM without getting robbed. It was entertaining and educational. Within the last two weeks, we've had two companionships that have been robbed shortly after walking away from an ATM machine.
Each week, I am passing off English modules with the missionaries who are striving to learn English. I thoroughly enjoy the association and it gives me a chance to know the missionaries better as they share bits and pieces of their lives, their families, their testimonies, as well as their thoughts and insights about life. This last week, I was impressed with something that Elder Seijas said. I asked him to give me a sentence using one of the words in a word web. He choose the word "kind." He then said, "Sometimes we can be addicted to a certain kind of sadness." It was an insightful comment.
I went to have my teeth cleaned this week. You would have thought I was having major surgery. I walked into the office building and had to wait 20 minutes on the first floor until the one and only patient in the dentist's office, on the 6th floor, was finished and had exited. Then, I was called up to the 6th floor.
When I stepped into the dentist office, I was immediately sprayed down front and back and asked to put footies over my shoes. I took a few more steps towards the examination rooms and was stopped again to put on a hairnet, which totally destroyed my good hair day. The dental assistant then escorted me to the examination room and before I sat down in the chair, I had to put on a protective gown over my clothes. I sat down in the chair and waited a few minutes for the dentist to come in. She entered the room in a hazmat suit, googles, face mask, and hairnet. She pulled on her examination gloves and was sprayed down immediately before sitting down in the dentist's chair. We talked for a few minutes and then she started cleaning my teeth.
After the cleaning, my hairnet and gown were removed, and I was sprayed down again. While paying for the appointment, I had to sign a paper saying I didn't have COVID. Walking out the door I took off my footies and was on my way. It was an experience to remember!
This morning we invited Sister Cabrera and Sister Vargas, the two sister missionaries who live in the apartment upstairs, to join us for sacrament meeting. We appreciated their company and their testimonies.
Life is interesting......enjoy it! Let us not allow ourselves to "become addicted to a certain kind of sadness," because of the challenges we face individually and collectively. Remember, your faith and optimism brightens our day. Best wishes for a wonderful week. Blessings to all!
Elder & Sister Lewis
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