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Will the Comité… |
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From: Brooke Derr Subject: Le Comité Date: March 2, 2020 at 2:01:17 PM MST Dear Comité: |
 Beetle |
| Andy, thank you for calling a virtual meeting of the Comiteé. The French Mission and the marvelous Comite group at 3, rue de Lota was formative for me. I remember long walks across Paris to chase down a referral, great discussions, saving up crusts of French bread so Sister Hinckley would make her famous bread pudding and, most importantly, putting together the Gospel plan in ways that made sense to me and from which I haven’t really deviated all these years. |
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Alas, here we are at a vulnerable moment pushing forward as best we can and waiting to team up again on the other side of the veil. I wonder if there will be long walks going to visit referrals. Will Andy still be quoting Breton verse? Will there be any pastries in route to our fields of labor? I am in the middle of a Church History Department oral history documentation of the closing of the Salt Lake Temple, where I have been an ordinance worker. After fifteen interviews, including those with the temple presidency and matrons and the Recorder, it is clear that people really miss their close associations with fellow servants—a bit bizarre in a setting where we don’t converse that much or form social groups. What is there about the joy of serving together that makes us feel close? We are doing well and now live in Holladay in a condo. Jill works every day on her Eliza R. Snow biography and I do various projects. We are busy in our callings, with our grandchildren (only eleven), trying to stay healthy, etc.—but it’s hard to say what we are about. It seems as if time is flying by and we are part of lots of dynamics. Life is good. The Lord is merciful. We wish we had Andy’s genealogical skills as we figure out how to be the ward temple and family history leaders. We wish we could do another mission but we don’t have the energy. About a year ago we had dinner with Lynn and Gene Bennion near Palo Alto and they seem as fun and solid as ever. Do any of you remember Ron Anstead, the printer? He now lives in Texas. When we served our mission in Frankfurt over church history for Europe, we worked closely with Jean Caussé in Bordeaux, who was our French historian. In the Europe Area offices, where we worked, we learned that France has done a better job than most countries retaining their members and most wards in the five stakes now have 2-3 generations of Saints in their membership. Gerald Caussé, now the Presiding Bishop, claims that we were the ones who labored amongst the foundational families of France. Greetings to all and thanks for influencing my life for good. Brooke Derr, the Beetle |
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