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Traveling with Debbie |
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By this time, Debbie and I had become a customary traveling team, in my church assignments. Blessed with seven active children to take to Sacrament Meeting every Sunday, under practical conditions equivalent to widowhood,1 Valerie was delighted to see me take along this cheerful little handful, although Deb never gave me a moment’s inconvenience.2
In a fairly typical weekend, we’d climb into Brunnhilde before dawn on Saturday, meet with Church folks somewhere between Connecticut and Rhode Island and Maine, stay the night with a local family, attend Church with them in the morning, and then drive home, arriving around dark. Valerie made her more than one beautiful, frilly Sunday dress, which she’d wear all day, both days! Our mission came to extend all the way up to the top of Maine, and President Tempest found himself with ecclesiastical responsibility for a large, remote, rather impoverished3 Caribou District, whereas the New England Mission he’d inherited from Jae Ballif had consisted entirely of stakes, in which he was not the presiding authority. 1Newcomers to the congregation would ask how she managed, with all those kids and an inactive husband… 2I still run into lovely people from Caribou who will exclaim: “Andy! It’s good to see you! And how’s Debbie? Her they really remember. I maintain that there’s not an important road in New England that Debbie and I haven’t harmonized on. We developed a lovable repertoire, some of which they’ll still let us sing in Church, now and then. 3My fellow counselor, Dave Ingerson, a native of these parts, used to say, “You know those people in Aroostook County? Why, they’re just as happy as if they were in their right mind!” |
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