Week 22- Primary Tales

This last week has been an odd one. Because I serve a mission as a Church employee, I can't go in to work on holidays. Instead I serve from home. I don't mind this when it is only a day, but I've learned that it is hard to be a self-motivated missionary when everyone else is on a holiday for a few days. It's not that I dislike the work...it just doesn't feel very urgent and if I'm in a funk I don't feel like doing anything. This week though, I am going to rededicate myself to the work.

We also had the primary program last week. Oh boy. I didn't like all the practicing it involved as a kid, but I do enjoy watching as an adult. I sit somewhere in the middle as a teacher. This time, about 10 minutes into the program, Jimmy looks back and me and asks, "Can I go the the bathroom?" I shook my head. Of course he can't go in the middle of the program! He frowned at me. "When are we going to have a break?" And so I found myself explaining during the Valiant 8 lines, that we were not going to have a bathroom break in the middle of the actual performance... This is one of those things I never thought I would say as a teacher. You learn new things every day.

Jimmy also likes to tell stories. Before we began our lesson on forgiveness, I asked the kids if how they had practiced service last week, to follow up on the previous lesson. The kids all give their answers, telling how they helped clean and put their little brothers to bed, but Jimmy isn't done. I knew I might regret this, but I let him go ahead.  He starts "I served my mom by putting my little brother to bed and cleaning up his toys, and..." I looked at him suspiciously, "Jimmy...you don't have a little brother. I thought you were the youngest." Yep. He's totally spinning a yarn, but he's not done. He tries to convince us that he was really helping his mom put his big brother to bed. Uh-huh. "Thank you, Jimmy. Maybe you can serve your mom this week by putting yourself to bed." That funny kid. He wasn't trying to lie. He just loves to talk, and he'll do anything to spin a good yarn. I just had to laugh. At least this one didn't involve blood, puking, or the various changing colors of his cold sore...

After the primary program last week, we played a game of scripture charades. This was hilarious. One, because the sunbeams had noah's ark, but they all wanted to be the animals, leaving nobody to be Noah. And secondly, because my class is way too enthusiastic. We got the story of Jonah and the whale. Even our usually calm Suzie is jumping up and down to be Jonah because, "Whales are my favorite!" I'd already told Carson that he could be Jonah, so I said, "How about you and Annie be the whale?" I've never seen a whale bounce and squeal so much. Meanwhile, the rest of the kids played the sailors that threw Jonah overboard. Unfortunately, they got a little too enthusiastic and poor Carson when flying so far the 'whale' had to chase him down to swallow him. It was quite the charade.

Week 21- Rachel and the Michelin Turkey

I had a special treat this week. My friend Rachel and I arranged to go to the temple together (quite a feat when you do it through weekly e-mail). It was wonderful to see her and hear how she was doing.

 Some of the things I've done:

• Repaired last week's transcription (It was really rough, as you recall).
• Transcribed a new speech
• Resized pictures for my article which has been approved for publication on the church employee intranet.
• Updated spreadsheets
• Stared at other spreadsheets
• Gave badge access
• Found out that PSD now covers at least two more floors. We have people everywhere from the first floor to the 28th. Crazy.
• Moved a lot x2 of people to different supervisors.
• Called bishops
• Listened to a YCSM Devotional by Sister Elaine S. Dalton
• Added agenda items to a 3 hour meeting I am glad I don't attend.
• Edited the PSD Systems Newsletter. It's all about the new software. What do I know about software? Also, I don't get excited about software...I end up taking out a lot of exclamation points because I feel it sounds like we're selling it. Why can't they just say, "We have this awesome new software that will fix this problem." I guess people don't hire minimalists for marketing.
• Filed an education re-imbursement.
• Mail. Lots of mail again.
• Distributed ads for a blood drive that I most certainly will not be attending. I hate having blood drawn.
• Collected blood drive ads to throw away three days later.
• Wrote a little
• Gave more people CDOL access
• Had four phone lines to myself...the perfect opportunity for people to call with strange questions.
• Attended a great community of practice meeting on editing.
• Attend a sisters only meeting.
• Recycle a lot of confidential paperwork. The box is locked and only has a slit so you have to shove it in a little bit at a time. Working in the directors' office, I get to recycle plenty of this.
• And... bum bum bum BUM! I successfully transferred a call for the first time ever!

In contrast to my crazy list, here is the list of things that are part of a regular schedule.

1. Create and send out a new spreadsheet on empty job positions.
2. Print the completed spreadsheet for the HR director.
3. Send out assignments for a directors meeting.
4. Attend District Meeting.

Yep. That's it.

The office was really quiet on Friday when I was answering phones. That is, until a couple women decided to take decorating into their own hands. You see, one of the directors has a 18 in. michelin man on his desk (for reasons unbeknownst to the rest of us). A couple of the managers felt that his office needed some sprucing up, so they stole the michelin man and returned it...like this:

On a more spiritual note, I have been listening to the Hope Works Series along with my scripture study and have learned a lot. They are very much like spiritual Ted Talks, and are both fun and inspiring. I just listened to this one today, and I encourage you to watch it if you have a moment:

Week 20, Ryan's Mottos, and a Story of Enchantment

Things I did this week:

• Took 3 hours to transcribe a very rough draft of a 35 minute talk. I volunteered, but it's a good thing it was a very interesting talk.
• Delivered mail to get the new mail-missionary caught up.
• Deliver a package that will assist in the translation of the scriptures into Lao. Pretty cool.
• Become anxious to the point of nauseousness because someone flirted with me. Hopefully I'll get over that by the time my mission ends...
• Run into my best-friend's husband's grandma at the temple, which made me ridiculously happy.  She was so sweet and gave me a hug, which was just what I needed that day.
• Only had to drive to Salt Lake twice this week. The office was slow, so I worked from home. =)
• Try to figure out some really confusing paperwork requests
• File more educational reimbursements...must be that time of year.
• Explain that I can't change information for an employee we haven't hired yet.
• Be at least the third person to tell someone that managers have to request employee data changes, not them! They thought they could get around the rules by getting the gullible missionary to do it. Not today, bud!
• Have a manager request to get around the system for employee changes. My manager gave him a one word answer: "nope." =) If only I could get away with that. So far, it looks like he didn't need it that bad, because he never filed the proper requests.
• Deliver five bottles of white out.
• Search the whole NOB trying to figure out who absconded with three video-carts. I only look like an innocent lost missionary...I'm really hunting you down and reporting you to the authorities. ;)
• Set up lots of agenda items.
• Set up an agenda item entitled "DAM presentation." Maybe they shouldn't use an acronym for that one. Then again, maybe it's for our own entertainment.
• Attempt to convince and/or teach people to correct their office addresses so we can deliver their mail...I should make it an assignment they have to check off so that it nags them until they do it.
• Give people access to buildings and church directories.
• Get myself into a small wild goose chase trying to figure out whose cows got loose. I thought I would just chase them back and close the gate after them, but I couldn't figure out where they got out in the first place. I guess cows are smarter than they look.
• Take Ringo for a ride in the car while I returned some library books. He was shaking with fear and smiling into the wind at the same time. Just a guess, but I don't think he's a roller-coaster kind of dog.

I always forget to post this, but within a couple of weeks Ryan made two statements that were so true to his character that we couldn't do anything but laugh.
Ryan's two mottos:

1.You should never, EVER, hurry.

2. Condiments should NOT be taken lightly.

I also have a really neat story for you this week. This is about a manager I call Enchantment. Enchantment is the nicest person. She is one of those beautiful people who glows from the inside and makes everyone around her feel loved. She even makes work requests sound loving. And she is leaving in January. I'm really sad that she's leaving, but I'm happy for her at the same time.

You see, Enchantment had cancer when she was three. The doctors saved her life, but she grew up knowing that she would never be able to have children. This is heartbreaking to me. There is something so special about the knowledge that someday I will get to feel that precious little person inside of me. Enchantment would make a wonderful mother, yet she grew up knowing she may never have that chance. This year, that changes.

Adoption is difficult, and Enchantment and her husband haven't had that opportunity so far, although they want to. Furthermore, I think it must hurt someone as empathetic as she is to know that for her to have a child, another woman must give hers up. However, Enchantment's cousin felt prompted to make a beautiful offer to this family. She offered to become a surrogate mother. I am sure this is a huge sacrifice, but you can see the joy on Enchantment's face. This baby was hers from the beginning. She gets to feel the baby kick, and wait with anticipation for his birth. They have already chosen a beautiful name for this baby boy of theirs. And when he is born, she will be right there, and the doctors will put that baby in Enchantment's arms. Her own little boy, forever. The miracle baby she never thought she would have. Miracles may not happen in the way we expect them to, but they happen. I am so happy for Enchantment and her family, and feel so blessed to watch this miracle unfold for them.

Week 19

I've been 'out' on my mission for over four months now. It's crazy. I feel like I just started. I have been very blessed. Normally a job like I am doing now, which involves processing lots of data, would make me miserable. However, despite the work sometimes being difficult and not my favorite, I really do enjoy my job in Publishing Services. I feel needed, which makes a big difference. When I began my service mission, I was afraid that they would just stick me somewhere and give me busy work to make me feel better, but that has never been the case. I feel like my contribution is valuable and my service welcomed.

I do have trouble transitioning between different kinds of jobs. If I've been handling data, it takes about twenty minutes for my brain to transition to writing. I wish it were like a switch that I could turn on and off, but that's just not how it works. I kind of have to dig into my creative zone like it's a foxhole. It's always under there, I think, but it gets buried. People don't want creative solutions to a termination form. I think I can move back to data okay, just not the other way around.

Two of my articles were published in the last little while. Listicles are popular, but they feel rather cold to me. My favorite was the Doctor Who article:

You can read "7 Tips to Make Prayer More Meaningful" here.
And read "When Bad Things Happen To Good People--Life Lessons From Doctor Who" here.


<<Insert logical transition here =) >>

One of the kids made a really gruesome jack-o-lantern this year. Besides the knife sticking out of its head, it's eating a doll's leg and there is blood dripping out of its mouth. It's both clever and disgusting. So while I wasn't planning on decorating a pumpkin this year,  I decided that our porch needed something more kid-friendly to balance out the effect. I actually had a lot of fun making mine. 

I present to you: Princess Patty. (I was just going to stick a crown and wand on a pumpkin, but mom donated all the old dress-ups, so I had to improvise. Hurrah for tinfoil!)

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Pet update: Ringo has a bow tie! I love our dog. He's so cute. It totally makes up for how neurotic he is. (He's getting older and therefore moodier.) We also tried to get him a dog sweater, but that didn't work out so great... It was too small. It was like putting the shirt on Gus-Gus in Cinderella. Poor little stuffed sausage. =)

I also found this picture, which never fails to make me smile. Ringo has since lost his raccoon tail, but we got a good laugh while he had it. He was afraid we were going to take it away, so he'd run around with it in his mouth and whine if we got to close.

And here we have Merlin, in his natural habitat. If you were to get close enough you would see that the inside of his mouth is as marbled as his fur. Unfortunately, most of those who get to see the inside of his mouth also see the inside of his stomach...

Here you can see us having a family learning experience from when dad was taking a class and had to prove that he taught five people about his experiment. Ringo is #5.

I also got a new missionary picture because they lost a bunch and had to take all of them over again.

Now for the weekly 'things I did' list:

• Process education reimbursements
• Process transfers, terminations, and every other weird request we get
• Finish an article
• Get up at 5:50 to set up for a writers symposium
• Mix up the building the symposium was in
• Be misinformed on the time the symposium started (are you sensing a trend?)
• Have a major wardrobe fail...(more on this later)
• Fix a watch (not mine)
• Fix a necklace (mine)
• Start an article for the church employee network which I think (read 'hope') nobody reads.
• Be told NOT to process paperwork because the managers are going about it all wrong and breaking the rules.
• Attend an absolutely awesome writing and editing symposium put on by the writing and editing resource managers. This made me miss school and realize how much I love the academic life. I just felt like I belonged there. These were my people! Also, I get their sense of humor, which makes a big difference in my ability to understand them.
• Fiddled with giant spreadsheets.
• Set up meetings.
• Got people building access.
• Ran into lots of glitches with the 'updated' PeopleSoft.
• Asked a bishop to clear his own wife for the Mormon Channel.
• Decided by Thursday that I am done with humans.

So...wardrobe fail. You'll get a good laugh out of this, Grammy. I know I did. 

It just so happens that I hate wearing nylons and tights. The people who designed superhero costumes obviously never had to wear nylons, because the only super thing about them is their discomfort level. I cannot see how anyone would wear a skin tight suit when they could choose street clothes. But I digress. It is starting to get cold for someone in a skirt and I was beginning to rethink my dislike of nylons, so I was delighted when mom found me thigh-high nylons. Those I can handle, right? Wrong. They were comfortable enough, but they didn't quite fit... Monday morning and I'm not even out of the conference center parking lot before I can feel them slipping down. I stop a few times and furtively adjust them but figure I will at least make it into work. By the time I'm crossing North Temple Street, in front of all the morning commuters, these nylons have mutinied. I have giant lace and elastic ruffles sinking around my calves like hideous upside-down bloomers. But as I march across the street I had the thought, "Well, it could be my skirt in the Walmart parking lot" and began to laugh. As Grammy taught me, you can cry or you can laugh. It's better to laugh.

I love you all. Have a wonderful week.

-Sister Ward