Four Months Out!

My Dear Friends,

I know that it has been a long time since I posted anything on my blog or wrote an update as to the happenings in Nauvoo.  This is a much different experience from the previous six months that we spent here and I am so much busier.  We were both site missionaries the first time and the last three months we were here we worked together in the Visitor's Center. 

This time around it is completely different.  Dave is the site leader over the Browning Gun Shop and spends three days a week at that site and then two to three either in the tin shop, the boot shop, the blacksmith or the brickyard.  We hardly ever see each other.  We see each other on Rendezvous night or exchanging the car with one another.  I pick him up at 6:00 and then he drops me off at the Cultural Hall for my night at Rendezvous, while he hurries home to change for Sunset, Rendezvous or has a night off.  He is in shows four nights a week.

It is a very tiring schedule for the seniors, especially in July.  They work a six hour schedule in the day and shows four nights.  No one complains (at least not out loud) and everyone has a great attitude.  The pageant had its closing night last night so things will become much more quiet here.

I am scheduled for "show" five days a week.  I have three casts of 60 missionaries each and I am the so-called director of "Rendezvous in Old Nauvoo".  This show runs year round with two performances each night in the Cultural Hall.  Every missionary is assigned to be in a cast.  They are called, Sarah Granger, Lucy Mack and Emma Hale.  It becomes part of your identity here in Nauvoo.  Each cast has a manager and a social director. The cast has a temple night once every two months and dinners and BBQ's, etc. 

My job is vast.  I make a spreadsheet schedule for each cast so that they know what songs they are in and where they enter and stand for each performance.  I do one cast lineup  on Monday, one on Tuesday and one on Wednesday.  I train the new missionaries for the show and I replace and rehearse vignettes.  It is a huge calling and I go to the show EVERY night.   I take notes and give them ideas to make it a good, clean, tight show.   The worst part is the long hours and the best part is that I know every single missionary here and know them well.  That part is wonderful.  I am working with people who have ever been on the stage before and hoped they would never be there.  It is really very rewarding.  All in all, once I got over the huge learning curve, I am really enjoying it and love the people I work with.

Dave and I taught Sunday School today.  It is not something that I really wanted to do but now it is over.  Our lesson was on the resurrection and people said it was good - but who knows?  Now we have spoken in church, taught Relief Society and Priesthood and now Sunday School.  I think we are through.

We work together on Sundays in the sites.  Because I have such a huge job, we work one Sunday and get two or three off.  I like to do it as I don't get into the sites much.  The only time I wear a pioneer costume is on those Sundays - otherwise it is church dress all the time.

I love Nauvoo.  I love the spirit that is here.  They say that if you come - they will be here and I believe it.  I do not think that if they were here they would care about their yellow cup or their hat box, but they would want you to know of their great faith and their willingness to leave it all behind to follow the directions of the prophet.

We are so lucky to walk out our front door and look right directly at the temple.  We live in a darling home - the home of William Weeks - designer of the Nauvoo Tample.  It is within walking distance of the Visitor's Center.  This home was dedicated by President Hinckley in 2002.  It is small but it is really nice.

Sorry for the long delay between letters.  I will try to be much better.

Love,

Sherry and Dave

Wow! What A Ride!!!!!!

Here is Elder Curtis standing on our front porch!

Here I am standing on the same porch but turned the other way.

My dear friends,

Well, we hit the road running here in Nauvoo.  We have now been here a month.  This is completely a different experience from our last mission to Nauvoo.  I will start at the very beginning.

While I was innocently at home in Crestline, one of the missionaries here in Nauvoo emailed me and said that there was a rumor going around that I was going to be the next "Rendezvous" director.  My heart leaped - and not for joy and I told Dave, "Oh, I hope not."   It is the most brutal job here in Nauvoo besides the scheduler.  I immediately wrote back and told her that it was not true and to stop listening to rumors.

About three weeks later, a call came from the mission president, President Gibbons, asking if I would take on this huge responsibility.  It is not just directing (which I love) but sending out a schedule where 180 missionaries are put into three casts and you send a spreadsheet out each week with the lines and directions to all the missionaries telling them which number they are in, which side they enter from, which lines they speak that night, etc.  .  There are words like: first wave stage, screeners, pottery, kickers, whip and clip clop, horses . . . . . . . . . . and it goes on and on.  The directing I can do but I had to learn Microsoft Excel to do these spreadsheets.  Me?  A computer guru?  By May 25 there will be about 60 missionaries in each cast.  They casts are called, Emma Hale, Lucy Mack and Sarah Granger after three great women who lived here in Nauvoo.  We have 10 to 20 new missionaries coming in each week who are  assigned to one of the casts and so I am constantly teaching the new missionaries the songs and actions so that we can add them to their show.

Dave and I both had surgery for skin cancer the week we left. Dave had his surgery the morning of the 26th of March and we literally left from the hospital parking lot and headed to Nauvoo so that I could get as much training from the outgoing director as I could.  I am working 12 hour days, but with the Lord's help, I get up the next morning and feel ready to go again. 

I love working with the missionaries and encouraging the new people that this is something that they can do.  Most have never been on the stage before and are scared spitless.  After a few times, they begin to realize that it is actually fun.  Rendezvous is their identity here.   It takes a huge mission and makes it so they have a group to identify with.  Each cast goes to the temple together once a month and they usually have a potluck, or something.

I don't get to be in any shows because I am at Rendezvous every night with every cast, but it is rewarding, and maybe someday I will be confident enough with scheduling on the computer that I might actually like it.  My favorite part is working on the vignettes with the couples and directing them and teaching the new missionaries.  It is not much different in teaching seniors than it is teaching second graders.  They are both innocent and willing to do what they are asked.

Dave is going to have a vignette with young James in one of the casts this summer.  He loves being in Rendezvous and Sunset by the Mississippi.  He is the site leader over the Browning Gun Shop and that is a favorite place of his to serve. 

We are working hard and feel very blessed to once again to be in Nauvoo.  Nauvoo is not a place but a feeling.  You cannot even imagine what those early saints endured and willingly left because of their great faith, until you have been here and walked these sacred streets.

We are living in the William Weeks home. William Weeks designed the Nauvoo Temple, the Cultural Hall and the Seventies Hall here in Nauvoo.  We are about a three minute walk to the temple.  This home was dedicated by President Hinckley and has a wonderful spirit.  It is tiny but wonderful.  We are within walking distance to the Visitor's Center and the outdoor stage where Sunset is performed.  Our home has a Federalist style architecture with a fireplace in every room.

This is your last chance, come and visit.  We pretty much have guests from June 21 until July 20.  Before and after that, our home is open to you.  We will plan your trip and get your tickets.

We love and miss you all but know that this is where we need to be at this time.  We love the Lord and have a testimony of the restoration of the gospel.  We feel we are answering Wilford Woodruff's prayer when he asked the Lord to remember the sacrifices of the saints.  I believe by serving here we fulfill that prayer and by you coming to visit here, you are also fulfilling that prayer. 

Love,

Elder and Sister Curtis

It was nice of them to have a bonfire for us on our arrival day!  Just kidding.  This is the prairie burn.  They burn an acre once a year to show just how fast a wildfire could take out this little town.  This happened about an hour after we arrived.

This is Sister Jones, the out going Rendezvous director.  She spent hours training me.