This has been an unusal week!

Monday I had a fun reunion with sisters I met in the MTC a year ago. They are all in the east/Midwest area but we met on zoom and had a very pleasant get together. Sisters Christy Bell, Kathy Blosil, Sherrie Fox and Vicki Martin.

I am seldom sick. A week ago last Thursday, after our zone conferences in Medford, I began to cough. The cough got worse through the weekend and by Monday, I was hacking a lot. 

I walked Monday morning but by the time I got back to my apartment, I realized that it hadn’t been the wisest choice. Tuesday and Wednesday were the worse days. I ran a low grade fever and was nauseated along with the worst cough I can remember having had in a long LONG time.

I stayed at home all week. Fortunately, I can work from home so that I was able to still help with the missionary illnesses and accidents. 

Wednesday morning I went to urgent care. I was tested for COVID, influenza A & B, and RSV. I have had RSV with bronchitis caused by the virus. Hence the coughing!! I asked if I was contagious and the doctor told me that I was past the contagious period.

I was prescribed prednisone and by Friday, my cough was less annoying so I went to North Bend on the coast with President and Sister Cornelius for interviews. 

Sorry for the long medical history, but it explains why I have little to report this week as not much happens when one is lying around the house. Didn’t share to get sympathy but to let you know that I am now on the road to recovery. My prayers for healing have been answered.

On our Monday morning walk, we noticed how high the river was due to all of the rain/storms. 

Friday on our drive over the mountains to the coast, road crews were still picking up tree falls and working on downed power lines from the ice and snow storms last week. Here are just a few examples of downed trees and stacks of logs cut to be hauled away from the road side.

It was a cloudy, rainy day but still beautiful

I don’t know the name of this bridge, but I like it.

Waiting for interviews.

Sisters Sutherlin, Cornelius and Davis

Traditional “silly” pictures Sister Sutherlin and I take when we get together.

We stopped at Yeong”s Place to eat before returning to Eugene. 

I had a Reuben sandwich with sweet potato fries. I could only eat half of the sandwich and a few fries. WAY too much food but it was delicious.

Saturday morning, it wasn’t raining and the sun even shone for the first few hours of the day so Sister and Elder Crump walked along the river with me. We walked the opposite way we normally walk. We wanted to make sure that the big old cherry tree in the rose garden wasn’t damaged in the ice storm. Thank goodness all is well!

The sun through the clouds is always amazing

The pond at Alton Baker Park is very full. 

The stepping stones over to the little island are usually 6-8 inches out of the water. Today they were buried and the geese used them to walk on.

More downed trees

The river was wild.

Saturday evening, I took Sisters Lunt and Weeks to dinner. They chose a Hawaiian grill. I had teriyaki chicken stir-fry. The best part was being with the sisters. They shared a thought. 

First Sister Weeks taught me how to make an origami star. 

Then Sister Lunt shared a thought. She read a quote about the starfish thrower from a conference talk. 

 Loren Eiseley walked along a stormy beach late one afternoon “with the wind roaring at his back and the seagulls screaming” overhead. Tourists who came to the beach would collect shellfish and sea life tossed up each night, boil them in large kettles, and take the shells home as souvenirs. Eiseley walked far down the beach around a point away from the collectors and saw “a gigantic rainbow of incredible perfection.” Toward its foot he “discerned a human figure … gazing … at something in the sand.”

“In a pool of sand … a starfish had thrust its arms up stiffly and was holding its body away from the stifling mud. … [“Is it still alive?” Eiseley asked.]

“‘Yes,’” [said the man standing in the rainbow] and with a quick … gentle movement he picked up the star and spun it … far out into the sea.

“It may live,” he said, “if the offshore pull is strong enough. …”

At first Eiseley felt only the futility of the man’s efforts, “throwing one starfish at a time back into the sea when it nightly tosses out hundreds.” He walked away, looking sadly “at the shell collectors … [and] the steaming kettles in which … voiceless things were being boiled alive.”

The next morning Eiseley again went to the beach. Again the star thrower was there. “Silently [Eiseley] … picked up a still-living star, spinning it far out into the waves. … ‘I understand,’ [he] said. ‘Call [me a star] thrower [also].’”

Of throwing the starfish back he wrote, “It was like a sowing—the sowing of life on an infinitely gigantic scale. …” He saw the star thrower stoop and throw once more. Eiseley joined with him. They “flung and flung again while all about [them] roared the insatiable waters.”

They, “alone and small in that immensity, hurled back the living stars.” They set their shoulders and “cast, … slowly, deliberately, and well. The task was not to be assumed lightly.” (Loren Eiseley, The Star Thrower [New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1978], pp. 171–73, 184.) Each moment counted if they were to rescue the starfish that they sought to save.

We need star throwers—throwers with vision and who have a sense of discipleship with the Savior, who feel the need to save where there is still life and hope and value, and not to let that life die on a friendless beach, but to hurl it back to where it belongs.

In a world where materialism, cynicism, and hopelessness exists, we share the message of greatest hope—the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Be a star thrower! Then you may better understand our Lord’s commandment: “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.” (Matt. 19:19.)

It was a wonderful message. I hope that each of us will reach out to those in need in some way: loneliness, sadness, overwhelmed, heavily burdened, etc. May we be rescuers to serve and to help bring the light of our Savior into the lives of those around us and thereby to ourselves as well.

I love my Savior,

I love you my dearest family and friends. May you be well and happy through the coming week.