As we were developing the grand master plan for this excursion, we knew we wanted to be in Albany on a Sunday so we could go to church in Daniel’s mission area. During his six months in Albany, he spent part of his time serving in the YSA ward and part in the family ward. One of his mission president’s mission rules was that he wanted each missionary to spend one hour each week working on family history. There was one particular sister who would drive out to the church every week to teach the missionaries how to do family history work. Once Covid began forcing lock downs all around, she continued to meet with them via Zoom. this sister also kept the elders in board games and toilet paper once they were apartment bound.
When Daniel ended up back at home due to Covid, he continued to have weekly virtual meetings with the same sister for nearly a year. It was important to him, and it gave him something productive to do, something to focus on when he came home and was lost for a bit with no mission, no job, and no school to occupy his hours. She is one of those people for whom my mama heart holds an immense amount of gratitude. She was the one person Daniel wanted to be certain to see, so we ended up in her ward. The fire about family history and temple work is alive in her, and she took a few minutes to show us a cool new trick in the family tree app that allows us to find family names literally with just a couple of taps. Daniel was so glad to see her, and I was so glad to be able to give her my thanks face to face.
After church, we spent a bit driving around so Daniel could show us the places where he lived, the places where he taught, the places where he worked. As we traveled the once familiar neighborhoods, he shared with us some mission experiences and told us a bit more about his time in Oregon. One thing that was neat was how many churches there are in close proximity to each other. I know we have a lot of churches here as well, but they are mostly our churches. What we saw were just as many churches, but of all denominations. While lots of places we visit have only an occasional building dedicated to religious beliefs, there were a multitude of religious gathering spots in the Albany area. It put me in mind of days gone by when everyone went to church of one sort or another. They not only gathered to express their faith, but their churches were their community and social support as well, much as our church and our wards are for us. But it seems that nowadays the religious folk are the minority rather than the majority. I guess that is yet another sign of the times. Anyway, Daniel confirmed that the area is a highly religious one. Many times, he would meet people and they would tell him they went to either this church or that one, and there were several that came up often. We enjoyed seeing his old stomping grounds and hearing the stories that accompanied them.
In our wanderings over the past couple of days, we discovered that seasonal allergies are a beast in an area where there is actually enough rain to sustain an oasis of plant life. There were runny noses and itchy eyes all around. There was much of sneezing and a great need to buy more antihistamine eye drops since I packed some, but included only what I suspected would be used based on standard usage in the freaking desert we call home. It did not put a damper on our fun, but it was not something that could be ignored. Thank goodness for the 24-hour antihistamines we have! So much nicer than the 4-hour “knock you out like a sleeping pill” antihistamines of my youth. Having some relief from allergy symptoms and being awake at the same time is definitely an improvement!
By this evening, we were all ready and excited to move on to the next part of our trip. Tomorrow, we leave Albany and head to the coast!
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