Hanging Out With Hannah

I had a lot of fun hanging out with Hannah for part of a day anyway!

She led us on a tour of the BYU Museum of Art "Images of the Saviour" exhibition - a wonderful exhibition by the way - I recommend it highly - it's there until June I believe.

(And Hannah did a great job being our guide!)

We had lunch at the MOA Cafe - also excellent - and I recommend it too.

I went to class with her - and the teacher's mom was there also! Seemed like everywhere we went, we kept running into people Hannah knew - that's my girl - the Queen of Provo!!

It was very cold - and we walked home - at least home to her little house. Down all 147 Maeser steps - oh, that brought back memories! Much has changed on the BYU campus - but much is still the same. Thank goodness!

It was fun to see Melanie too! And it was fun to see Hannah K. at the reception - I've included another in the collection of "The Hannahs Shots." And the bed Hannah is sprawled on is in my hotel room - she's showing off her ace bandage!

It was a cold, snowy day, but being with Hannah certainly brightened things up!

Teachers I have known - Chapter 3

Since it's Sunday, it seems appropriate to write about another favorite Sunday School teacher.

George Woods moved into our ward with his family and indeed seemed to be a man of many talents. In addition to being an excellent Sunday School teacher to us 16 years olds, he played the organ really well and played often for Sacrament meeting. He was an excellent speaker too.

He also hired me to come to his home office on Mondays after school to file - I loved feeling like I had a real job! (Although I hated filing as much then as I do now!!)

But soon everyone found out about his exceptional talents and abilities and he was called to the High Council. I remember my mother saying that good teachers for the youth always got hauled out for some executive or administrative position. The lousy teachers stayed forever!

I have found this to be sometimes true. Often very good teachers are very good at many other things too - and they are needed in other places.

I would certainly hesitate to classify any long-standing teacher as lousy. Sometimes, however, someone sees the potential in a prospective teacher and keeps them on the job so that they can learn.

And learning is what the gospel is all about.

But we did sorely miss Brother Wood! (And I don't remember who took his place!)

Teachers I have known - Chapter 2

After listening to Elder Monson last week, I realized that I couldn't remember the name of one Primary teacher I ever had! I remember loving Primary. But I can't even pull up a description!

I can, however, distinctly recall a Sunday School teacher I had when I was 12 or so.

Lydia Buck was a teacher by profession. She was tall and imposing - at least I remember her that way. She had black hair pulled back in a bun. And she usually wore a black dress.

She taught us the Old Testament I guess, because I remember memorizing the Ten Commandments . And our ward took a trip to Grauman's Chinese to see The Ten Commandments when it opened there.

If you memorized them, you got a gold-tone charm bracelet with charms for each commandment. I coveted that bracelet and worked hard to get it. And I wore it happily for years.

Her son was my age and was in our class. And I can't remember much about him. Her daughter Carol was two years older, and I wanted to be smart and funny like she was. She is still in Mom's ward - and she's still smart and funny. When I visit, I love to exchange banter with her.

Best of all, she reminds me of her mother.

And there a no pictures of her that I have.

Teachers I have known - Footnote to Chapter 1

Lest I leave the impression that Mrs. Lazurus was not one of my favorite teachers, let me say that even though she nipped my tennis career in the bud, she did lots of other good things for me.

And I really wish we had made the Grandma Terrill connection earlier, because once I figured it out, Mrs. Lazurus had died. It would have been a real opportunity to tell her how much I had learned from her. And how the things she taught me were things I used my whole life.

(Which is a good argument for telling people how important they are to you now, not later!)

She seemed to understand my frustration with P.E. In spite of dressing daily, getting A's on the rules' tests, and having clean, ironed gym clothes every Monday morning, I still always got a C in P.E. because the skills' tests had the greatest weight. So she qualified me for Corrective P.E. on the basis of my pronated ankles. I got an A in Corrective P.E. (That's a blog posting of its own!!)

And when I signed up for her Modern Dance class, she wondered if the B I'd earned would "ruin" my GPA!!

(Of course, those years, math started getting harder and harder and Trig and Algebra 3 were my C grades instead of P.E.!)

But as a high school 10th grader (the year high school started in my district - we had the 3 year variety) she addressed my P.E. class and gave me some of the best advice I've ever received. She said, you know, ladies, your periods are a fact of life - and they are going to be a regular part of your life for a long time. So you can shut down every month for a week or so and just lose part of your life. Or you can get out there and run around and feel better in the process.

My Grandma Connie gave me similar advice one summer when I was moping around. She said, go take a walk, you'll feel better. And you know, to this day, a walk makes me feel better!

I combed my high school yearbooks for a picture of Mrs. Lazurus - and they are not to be found. I don't know if she had some metaphysical objection to being photographed, or if she just wasn't there on picture day.

So just take my word for it - she was tall, striking, blond, and when she wasn't in P.E. clothes, she looked sort of earthmotherish. And her first name was Keo.

Teachers I have known - Chapter 1

I attended the Worldwide Leadership Training meeting Saturday. The focus was on teaching. Elder Holland led a great discussion on teaching. But I found myself pondering on President Monson's talk about great teachers in his life.

I started thinking about teachers who had made a difference in my life. I was surprised that the list was quite short. Maybe - and this is probably so - I have forgotten whole chunks of my earlier life!!

I hope it doesn't mean that I haven't had that many great teachers. (How else to explain who I am today!!??)

But more are from school than from church. In fact, I can't remember the name of one single Primary teacher!!

But the one Primary teacher I do remember, although not by name, actually didn't help me, rather she gave me an almost life-long complex about my ability to learn new things. Let me explain.

When I was in Primary, the older girls' class was called "Seagulls." In order to move on to "mutual" you had to make a piece of needlework - either knitting or crocheting. I couldn't seem to get the hang of either one of them. I did produce a pile of "chaining" which for the uninformed is how you start to crochet something. She let this "count" and I was moved on. She told me that some people just couldn't do certain things, and crocheting was something I just couldn't do.

I never learned to swim as a child, but when I was 14, my brother Charlie almost drowned at a Cub Scout activity. After that my mom took us all over to the public pool and signed us up for lessons. It's a little tough to learn to swim at 14 when the class is full of children much younger than you. I didn't do well. The teacher actually told me that maybe I was too old to learn. And I believed her. (And everyone who knows me knows that I'm not much of a swimmer.)

Then in high school, we had tennis in P.E., and I did badly. My teacher, Mrs. Lazurus, told me that some people just couldn't play tennis, and I must be one of them. I liked Mrs. Lazurus, and she once gave me some excellent advice that I have remembered my whole life. But her assertion in this case was probably not helpful. (And certainly everyone knows I'm not much of a tennis player.)

Many years later, a friend made some charming little crocheted Christmas tree ornaments, and I wanted to buy some from her. She said she'd show me how to make them - they were a cinch. I said, oh, I can't crochet. Well, I will teach you she said. You don't understand I said, I'm one of those people who can't learn to crochet. To this she asserted that there was no such thing as someone who couldn't learn to crochet - and she proceeded to teach me how!! (And I've been crocheting ever since!)

I guess you could say that she was an excellent teacher!! (Her name was Lorraine Gould.)

I thought I'd do one post of "Teachers I have known" but maybe this will be Chapter 1!

Thinking about Annie

Walking home today, I found myself thinking about Annie Burnham. For the uninitiated, Annie was a very large presence in our lives for a few years, until she died in 1990.

I first met Annie when I was assigned to be her visiting teacher in 1980. Saying she was hostile doesn't describe the situation very accurately. Louise Childers, an elderly sister in the ward, was my companion. The first time we went, Annie wouldn't let us in. She talked to us through the screen door. Both Louise and Annie were Southern, and I think Ann might have been sharper with us, but the accent stopped her. In fact, I was told that the Ward Mission leader had gotten in to see her once on the strength of his recognition of the county she was from in Georgia by her accent. (He was from a neighboring county.)

We kept going - and developed a pretty good rapport with her grandson Dwayne!! One time, however, I think she forgot and let us in. After that I think she realized she couldn't very well not let us in the next time. Over time, she talked about her issues with the church. It turned out that she had been baptized as a child when her parents joined the church. Her parents had been very controlling and dictatorial, and they would only let her associate with the other LDS kids in their ward. But there weren't a lot of members in Georgia, and at age 16 Annie rebelled and ran away and got married.

She was gone for 9 months - and then her husband dropped her off at her mother's house - and Annie was in labor. She gave birth to a son - a son her mother appropriated by telling Annie to go to the city and work and they'd raise the boy. And Annie did just that.

A few years later, she married again and gave birth to a daughter. She and her husband headed for the west. At one stop, their baby daughter seemed very ill to Annie, so they went to the ER. They told her the baby was fine and sent them home. That night the baby died - Annie always believed the doctors knew her little girl was not going to live and just didn't tell her.

That marriage didn't last either, but Annie did make it to California. She married again and had a son and a daughter. She told me that she occasionally went to church and even had her children baptized. But once when she asked for some assistance, she was insulted when the Relief Society President came over to assess her needs. When the Bishop and R.S. President found out that they had offended her, they came over and apologized. They tried to explain to her that it was just Church policy to be sure that aid recipients were truly in need. However, Annie was not convinced.

Years went by, and Annie had visiting teachers and home teachers of varying degrees of diligence. And then I met her.

As years and months went by, Annie came to trust me. And she was blessed with a great home teacher and a Relief Society President who understood her needs. Annie needed work - and I needed a babysitter, so she started babysitting for me one day a week. What a treat that was. It was the year I was pregnant with Noah, and it was such a treat to go off every Wednesday and do whatever I wanted to do, knowing that Eliza and Hannah were in good hands. I remember one time I went to the show all by myself - saw "Three Men and a Baby," and I was wondering who would be in the theater at 11 in the morning. I soon found out just who goes to the show at 11 a.m. - the Senior Citizen Set!!

Word got out, and soon other women in the stake and neighborhood hired Annie. She enjoyed the money and the work. It was a win/win situation for all of us. After Noah was born, Ann absolutely adored him. He could scream and cry and fuss and she would just hold and comfort him. One time she was playing with him and he laughed out loud - he was only a few months old too. She was delighted - and it was delightful to watch her joy!

Annie had smoked for many years. She did quit, but the damage had been done. She suffered from congestive heart failure, and she continued to get worse. Soon she was getting hospitalized often. Many times I would feel impressed to call her. But I wouldn't always call. And every time I didn't, she would turn out to be in some kind of crisis. One time her son - who was exactly my age - was dying of cancer at County USC. She'd had surgery and couldn't go visit. I had just given birth to Eliza, so I wasn't up to the trip either. Her son died - Eliza and I went - along with the home teacher and the Relief Society President. Ann came - as did her son's former wife and his two daughters. And that was it. I couldn't believe someone could live for 38 years and no one seemed to care when he died!

At the end, I had figured out that when the spirit prompted me to call Annie, I needed to act on that prompting. I got a call from her home teacher one night. He'd just been to see her and suggested I go over in the morning. I felt I should go right then - but it was after 10 p.m. I finally went - walked in to Santa Teresita and no one said boo! And I found Ann and sat with her for a time. She couldn't talk, but she could squeeze my hand. I left around midnight.

I got a call the next morning that she had died at 2 a.m.

I once asked Eliza, Hannah and Noah if they remembered Ann. They all said they didn't really remember her but that I had talked about her so often that they thought they knew her.

Maybe that's why I wanted to write this - I want to always remember Annie Burnham and the many lessons she taught me. I don't have a single photograph of her - but I will never forget her.