The DOCTORS

Nothing much happened since last week, except making doctors' appointments and seeing doctors.

Mary called the dentist and since we both had recent visits, he had her bring in the forms for him to fill out. So that one's done.

Max as able to see the dermatologist and get his precancerous skin things frozen off and have a chunk of skin taken from his back for a biopsy. Negative, thankfully. Dr. Reese, the skin doctor wants to see us six weeks before we go so he can check us again since we will be gone for 18 months. We usually see him once each year.

Max needed a blood test for something else, so he arranged to have all his lab work done at the same time on Friday. He will have the tuberculosis skin test done at the next doctor's appointment, in early March.

Mary will also she her primary care physician the first week of March.

Max went to the optometrist on Friday and ordered new spectacles, even though there isn't a big change in the prescription.

Max spoke at the devotional for the Church Service Missionaries in the Family and Church History Mission. That's Mary's mission; she works on the British floor of the Family History Library. She sat on the stand in the Chapel of the Joseph Smith Memorial Building with Max. There were about 200 people in attendance. Max spoke about the Joseph Smith Papers project, since he is on the Editorial Board for the papers.

Since the Salt Lake Temple is still closed for cleaning and minor remodeling, we went out to dinner with friends last night. We went to the Symphony Friday night and heard two versions of Romeo and Juliet in honor of Valentines Day on Thursday: Prokofiev and Tchaikovsky.

Mary says:  Planning for a mission gives a new perspective on about everything.  I'm still driving Mom's car, the 2000 Mercury Tracer;  although we need 2 cars, buying a new car is out of the question until we come back.  We have been constantly remodeling our house since we've moved back into it 5 years ago:  new bathrooms, new basement apartment, new paint, new roof, sky lights, new patio, new front porch, hot tub, pergola, and new landscaping.  I think of new carpeting, but it makes no sense to tackle until later.  We buy season tickets to the symphony every year, but, wait a minute, we won't be here.  Vacation planning this summer seems to revolve around spending time with family--no exotic places this year.  I can hardly believe Max is actually retiring in May.  We're truly entering into a new era of our lives.  

The MISSION

Max writes - Well, we finally took those first steps into the unknown. Since I will be retiring in May, we thought it would be a good time to put in our papers for a senior couple mission. Especially since I learned that seniors can apply up to 9 months before the availability date, not 120 days, as is the case for the young elders; yes, Sam.

The bishop has to start the process, so I asked him to get us going last week. It's all done online now, so we log in the the missionary application form on lds.org and begin to answer dozens of questions, about us as a couple and each of us individually. We each fill out a health survey that we will take to our doctors and dentist. It took us each a couple of hours. We had to find and scan documents to upload into the application.
We also had to have a photo of the two of us in our Sunday attire. Mary had her hair done, so she looked nice. I was about to get into the hot tub, so I put on a shirt, tie, and jacket so I would look decent. Emily took the pictures.

Here is the one we selected.

Emily also took this one, with me in my swim suit and Mary in pants and another jacket.

We will make appointments with our doctors this week. Then we give their reports to the bishop who scans  and adds them to the application. He then  notifies the stake president, who will send it to the Missionary Department.

I takes about four to six weeks to receive the call. We indicated that we will be available in August and that we want to serve for eighteen months.

Mary writes - Yes, it is my mother's white jacket that I thought would look the best.  I know I was smiling better in all the other pictures, but Max looked weird in them so that's the one we chose.  The process of filling out the mission papers takes a lot of thinking--we ended up going through medical files and shredding most of what we were keeping.  It changes your perspective.  You realize you need to organize your life and make plans in a different way.  We do have current passports and are in reasonably good health at this point in time.  We need to go sooner, rather than later--when our health might be more iffy.  So, we will let you know more as time goes on.