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.