SISTER POWELL: a letter to my dad
This week’s Swedish surprise was being able to watch conference in ENGLISH. Talk about a little tender mercy.
Monday: Getting to watch ’17 Miracles’ (literally I talk about it every email cause we watch it ALL THE TIME) for FHE. The only people who showed up were investigators and investigators that don’t know much about pioneers. That was entertaining.
Tuesday: After 15 ‘det finns ingen Gud’ right in a row, we contact a man from Bulgaria. We ask him if he believes in Jesus. He says, ‘Jesus saved my life! He saved my life!’ and on and on and on. My reply way, ‘Hey, me too. Let’s talk about it.’ Oh how grateful I am for this mission and that it is literally saving my life. I knew nothing of my Savior’s atonement and of His sacrifice and how it applies to me personally before I came here and testified of it on the street in broken Swedish. I love missions and I love my decision to serve one.
Wednesday: Talking with a member from Nigeria and she tells us her city is known as the one where the buses don’t stop. She tells us all these stories of just having to jump onto buses as they’re moving. We ask, ‘What if you’re old??? Pregnant??’ ‘It makes no difference!’ She then tells us if we ever tried to jump on a moving bus the driver would have pity on us and stop. Then everyone on the bus would judge us. Yikes!
Thursday: Took pictures all day long of Sweden because it is autumn and it is beautiful. I remember last year I was at BYU and the leaves were changing and I was in heaven. On runs I would stop every 3 minutes and take a picture because I just couldn’t get enough of it. I called my mom and said, ‘Why don’t leavens change in Sandy?? I have never noticed them before’. She told me that leaves do, in fact, change in Sandy and I just must not have noticed. Oh how silly we can be to be so focused on other things that we miss all the beautiful parts of life. I love that I am here and really here–present and loving every minute.
Friday: Teaching a man, Oloy, about prophets. He is good friends with a member so he knows a lot about the church but on Friday he wanted to learn more about prophets. Seeing the spirit work on him as he listened, reasoning in his head, and then say, ‘Well of course there is a prophet today. It makes sense. I will come to your church.’ Oh I love this gospel.
Saturday: Kanelbullar day. Kind of like a cinnamon roll but better. So obviously, we celebrated kanelbullar day by eating them………………… Experienced my first shopping trip at TGR. Oh man, why is it not in America?? Went to Norrköping for General Conference. Solid day. Celebrated the fact that it has been two whole years since President Monson made the missionary age change. Two whole years and here I am as a 19 year old missionary in the Sweden Stockholm Mission. I had goosebumps all day as I listened to and sustained the prophet. I testify that there are living day prophets in this day and age and they speak what the Lord Jesus Christ would speak if He were here.
Sunday: Some random guy on the train has a lot of Swedish pride and I learned a lot about the country… apparently Spotify is Swedish? Who knew?
This week I thought a lot about my dad. It started on Monday as I read his weekly email to me. Each week, he includes excerpts from his mission journal. I look forward to reading them all week. I continued to think about him as the days went on because this week was hard. This week I lacked a lot of motivation and desire just to work. But my dad has taught me how to work and he has taught me how to work when working really isn’t that fun. This week I was grateful for him.
My dad and I are a lot alike. We look alike and we have similar personalities. In the words of my mom, ‘Hannah got her height from her dad.’ That I did. I got a lot of other stuff from his as well. I think people who don’t know either one of us well would describe us as reserved, quiet, passive. But those are certainly not words either one of us would use to describe the other. We are both stubborn. So stubborn that for a lot of my childhood we fought about everyyyyything. I am pretty dramatic and he is pretty set in his ways: and with both of that combined we didn’t always get along. But because we are so much alike, I have always admired him. I have always looked at him and thought, ‘That’s what I want to be. That’s the person I want to become.’ But man, it is hard.
I have been thinking this week about all the lessons I have learned from my dad. I remember when I was in elementary school we would wake up on Saturday mornings and we would go on a family hike. I hated it! I just hated it. My dad would always pick hikes that were 6, 7, 8 miles. I would just be so darn tired and I would ask for miles, ‘How much longer????’ ‘Are we close?’ And without fail, every single time, he would turn around and he’d say, ‘It’s just around this corner!’ EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. Oh, it would drive me crazy! But as the years went by, I stopped asking how much longer. I stopped pouting and complaining and cringing when my dad said, ‘Let’s go for a hike!’ I got stronger, I developed patience, and over time, I actually began to love hiking. I learned how to work and how to do so without complaining. Every Wednesday for as long as I can remember has been yard work day. I used to hate coming home from school on Wednesday because I knew the second I got home I would be out doing yard work. Then high school came and track and cross country practices went late and I had a job and friends and things after school and suddenly I wasn’t home for yard work. Isn’t it weird when something you grow up dreading actually becomes something you miss when you can’t do it?? I loved summers because I got to be out with my dad again doing yard work. I remember missing yard work when I was away at school. I missed being with my dad and watching his hard work and learning how to work hard alongside him. I grew up participating in Sandy Pride day: planting trees and cleaning up garbage and painting fences early on a Saturday morning. I grew up cleaning the church at the crack of dawn when it was our family’s turn and cleaning it well. You get up and you work. I cleaned my dad’s dental office in high school as a way to earn a little money. I had to have it cleaned sometime between Friday night and Monday morning. Sunday was out. That left my Friday night, or my free day on Saturday to be out at his office cleaning. It was the day of junior prom and I was excited for the dance and my dad reminded me that I needed to go and clean his office before I got all ready. I complained a bit but I did it. Then a year later on the day of another junior prom I was up early and I had cleaned his office before I needed to go to my activity with my date for breakfast.
My dad taught me how to work and how to work when it really isn’t fun. This week I have thought a lot about that because this week really wasn’t that fun. My dad’s mindset is that if we don’t give the Lord something to work with, He isn’t going to help us. I have seen that in his actions. When he needs help, strength, comfort, direction, guidance, reassurance, even just a full out miracle: he does his part. He works, he strategies, he forms plans, he makes calls, he learns more, he doesn’t just sit there waiting for the light and revelation and inspiration to come. He doesn’t sit there and pray for motivation to work. He works, and prays along the way that the motivation will come. And that’s what I did this week. I worked and I prayed and hoped and trusted that I would make it through the minute, hour, day, and week. And that is a pattern I have learned from my dad.
So today, I want to thank my dad. I want to thank him for his life and for his testimony and for his love. I want to thank him for our first daddy-daughter date, a Jazz game, with lots of ice cream. I wonder if maybe that’s why I like to watch basketball and maybe that’s why I love ice cream. My dad has passed on to me his love of Whoppers, powdered donuts, In-n-Out, clam chowder (we are a food family, what can I say?), thunderstorms, mornings, hiking, ‘Cops’, learning, reading, movies, missionary work, family time, service, the Book of Mormon, callings, and the Lord. He’s taught me the importance of respecting authority, of doing what is asked, of leaving something, somewhere, or someone better than how you found them. He’s taught me how to submit to the will of the Lord: a task and a skill I am a ways away from perfecting.
This week a few of my favorite memories with my dad were in my head. I will forever be grateful for our runs together. I love running with my dad and I love running races with him. I’m thankful for him. I’m thankful for the family vacations he has planned and provided for. I’m thankful for his testimony. The day of my farewell I got to speak with my dad out at a Utah State Prison branch. It was a humbling and strengthening experience. It is something I will always hold special as I listened to my dad begin to cry as he said, ‘On Wednesday my oldest and only daughter will enter the Missionary Training Center to prepare to serve her mission in Stockholm, Sweden. I am proud of her and of her decision to serve.’ This week I have thought about my dad’s support in everything and anything I ever did in life. I don’t know how many school performances, plays, choir concerts, soccer games, basketball games, races, award nights, club celebrations, science fairs, history fairs, you name it, he has been to–but I am thankful for each one. I actually didn’t know until college that not everyone’s parents come to everything. That was a bit of a shock. Hahaha. This week I have thought about the mornings I have come downstairs to eat breakfast and seen my dad sitting at the table reading the scriptures. I have thought about the countless father blessings that have come just when I need them. I have thought about the day I entered the temple and received my endowment–and my dad with me through it all. I have thought about the day I came on my mission and hugging my teary eyed dad on the curb. I have thought about his constant love, support, and prayers since wearing this missionary tag and today I just want to say thank you. Thank you for being the role model I have needed and depended upon for 19 years.
Last week my mom sent me a talk entitled, ‘The Ministry of Angels’ by Elder Holland. He explains, ‘I have spoken here of heavenly help, of angels dispatched to bless us in time of need. But when we speak of those who are instruments in the hand of God, we are reminded that not all angels are from the other side of the veil. Some of them we walk with talk with–here, now, every day.” My dad is one of those angels and to my Heavenly Father I am forever thankful for him.
I love this work and I appreciate the things it is helping me understand. I understand the family unit and the importance of the priesthood at a level I didn’t before I came to Sweden. I am thankful for my dad and his worthiness, his love, and his support. I am thankful to be here to teach others about the family and about the priesthood and about these sacred things I have taken for granted for so long.
I love you all and I hope you have a great week,
Syster Hannah Powell
