New friends

 We walked into church this week, and a visiting family was sitting on the row right behind where we usually sit. After an initial sigh of relief that they hadn't claimed OUR pew, and made us sit somewhere different for the day (you know you're all the same....) I noticed that they had kids pretty similar in age to ours. We sat down and said hi, where you from, etc. They were from Florida, the whole family was deaf. Their 9-yr old boy and my 9-yr old boy locked eyes, and I swear, before they even said anything, they were instant best friends. Sam has gotten so much more confident signing, and he's turned into a fast fingerspeller. This means that he can express himself about as fast as his mind goes, as long as the person he's talking too is good enough at ASL and English to understand his signing and his wonky grammar. :) Well, Sam's buddy could hack it, and the two of them gabbed for 10 minutes before church started. Part of me thought I should tell him to stop talking and get ready for the sacrament. But I saw so many people smiling at them, I think their instant brotherhood made people happy. It made for a fun day at church! We're so blessed. Remember back when the kids thought moving to the branch was a sacrifice? (And there were some sacrifices...) Now we're on the end where we mainly see the blessings. Like the kids making friends with people they would never have been able to meet before. 

Some thoughts about teaching scripture lessons to CODAs in Primary. I've been sitting in some of the little kids' Primary classes lately as the required second adult. Their teacher is a pro. I've been observing her, so I can learn from the best. Something I've noticed that is different from hearing Primary - it takes soooo loooonnng just to name all the people, because the kids aren't really great spellers  yet. Many of the Old Testament characters don't have name signs, but fingerspelling Mordecai over and over again is the WORST. So they spend the start of class making up name signs for everyone. 

Another observation: sharing is the worst, too. The kids don't understand each other! They don't have the attention span or the interest to pay attention to what any of the other kids are saying, anyway. So if you ask the kids to share what they learned this week....all the other kids check out while one kid chats with the teacher. Fortunately, this gets better as they get older. But at the end of class, when they get to color, a lot of the kids will share spontaneously, and then they can have a good chat with the teacher.  Just another one of the ways that things need to be adapted for ASL situations. 

Stuff

 Hey, friends, it seems like it's been a long time since I wrote. That's because I haven't been able to think of anything interesting to share with you! Of course, there are lots of interesting things going on, but sometimes they don't write so well on paper. 

For example....I've been thinking for a long time about how to expound on the interesting sounds ASL makes. I was sitting in the living room when I heard the sound of "In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." I knew that Marriner's meeting on zoom was over, despite him being in a different room just because I heard the knuckle pop of the sign "with" then the clap of "amen." Sure enough, Marriner came up the stairs a few minutes later. I've thought about how to describe the tummy slap of "please" and the hand slap of "bless" that Jane makes when she prays. Most people rub their chest for "please", but Jane's in a hurry, and little kids don't have much of a chest to aim for, so they hit their tummies instead. :) It sounds like thumping a watermelon. The language has become auditorily fascinating to me! But these things probably work better in video format than on a blog....

We had some visitors this weekend - some long-lost friends who were brave enough to look us up when they came in town for the temple open house. It makes me so happy when people do that! I'm so glad they reached out! Of course, they know no sign language, but we're not going to send them to the hearing ward and not see them all day. When friends come to visit, they come to church with us. We took their 11 and 12 year old kids to Primary since YW was just reorganizing their class presidency - boring.... I thought Primary was pretty fab, definitely showing off for our visitors. But after Primary, our 11 year old visitor gave me his frank assessment. "Primary isn't so fun in ASL. When people are talking, if your mind starts to wander, you'll hear something and it will make you interested again. It's really hard to pay attention without any talking." I was very impressed at his analysis - this is, indeed, about what I'd thought of it. It's just harder to pay attention! The poor little kids really struggle with it. I wish I knew a way to make it better without excluding the deaf teachers, but I don't. I mean, going to church is hard, but in general it's the same hard no matter where you go. But all our kids know that their church is HARDER than everyone else's. Sigh. 

One last comment....we've been in the branch 4 1/2 years. Lots of people have started to notice this. I have a simultaneous desire to not talk about it because I don't want to get anxious, and a need to talk about all the worries I have about the future. Getting released eventually is not going to be easy. But even though I keep talking about it, I really don't want to talk about it yet. So if you're one of my 3 readers (ok, that's a made-up number...) do me a favor and don't bring it up. We don't know what's going to happen, or when it's going to happen, and that's everything I'd tell you anyway. :)

 Sigh. This week has been a crying week. I just get overwhelmed with the news from Ukraine, and there's nothing to do but cry about it sometimes. We knew things would get worse, so it's like watching a slow train wreck to hear news from friends. 

Yesterday, I finished Singing Time, cleaned up, and went to the end of Relief Society. The lesson was about increasing our compassion for others, and the teacher used the kindness of the people in Poland as an example. The pictures of refugee camps opened the water spigots in my eyes, and I just sat there and cried. And, of course, felt a little awkward about it. Then I felt the comforting thought that everyone around me was deaf, and didn't hear me sniffling - that was a small comfort! But then I laughed as my small comfort turned against me - the RS president turned around and asked me to say the closing prayer. :) I'm sure she wouldn't have asked me if she'd heard my sniffling!

Keep praying for Ukraine, friends!

Slava Ukraini

With Russia's invasion of Ukraine, I just want to acknowledge the special place Ukraine has in our hearts. It was there that Marriner learned sign language. It was there God began preparing our family, before our family existed. It was there Marriner (sorta) served as Branch President for the first time.

(It wasn't very long...or very official...but we still enjoy joking about it.)

Marriner's mission companion, Elder Leonhardt (because your mission companions are always Elder and Sister) contacted Marriner this week. He's been called to coordinate refugee assistance for members of the church fleeing Ukraine, and asked Marriner to help spread his contact information to anyone he was in contact with who had fled. At first, Marriner thought he didn't know anyone, his contacts were few and staying put. But he realized that very few people would know any of the deaf members - the branch was dissolved shortly after Marriner left. So he took some vacation time one day, pulled out his pictures, tried to remember names and looked people up on FB and Linked-In. Elder Leonhardt messaged him the next day thanking him - he'd had several people contact him and say Elder Merrill had contacted them. It was a sweet experience to feel the influence of the Spirit as Marriner tried to remember names and faces from over 20 years ago! And it was hilarious to see him trying to remember Russian Sign Language! And it was such a relief to be able to do SOMETHING to help. 

Slava Ukraini. We love you!

Articles of Faith

 So Sam's Primary class is working on memorizing the Articles of Faith, which are 13 succinct statements of our basic doctrines. They're great for kids to memorize - just the right length and difficulty to be challenging but not overwhelming. I was sitting in Sam's class this week, and he said the closing prayer. "Please bless us to memorize the....(and he couldn't remember how to sign "Articles of Faith. So he fingerspelled the whole darn thing.)" After the prayer, his teacher showed him how to sign it, which is to hold your hand up like you're giving high-5, then make an "A" on the top of your palm, then an F on the bottom. Sam copied it to make sure he'd gotten it right, except he did it backwards, doing an F on top and the A on the bottom.

I started to say, "No, that would be the Farticles...." and I got really quiet and just didn't finish that sentence...