My day at the Library started with a prayer meeting that was a bit unusual. The person who usually conducts the meeting had a temple day, and the replacement did not show up until about noon, so the half dozen or so of us that were there did things a little differently. I was able to get the Power Point set up, and I asked one of the older elders to conduct the meeting. I played the keyboard and gave the spiritual thought by reading my blogpost about my Elijah Moment from 17 September that I did not post until the 26th. One of the sisters gave the prayer, and everyone had already done the in-service lesson, so we skipped that.
The first hour the Library was open to the public was extremely slow on our floor, but later we were rather overwhelmed with guests from Asia. One of our new Church Service Missionaries is of Chinese ancestry, and she did a great job of helping not only the Chinese guests, but also the Japanese visitors. I think that altogether she helped about a dozen guests in about 2 hours, and they all left happy with their searches.
I spent some time creating a PowerPoint for an in-service on tips and tricks with keyboard shortcuts, etc. I have not done a PowerPoint since I ended my last mission in 2012, but as long as no one minds that it is not fancy, I seemed to remember the basics.
I did help quite a few guests today, although most often I needed to turn them over to someone who knows more than I do. Sometimes the help was just to verify what I thought was correct, and sometimes much more extensive help was needed.
One guest had a copy of a large, elaborate pedigree chart in the form of a literal tree! Originally created in the mid-1800s, it was a bit of a challenge to figure out exactly what was going on. An unusual item listed on the tree was a note about a copper shield that gave different information than what was apparently available in the records in the 1850s. I asked for help in translating the word for copper shield, and when I went back to the guest he said, "Yes, I knew about that discrepancy on the shield"!!!
I cannot take any credit for the records of a grandfather that a guest found, but she gave me a hug anyway when I just went to check on her. In addition to her, "I found him!!" and the hug, she also said, "Please do not ever stop doing what you people do here in the Library!" I assured her that we would not stop, and that what she was feeling was the Spirit. It was another Elijah moment.
During my lunch break I decided to drive to the market to get more apples--and I got some Red Delicious which were being cleared out. I like them OK, but I decided I wanted to figure out how to use them in a recipe--and I actually made Tuna Waldorf Salad for my supper this evening! I enjoyed it and decided that the main difference between it and regular tuna salad was that instead of using pickle relish I used apples! Since I used a whole apple and two stalks of celery, I could barely taste the tuna. I like tuna well enough, but it was rather nice to have this be mostly waldorf salad!
When I was leaving and arriving back at the Library, I noticed some people with signs denouncing the Church. [My Sweetheart told me tonight that this happens on all General Conference weekends, so I would probably see more of them.] We talked about this during our afternoon prayer meeting, and the elder who was conducting reminded us of the principle of "opposition in all things". We must be doing something right when we receive such opposition. Later in the day I wrote to a FairMormon questioner and shared that principle.
I also thought about that principle in remembering an interesting observation in a medical conference I have been watching. The point was made that negative memories are much more powerful than positive memories in stimulating the brains of people who have diminished memory. I have heard that before, but I did not before put that thought together with opposition. Integrating these ideas reminds me that we came here to learn for ourselves to distinguish between good and evil. Perhaps instead of blocking negative memories, I can truly feel the emotions attached to them, learn from them, and then let them go. Too often I have run from negative memories. Perhaps I need to remember that without those negatives, I could not experience the opposite joy [I am borrowing that thought from my Sweetheart! When we talked about this idea he put into words what I could not figure out how to say].
When I finished my shift at the Library I stayed for a while and worked on my Eppingen records rather than going again to the temple. That work seemed to go better than it has before. I corrected some relationships, and figured out how to attach some sources based on the Ortsippenbuch. One of the parent-child relationships I corrected had parents attached whose names bore no resemblance to the child who was born about 25 years before they were! It is amazing to see some of the really strange things that are in the collaborative family tree!
Tomorrow is Conference and I should get to attend the afternoon session in person--a new experience!
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