As we were in the final few weeks of our mission, we visited Camp Wildwood in north San Diego. The camp is for church and family events, and has a whole host of entertaining stuff: soccer fields, pool, archery range, zipline, mess hall, and so on. A handful of senior missionaries manage the camp, supervising the stations and keeping everything running smoothly. Unfortunately one couple had to return home early, so they’re short-handed and desperately looking for help.
Pepper’s brother Randy, and his wife Nancy, recently retired and have been talking about serving a mission “someday”. Well, after hearing about the camp’s plight, Pepper called Randy and explained the situation. Not only would they be a ton of fun hosting youth and families, but Randy is a mechanic and incredibly good at fixing and maintaining things like the camp (sprinkler systems, pool plumbing, buildings, ATVs, yada yada). They’re perfect for this assignment!
After a couple days considering it, Randy and Nancy compiled their mission papers and sent them in. Within just a few weeks they’d been accepted, trained, and were on their way to San Diego! Interestingly, we finished our mission and headed home the week before they arrived. We didn’t overlap at all, but today we received this photo of them at the camp:
Yep, they’re official with their nametags. And this is the first time in the thirty years I’ve known Randy that he doesn’t have facial hair (full-time missionaries are expected to be clean-shaven).
They’re having a grand time, and it’s cool to chat with them about the people we both know from the mission.