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Today is Celia’s birthday. We were invited to a big party that felt very much like the kind of party you’d throw for a six-year-old. Celia is the one in the back right wearing a red sash that says “BIRTHDAY GIRL”, along with a candy necklace. That’s pretty much her style. Happy birthday, my friend!

When Pepper and I first moved to Montana in 2019, we wanted to get to know people in the area. We jumped into trivia nights, I played with a local bridge club, and we even went to a pickup pickleball game. The pickleball crowd was entirely over-60 people whose athletic ability wasn’t stellar, but whose love of the game was obvious. After learning how to play, we jumped into the games. After a while I was asked to “not play so hard” by the coach/organizer guy. Apparently I was running around too much to get deep shots, and generally playing at a higher athletic level than the rest of the people. Fair enough. (We didn’t go back.)

Fast forward to today, when we played pickleball with a couple of senior missionaries (who are, notably, in their 60s). Unlike the Kalispell club, they’re serious players who are quite good. They taught us a few “tricks” of the game– like how to position ourselves to receive the serve and so on– and then proceeded to wallop us. We posed afterward, looking appropriately serious for this serious endeavor.

It was actually a lot of fun. Prior to this, pickleball held no appeal for me because every game I’d played (not many) had been with people who didn’t really know what they were doing, or had little to no athletic ability. Being on the court with solid players completely changed the game!

Since our friends had driven two hours out to the Valley just to visit us, we all went and hung out with the young missionaries too. Our little group played nine-square and had a blast.

We first met the Farrers about two days after their arrival in San Diego to start their missionary service. We invited them to lunch at a place called Duke’s Old Fashioned Onion Burgers; when we all met there, Sister Farrer informed us that she’s allergic to onions. Hmm. Anyway, we’ve enjoyed spending time with them over the months, and this evening we had one last meal together.

They’re an amazing couple. They’ve been married almost sixty years and have served five missions. Elder Farrer is 85 years old but still going strong. He’s always grinning like he’s thinking of a good joke, and he has fashion tastes like my own.

This is Jerry.

He owns the Brickhouse Deli and has been working there for decades. He’s always wandering the restaurant, talking with customers (he just sits down at your table and joins the conversation!) and handing out free cookies. He’s a hoot, and we enjoy seeing him once or twice a week when we drop in at his place.

We’ve loved the opportunity to work with a local charity to distribute food to people in the area who need it. Today marks one of the last times we’ll be doing this before we leave, so we snapped a picture with the people who run the show.

That’s Roberto, James, and Ariel in the back, with Cari in front. They’re awesome, and have been doing this every week for years. It’s been a privilege to work alongside them.

Of course the food distributions also need many helping hands, and the missionaries always come through. Here’s today’s crew:

It’s been great to do this work and know we’re making a difference in the lives of hundreds of local families.

Having lunch with the missionaries as they join our little Valley family is always a treat. Here are our lunch buddies over the past two weeks:

Every now and then we have a bonus lunch with the whole group. Always a good time!

One of our mission roles here is working with the local young adult group. When we arrived, almost a year ago, there were only three who attended activities regularly. Today we have a much larger group!

What’s funny is that they’re all… women. Our lone man recently left to serve a mission in Kansas, and since then it’s been me, Pepper, and a gaggle of twenty-somethings. If only we could find some handsome, fun young men for them…

One of the things I’ve always loved is having a “lunch buddy” who I can call pretty much any time and meet up for lunch somewhere. Here in El Centro, Woody is my lunch buddy. Today, on a whim, we had sandwiches at our favorite spot, Brickhouse Deli.

He’s even sporting his Magnicephopolis shirt!

I’ve posted many times as we’ve visited the Imperial Sand Dunes with the missionaries. As we enter the final weeks of our mission, we realized today’s trip to the Dunes would be our last. Fortunately it was just as fun as the others.

Elder Rogers impressed us all with a standing backflip off a high dune:

Not to be outdone, Elder Legg did the same but added a 180-degree twist:

I love Elder Tasi’s expression in the background. Apparently he’s not impressed. Elder Legg then improved on his technique by launching himself off the back of Elder Ginos:

I noticed Sister Johnson using an honest-to-goodness SLR camera– not a digital one. I asked to see it, and was shocked to recognize it: an ancient Pentax K-1000!

Here’s the picture from my 16th birthday in 1988 when I opened my Pentax K-1000:

It was awesome to see someone with the same camera, almost forty years later, actually using it!

The ladies all posed for a picture.

I’ve grown to love the Dunes, and how they just continue all the way to the horizon.

Even more, I’ve grown to love these amazing young missionaries. They’re so much fun.

Today we took an unusual route to San Diego, winding through the Anza-Borrego Desert. The desert landscape is littered with ocotillo plants, which are huge, spiky, and spindly. For most of the year they all look quite dead, but as spring marches on, they’re beginning to bloom.

At sunset they look particularly interesting.

As we continued on, and the sun sank, I stopped to snap a picture along the lonely highway.

The desert has a certain beauty all its own. I still love mountains, and lakes, and even oceans, but at times I long for the desert with its rocks and odd plants.