I Hope They Call Me On A Mission (Part 12 of 12)

A counselor in the mission presidency welcomed us. He introduced all the missionaries by language. A few of the missionaries who thought they were going to learn one foreign language were informed that their assignment had changed slightly and they were now going to learn another. Some of the languages were ones I had never even heard of before. Then we watched a slide show of what to expect at the missionary training center. After that, we met President Joe J. Christensen, the mission president of the MTC and his wife Sister Christensen. They gave us some ideas of how to write to each other. Somehow I had a premonition that as soon as this meeting was over, it would be time to say good bye. My loving family. The people who meant more to me than anyone else on Earth. My parents who had been with me all my life. They had supported me through trials and accomplishments. They were with me when I began kindergarten and when I graduated high school and all the school activities in between. My brothers and sisters who had come along over the years. They were all my dearest friends. And now the time drew near to leave them.
Then President Christensen pointed to a door on his left. “The families will go out this door and the missionaries will go out that door,” and he pointed to a door on his right. Big tears gushed out of my eyes. I put my arm around Dad. We both stood and hugged even more. “Good bye,” I sobbed. “Thank you for everything you’ve done for me!” I hugged Mom and said the same as best I could. The building up of emotion throughout that morning was unleashed as I hugged each of my sisters and brothers, Vera, Karen, Julie, Lisa, Christopher, Johnny, and Little Lori. “Good bye. I love you all!” And then all their teaching and all their training over the years kicked in and I walked out the door to my waiting mission for the Lord Jesus Christ.

The End

I Hope They Call Me On A Mission (Part 11 of 12)

My heart skipped a beat when we saw a sign for Provo and Brigham Young University. In a few more minutes we arrived at the front entrance of the missionary training center. Dad went to park the van as the rest of us proceeded in the building. In the lobby, a lady placed a red sticker on my suit jacket lapel, indicating I was a brand new missionary. Dad joined us and we continued on our way. We were ushered down the main hall. We passed by the cafeteria and saw for the first time the missionaries that were eating. White shirts and ties. Elder Kyle Hunter came out of the cafeteria. He had entered the MTC just a week before. He welcomed me. His smiling face will forever be etched into my mind. There was a large room on the left and we were instructed to put all my luggage in there. A lot of other missionaries’ suit cases were in there as well. One of my sisters placed an ice cream bucket full of left-over cookies from the open house on top of my suit cases. We then turned and went down another hallway. It was lined with tables and at each table was a person who gave each missionary a packet of something or other. One packet had my address on it. Mom quickly jotted down the address so she’d know where to send my mail to. Another lady gave me my black missionary name tag which said, “ELDER LOVELESS.” And then the name of the Church in Portuguese, which I recognized, yet couldn’t pronounce, yet. We turned left again and went down another long hallway. We went in a room which was actually two large rooms with an open divider that was normally between them. We were ushered into seats near the front. I was in the back of my family’s group, but everyone sat on the same long row. Dad was the only family member that I sat next to, Mom and the rest of the family were next to him. We waited for more missionaries and their families to come in. When the room was full, the orientation meeting began.

I Hope They Call Me On A Mission (Part 10 of 12)

Thursday, October 30, 1980 dawned overcast, but turned into a bright and sunny day. I woke up at 5:00 and made a final trip up to the attic with some items from my room. I then dressed in one of my missionary suits. I made the final packing preparations with my suit cases. I had a sad feeling looming over me. I knew I was doing the right thing. There was no doubt about that. But after this day I would never be truly at home in this house. After the mission I would probably go away to college and then marriage. My wonderful house! I had lived there since I was four years old. Not quite fifteen years – a short time really. But most of my growing up years were centered around on that house. My crayon drawings on the cement floor of the basement I had made as a little boy were still there. Symbolically I said good bye to all these things I had so dearly loved. I went to the back yard and said goodbye to the sandpile where I had played and built imaginary cities. Then I said good bye to the grape stake fence I had climbed on and gotten slivers. The old boards in the side yard I had built huts with. The electric lawn mower with its cord patched with a hundred pieces of black electrical tape fixing where I had run over the cord. I bid farewell to the big, wonderful swing set where every kid in the neighborhood had played at one time or another and where I had imagined to be a space fighter pilot. Tears were very close to the surface.
And then I went back inside. We had scriptures and prayers and then breakfast. Toast and scrambled eggs and jam. I went back down stairs and got all three of my suit cases and carried them up the stairs. A few days before I had zipped Christopher inside my largest suit case, Johnny inside the middle one, and Lori in the smallest. I carried all three up the stairs in this fashion, then after letting them out for a minute I put them back inside and carried all three back down the stairs. This time there was no going back. I saw little Lori as I paused a moment before carrying my suit cases outside. “Lori, I wish I could take you in my suit case again.” Little Lori. She would change the most in my two-year absence. Did she understand where I was going? Johnny would change a lot too. How I had loved these final few months to be home more with those two tiny children. I continued carrying the suit cases out to the van waiting in the drive way. I put all three in the back. Everyone piled into the van and we were ready to go. Dad drove the forty miles or so to Provo, Utah where the missionary training center was located.

I Hope They Call Me On A Mission (Part 9 of 12)

I picked up Melanie that evening and we went to a restaurant to eat. I looked over to the same booth where I remembered that we had sat as a family eleven years before when we celebrated my baptism. Now I was going on a mission!
After dinner as Melanie and I were walking out to the car, she put her arm around me and pulled me close. In the car she gave me a kiss on the check. I’d wear that kiss for a long time. We had never kissed on the lips and somehow that kind of kiss didn’t seem needed at that moment either. We got to my house just as the family had pulled into the driveway from going to pick up Grandma Winnie. Then we all went in the van to the stake center where Grandpa and Grandma Loveless were waiting for us. We sat around and talked for a while until President Banks came in the room. He then joined with my Dad, and Grandpa Loveless in a circle as they placed their hands on my head and with the Priesthood, gave me a special blessing and set me apart as a full-time missionary.
We got back in the van and took Grandma Winnie home. Then it was time to drop Melanie off at her house. I walked her to the door. But I noticed Dad was also coming with us. Oh, yeah, that arms length thing, and always being with your companion. I shock Melanie’s hand and said good bye. I’d see her again at the airport in two months anyway. And we’d write. I had seven anxious children and my mother watching from the car to see what happened next. Dad had a yearning look on his face. “Do I get the kiss?” he said. We all said good night and Dad and I walked back to the van together. Later that night I wrote all those events in my journal as I finished it out. “This is the end of my childhood,” I wrote.

(By the way, this post is the 300th post of this blog!)

I Hope They Call Me On A Mission (Part 8 of 12)

The next night Larraine (an old flame) took me out for barbequed ribs at the Old Salt Lake City Jail restaurant. At the end of the date she wanted to kiss me and I wanted to kiss her, but she felt that might not be right since I was one day away from getting set apart as a missionary.
I spent the next day cleaning my room out and getting things up to the attic. Karen had been eying my room for a long time, and now it was finally going to be hers. We packed my suit cases. Mom gave me a last minute lesson on how to iron. It was as if she were saying, “Oh no, so little time is left and there’s still so much to teach him!” She marked many of my clothes with my name. It was like I was packing for scout camp, but this would be a two-year-long scout camp. This was the greatest Church outing ever! Every other Church activity was just a preparation for this one. Mom had gotten me a bottle of one-a-day vitamins. She wasn’t sure how nutritious the food would be. I think she was still thinking that I was going to the Amazon Jungle and not to São Paulo, the third largest city in the world.

I Hope They Call Me On A Mission (Part 7 of 12)

The next night was our last Family Home Evening together as a family. Mom fixed a fabulous meal for dinner. It was of pot roast, bacon, potatoes, onions, and carrots all cooked in one pot. We also went to have a family portrait taken. In a family of amateur photographers and professional printers, it was our very first commercial sitting. We were joking with each other trying to smile. But the funniest one was when little Johnny said, “Christopher, your eye is falling out!” We burst into laughter at that.

I Hope They Call Me On A Mission (Part 6 of 12)

The next day was Sunday, and my missionary farewell. The opening song was “Scatter Sunshine!” My Mom and Dad spoke. Christopher, who was eight years old, sang the same song I had sung when I was eight. “I might be envied by a king, for I am a Mormon Boy!” My brothers and sisters sang, “Our Heaven Is Our Home.” Then I spoke. I drew an analogy from my ninth grade science fair project. “Technology is such that we can now take a beam of light and combine it with sound waves and pass that over a long distance. That is how Heavenly Father communicates with us. Pure light emanates from the Holy Ghost and this is coupled with the knowledge that the Lord has for us. This is then transmitted to us and we feel peace, calmness, tranquility, pure knowledge entering into our whole soul, or a burning in the bosom.” The ward choir also sang, and I sang with it for the last time. After the meeting was over people came up to me to wish me well. We had an open house at my house with lots of cookies. After several hours of that and as the party began to die down, I sat on the couch, exhausted. And I feel asleep.

Picture: My ninth grade science fair project -- light wave communication

I Hope They Call Me On A Mission (Part 5 of 12)

For my nineteenth birthday I got a tape recorder and a camera, two very important items for a missionary. I still had more than a month to go. Then finally a week to go. The highlight came when Mom and Dad took me to the temple for me to receive my endowments. In the Church there is no higher ordinance that a person can receive than the endowment. Unless you consider that being married in the temple is the highest ordanance. Actually, the sealing for time and eternity (or temple marriage) is a continuation of the endowment. Obviously I wasn’t going to do that yet. But being in the Salt Lake Temple, where I had always dreamed of getting married, was a special experience. And I was there with my Mother and Father. And I was able to participate in temple ordinances with them. When I passed into the celestial room for the first time, the room that signified being in the presence of Our Heavenly Father, Dad came up to me and said, “Welcome to the Celestial Kingdom!” Then I was asked to stand as proxy for a couple who had died years ago and were now to be sealed for eternity. The man performing the ordinance, the sealer, was made aware of me going on a mission in one week. He gave me some special instruction. “Temple marriage is the crowning ordinance of the temple. And when you get back from your mission, you’ll bring a lovely young lady to be your bride and I will perform your marriage.” At that time, I thought that was going to be Melanie. A few days later, I went with Melanie to a University of Utah Football game with her father and his new wife. I could tell the whole idea of her parents’ divorce was very hard on Melanie.

I Hope They Call Me On A Mission (Part 4 of 12)

Everything went very quickly after that. I went down town on the bus and went to Deseret Book. I bought a tourists guide to learning Portuguese, a Portuguese Book of Mormon, and a wall map of Brazil. I bumped into my friend from high school, Laraine while downtown and told her the news.
A few day later my parents and I went on a huge shopping spree for me. We bought suits, extra dress pants, ten white shirts, an overcoat, ties, socks, and an umbrella. We bought luggage and shoes. The sales man told me they were called Forward Thrust the same kind of shoes a mailman would wear.
I decided to ask a young lady in our ward to the Cottonwood High School homecoming dance. Her name was Darlyn Webb, and she had just been called on a mission herself. To ask her I copied the music of a primary song right out of the primary book. But I re-wrote the words. I presented her with a sheet of music that said:

They’ve already called me on a mission.
But first, I must prepare to go.
For two whole years I’ll be at arms-length.
So I’d like to go to the homecoming dance with you.

Darlyn had graduated a few years before me, she was the daughter of a former bishop of mine, and she had a prestigious job working at the Lion House downtown. I was very awed by the fact that she even consented to go with me. And we had a great time.

I Hope They Call Me On A Mission (Part 3 of 12)

Everything was on track for me to be on a mission by the earliest possible time, which was my nineteenth birthday. I had even heard that a young man could turn nineteen in the Missionary Training Center as long as he was nineteen years old by the time he entered the mission field. For English speaking missionaries this was a one month time. For foreign speaking missionaries this was two months. Yes, I was on track to being a missionary in a few more months. I was sustained in stake conference in June to become an elder and my Dad ordained me to that Priesthood Office on June 29, 1980. And then it happened. Russia invaded Afghanistan.
I had to register for the draft and I thought I would be called into military duty. Instead of preaching the gospel of peace I’d be shooting Russians. And since our nuclear weapons were pointed at them, and theirs at us, I didn’t have much hope for the future. As it turned out the worst thing that happened as far as the United States was concerned was that we boycotted the 1980 Moscow Olympics. The absence of our athletes was apparently enough a statement that the United States did not approve of the Russian invasion.
So in mid August I had missionary recommendation interviews with Bishop Kenneth D. Hunter and my Stake President, Ben B. Banks. And then we turned in my mission papers. On August 21 my mission call came. It was in a gray envelope. The papers inside where folded in half. I was fixing myself a cheese sandwich for lunch. The mail came and Mom got it. Somehow I knew that the mission call had come before she even said anything. Mom walked into the kitchen. The hopes and dreams of twenty years of marriage sparkled in her eyes and now her first son had received his mission call. She handed it to me. Time seemed to stand still for a moment. We looked at each other as I fingered the envelope. I knew inside there was a letter signed by President Spencer W. Kimball himself, President of the Church, calling me to a particular mission with the date when I was to report to the Missionary Training Center. I continued to hold the envelope. Mom was brimming with excitement. “Well, open it!”
“Mom, I can’t. I’ve got to wait until everyone is here.” Mom called Dad and told him that Billy had his mission call. We set on a time in the early evening when everyone would be able to be there. I called Melanie and told her. I wanted her to be there, as well. Then I had an assignment at the Murray Bishops Storehouse to help clean up. So I went to do that. When I came home I was very nervous. I went to my room and grasping the mission call envelope I knelt and prayed. “Where am I going? I know I’ll find out soon enough. Oh. Let me be accepting of this mission call and where I’m to be assigned.”
Finally the hour arrived. I sat in the orange rocking chair in the front room. Everyone else was seated on the couch or on chairs brought in from the kitchen. Then I opened it. I pulled out the mission call. I looked at the location I was to be sent to. And then I jumped up and ran downstairs. Our TRS-80 Model I computer was already turned on. I typed the word BRAZIL into the computer and pushed enter. Big letters proudly heralded the words, “I’M GOING TO BRAZIL!!!!!!!!”
Everyone followed me down the stairs as quickly as they could. Karen was the first and she looked at the screen and started screaming. Whenever I heard the word Brazil, I thought of first the Amazon River. So I immediately figured I was going to the Amazon River. The only other thing I knew was that there was a temple of the Church in Brazil. I thought maybe it was on the bank of the Amazon River. We examined the mission call letter more closely. We saw the date I was to report to the Missionary Training Center, October 30, 1980. And the name of the mission, Brazil, São Paulo. On the third reading of the letter I picked up the word “South” on the name of the mission. “So, Brazil, São Paulo South.” Then I thought maybe the temple and my mission are on the South bank of the Amazon River. We looked in a large world atlas at where I was going, but for some reason it didn’t really sink in where São Paulo really was. I was later to learn that São Paulo is the third largest city in the world and thousands of miles away from the Amazon River. I learned also that there are two missions with headquarters in that city, the south and the north missions. Brazil itself had a phenomenal number of six missions!

I Hope They Call Me On A Mission (Part 2 of 12)

I was preparing my whole life for a mission. And everything I did in the Church was in some way a preparation for it. I had looked forward to the summer of 1980 as the time when I would be able to devote a large portion of my time to preparing even more. A mission loomed closer and closer for me. I was excited as well as terrified. I would be a representative of Jesus Christ, Himself. In June of that year I went on my first split with the full-time missionaries. I spent a morning with one of the full-time missionaries and his companion went with someone else. We went trackting in the Three Fountains East Apartments. The elder I was with was surprised at my poise at doing my first door approaches. I felt like telling him I’d only been practicing door approaches by myself since I was twelve.

(Picture: Our family and some of the first full-time missionaries assigned to Salt Lake. About the time when I was 14.)

I Hope They Call Me On A Mission (Part 1 of 12)

I hope they call me on a mission
When I have grown a foot or two
I hope by then I will be ready
To teach and preach and work as missionaries do

I always wanted to go on a mission. And as I was growing up I always wanted to go where my Dad had gone on his mission in the 1950s – Denmark. When my Dad was growing up, he idolized his bishop’s son, Kay Brown. Kay was a little older than Dad and he went on a mission to Germany. Then Dad followed him into the mission field when he went to Denmark. At the end of Kay Brown’s mission, his family went to pick him up. Their airplane landed in Denmark and Dad was able to visit with them. Kay Brown married. Dad married. Years went by. Then one Sunday in the late 1970s, when Dad was in the bishopric, he was attending Junior Sunday School and he heard the children sing a song, I Hope They Call Me On A Mission. He made a point of looking at the music for that song. To his joy he saw that the words and music were by Newel K. Brown.

(Note: The picture is of Dad in Denmark.)

Accomplishing Goals (Part 9 of 9)

Enter the great time for accomplishing goals in the summer of 1980. I did this at the same table in my room where I also did my scripture study. I often played music on my stereo as I did this transcribing. I spent many late nights making sure I stayed on schedule to finish the Joseph Smith Oratorio. As I finished it in mid August, I knew it wasn’t going to be performed at that time, but I was very pleased. In all it had 56 legal sized pages of music. I went to a copy center and had two copies made of it. I kept the original for myself, I gave one to my girlfriend at that time, and I gave the other to my parents. I left it in their room one day. Dad later came and commented on it. “We were sure impressed, Billy. Thank you.” I told him about the Joseph Smith Oratorio’s creation, but I was very careful not to take any credit for it. In the few months that remained before I went on my mission, my parents played it on the piano and I played through it as well.
At the end of the summer I knew the time for going on a mission was drawing very near. Soon I would be leaving my family. I had been able to spend more time with them, too. But it was tremendously satisfying to have so many goals and be able to work on them, and achieving them.

Coming Tomorrow: I Hope They Call Me On A Mission

Accomplishing Goals (Part 8 of 9)

Another goal I had was to write music, particularly an oratorio. When I was sixteen, I had realized that no body had written yet an oratorio about the Prophet Joseph Smith. There was of course The Messiah, which Handel had written hundreds of years before. And in recent years there was An Oratorio from the Book of Mormon, which was written by LeRoy Robertson. I decided then and there, on December 23, 1977, that I needed to write one about Joseph Smith.
I started by selecting a group of scriptures from the Bible, the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price. Then I started writing the melodies to each scripture. These I recorded by hand in a musical staff notebook. I felt that each melody was a musical revelation from the Lord. I felt that I needed to live my life accordingly to be able to receive such wonderful things from God. By the time I finished my Sophomore year of high school I had written the melodies for all the numbers. I was sick one day in the spring of 1978 and I took advantage of that time to put everything in the order that I wanted it.
The big task of harmonizing the melodies now occupied me. First I had to learn how to do that. I bought a very old book called Modern Harmony and studied it carefully. Over the next few years I worked off and on harmonizing and re-harmonizing the Joseph Smith Oratorio. I felt that I couldn’t tell anyone that I was working on it. I didn’t feel I could take any credit for it because it was like the Lord had given it to me. I took Music Theory my senior year in high school and that helped me immensely. I also increased in my piano playing skills so I could play what I had written. I had written all original music for our ward road show and it was neat to hear the music played on the piano by someone who could play it. My Grandpa Loveless had given me a special pen. It
was the kind that one dipped in ink and then it could make a five line music staff. This was a great addition to my Osmroid music writing fountain pen that I already had. By the time I had graduated from high school I had completed the harmonizations. Now all I had to do was to write it all out neatly which the choral parts and the piano accompaniment.