Day 168: FHE at the Garon's

15 fevrier 2010 (Day 168)
Today was a good day. I had lots and lots of dreams last night about the missionaries and I think some of them were even in French, which is a good thing! I went running in the cold to the new area that Hannah showed me and I didn’t get lost! I was so proud of myself and it looks like it will make a nice 30 minute loop. I was also not painfully sore from rowing for the first time today and it was a sunny day (although cold). I think it was around -6C when I went out for my run.
The highlight of the day was definitely going to a soiree familiale (family home evening) with Joel and Anne Garon. They are Isabel’s “French parents” and they have one child left at home, Quinton, who is 18. I left a little before 5pm so that I could meet Cheryl at Commerce and go to their home. I thought the trams were on the holiday schedule which is why I left so early, but I guess it is only the buses, so I got to Commerce early and went into FNAC (like Barnes and Noble or Borders). They are having this crazy sale where you can get 5 dvds for 30 euros. Apparently Cheryl has bought 28 dvds in the past week! I can’t even imagine having that much spending money. Being in France has made me realize how much money my parents don’t have and how I never really realized how much of a difference there was because they manage their money so well. I definitely am thankful that I have parents who are very conservative with their money and spend it wisely. After Cheryl switched one of the movies that she had bought we got on the tram to go to the Garon’s. I told Cheryl about my funny Valentine’s day and she told me about how her ex-boyfriend broke up with his current girlfriend because Valentine’s day just wasn’t the same without Cheryl and cried to her on the phone. He is apparently coming to visit Cheryl in Paris for a day next month. Cheryl doesn’t want to date him again…oh boy.
We waited for Isabel and the last stop and then got on a bus to go to the Garon’s. Those two girls are crazy and boisterously loud. They were getting lots of looks on the bus. Bless their hearts though, they have so much fun. The Garon’s house is really cute. It is in a quiet city outside of Nantes. Joel made us some delicious crepes. We ate them with jams, peanut butter (crunchy or smooth), nutella, and this gingerbread flavored spread (quite good). I had about three. Quinton was being quite a sass all night. He was making hasty generalizations about groups of people (don’t we all) like that British people always put dark around their eyes and Americans sparkle (the Brits had on eye liner, I had on sparkles) and that Chinese people liked fat because they have sumos. I thought it was pretty funny although it was less funny after the prayer for FHE where I mentioned about being grateful to be together as a family and Quinton commented that if they were there wouldn’t be two Brits and an American and that there would be two other people. I didn’t really take offense until his parents got very upset at him for saying this, which was when I knew that he was quite serious. I guess some people don’t get the concept that a “family” can really be any group of people together, and even if it isn’t all the “family” members you are still a family. Anyway, Isabel gave a really good lesson about prayer. She had an activity where she gave us half a sheet of paper and we had scissors and the mission to stick our head through it. I had some vague memory of doing this in elementary school and so I succeeded (though we weren’t really supposed to). Isabel had lots of good scriptures and quotes. At the end Cheryl shared a story about listening to the spirit and then the Garon’s shared a few from their life experiences. I really liked when Joel said that when we don’t wait for God’s answer it is like calling someone on the phone, talking, and then just hanging up without letting them answer. I really liked that analogy. It was so great to have family home evening! With the songs sung and everyone participating you could really feel the spirit. It might just be me, but I seem to be more perceptive of the spirit in situations like this, especially when there are other spirits to glean from. I don’t know if it is because I just never feel the spirit here or since I am alone most of the time now I really notice the feel-good difference of what was around me all the time in Utah.
The Garon’s practically insisted that I call my family since they can call the United States for free. I immediately called Grandma and Grandpa Keeley to see how they were doing, but no one answered the phone so I just left a message. I then called my house to have a very surprised father answer. I said hello and he paused for quite some time and then responded with a greeting and asked me what I was doing calling them. It was good to talk to everyone (I talked for around 40 minutes to my family). The most significant thing that came out of this conversation is that my dad said that I can start putting in my papers to go on a mission when I get home in July instead of waiting a year. I won’t go into details on my blog, but that has got me thinking. A lot.
Around 9:30 Joel drove Cheryl and I home, where I continued to think about what my dad said late into the night gazing at the stars.