Tuesday, May 26, 2015

Chapter 3 Mary, My Best Friend

6/1/98 Monday – On this day, I finally got back to art class at the local Japanese middle school. I started carving a picture frame back in December, but I got sick, and other things came up. . . . Anyway, I finished carving it today. Now I just have to sand and varnish it. It’s square with a circle-shaped hole to put the picture in. I carved a butterfly at the top, a pansy at the bottom, and flowers and leaves up the sides.

6/5/98 Friday
– On this day, I finished sewing a vest for myself. The material is blue white Teddy bears and bows outlined in white. I stitched on 3 white buttons, for the finishing touch.

6/9/98 Tuesday
– At the church in Tama, my family has been taking classes on Cultural Anthropology. It’s a little slow, with the Japanese translation in between, but the subject matter is intriguing.

The Bible Conference began this evening. We sang in Japanese and English, and then heard a message by a pastor who is visiting from America. I enjoy hearing sermons in both English and Japanese. As long as I hear the English first, I can understand the Japanese pretty well.


I started asking for signatures in my Bible this evening. Later, I’ll look up the favorite verse references that people added to their autographs.


6/11/98 Thursday
– I’m so happy because Mary (age 14) is here at Tama with me! Her dad brought her yesterday to stay at the hotel with us. On Friday, I get to ride back to Mary’s house when Mr. Ron, her dad, comes to pick us up. 

I feel excited to think that God has given me a great friend, and He lets us get together even though we live far apart. I foresee a fabulous week ahead.


This afternoon, after two messages at Grace Baptist Church, Mary & I had some fun around Tama Lodge. We walked around the grounds and bought some goodies from the Country Store. Then we did some archery. I did about as well as I did last time. Mary hit the bull’s-eye once. We also played miniature golf, but neither of us did very well at it.
This evening, a banquet was held in the restaurant at Tama Lodge, on the U.S. base. Everybody got all dressed up, and we had prime rib for supper. I could only eat six large bites of my prime rib, but Mary devoured that whole huge hunk of meat. She said, “I just have to be able to tell my brother Ronnie that I ate a whole prime rib meal.”


6/14/98 Sunday – I’ve been at the Hudsons’ since last Friday. Saturday was a quiet day, with visitation in the morning, browsing in a 100-yen store (the Japanese variation on a dollar store), washing the dogs in the bathtub, watching a movie, and then supper with two families from church.

This morning in Sunday school, we had a most delicious object lesson! We made teams of three girls, three boys, and the teacher Mr. Jack by himself. We had to “unite” some odd-shaped pieces of cake into one piece, using a container of chocolate frosting.

The cake and frosting were meant to symbolize families, made up of different people, sticking together to serve the Lord. Mary & I had to laugh, because the girls’ cake really looked like one whole piece of cake with frosting on it, but the boys’ cake was crumbling apart!

This evening, I sang the song I wrote: "Help Me Sleep." Mary is tremendously proud of me for having written a song! I sang it at church, and Mr. Ron (the pastor and Mary's dad) had me sing it before the sermon, though I tried to warn him. I could see the ladies’ eyelids drooping and the kids snuggling against their parents as I sang. 

These are the words to the song:

~Help Me Sleep~

I will lay myself in bed,
Draw the pillow to my head,
For I'm in the dwelling place
'Neath my Father's holy face.

Help me sleep, fall asleep.
Lord, shelter me. Protect me.
Help me sleep, fall asleep.
Lord Jesus, keep me safely.

Shepherd, fill my heart with peace.
Make my worries all to cease.
Lead me to the pastures green.
My poor troubled soul redeem!

Help me sleep, fall asleep.
Lord, shelter me. Protect me.
Help me sleep, fall asleep.
Lord Jesus, keep me safely.

After the sermon, one little boy sidled up to me and said, “Your song worked on me!” He had slept through the rest of the service.

6/15/98 Monday – I forgot to mention that Mary & I don’t have to do any schoolwork this week! Isn’t that just super-cali-frag-listic-expi-ali-docious? (Yes, I know how to spell it.)

This morning, Mary & I rode our bikes to a department store. We dropped off some film from my camera, so I can show the photos to Mary before I leave. Then we walked all around and up and down the escalator, looking at the merchandise. We got a little bored, so we mischievously tried on some articles of clothing which we had no intention of buying. We put them right back, of course.

Following that diversion, we walked to the McDonald’s across from Daiei for a typical fast food lunch. To top it off, we licked an ice cream cone apiece, and then pedaled back home again.

We were pretty hot from our ride, so we put on our swimsuits and rinsed off in some cool water from the shower.



After that, we sat on towels in Ronnie’s room. Ronnie is Mary’s older brother, and I ignore him. Ronnie has been gone all week, which I consider to be another good thing about my visit. 

Mary & I worked on a 3-D puzzle. It’s a puzzle of a Victorian mansion that Mary got at Thrift Shop. While we worked on it, we listened to Patch the Pirate’s Evolution Revolution cassette tape.


6/17/98 Wednesday
– On this day, Mary dug away the grass from a little spot in front of their house where she wants to plant sunflowers and beans and tomatoes. I half-heartedly helped, but – lazybones that I am – I only cleared about an eighth of the plot of land. The earthworms that I dug up didn’t help matters either. It’s strange that, while Mary gets along with frogs and earthworms, she can’t stand bugs. I, who think spiders and insects are curious and beautiful, do not in the least appreciate slimy animals. More evidence of irony!

6/18/98 Thursday
– This morning, Mary & I rode our bikes to Daiei again to pick up my photos. We sat right outside the store and looked at the pictures. They were mainly of Spring Camp and the Bible Conference. However, the photo of Hannah & Megan Roberts & Mary & me evoked this remark from me: “We look dorky.”

Mary defended us by asserting that we had every reason to look dorky. We’d gotten up early and been running around all day. That’s certainly true, but knowing that doesn’t improve the picture. Oh, well.


This week, Mary & I have been painting and stenciling on little blocks of wood. One of mine has on it an apple and two daisies. I’m going to give it to Papa for Father’s Day. The other one I made matches my bedroom because there’s a Teddy bear in the middle with a border of pink flowers on a light green background. Mary’s paintings feature dark green and blue backgrounds and sunflowers.


This afternoon, we finally decided on names for the hambabies. I didn’t mention them before, did I? Well, Him and Her Hamster now have four descendants: Martin, Matthias, Mattimeo, and Mariel. We named them after the mouse heroes in the Redwall book series. Both Mary & I love the Redwall stories. The baby hamsters are unbearably cute. We could see them getting bigger every day, but they’re still so small that I can hold all four of them in my hands at once.



Another event of this afternoon was the car wash / water fight. Miss Sherry (Mary’s mom) wanted Mary & me to wash her car, so we did. We didn’t do that great of a job, because we couldn’t get off the bits of mown grass that stuck to the car. 

Anyway, it was fun, and after the good-enough car wash, we had a water fight. We were each allotted a bucket of water and a sponge as weapons, and the battlefield was the gravel parking lot in front of the Hudsons’ house. Our buckets were placed 10 paces apart from each other and beyond each girl’s bucket was her safety zone, into which her enemy could not enter.


It was funny! We’d each dip a sponge in our own bucket and charge at each other, alternately hurling the sponges or squeezing them onto the opponent. After two buckets full of water each, we were ready to sign a peace treaty. 




When we finally got dry again, we made supper for ourselves. Mr. & Mrs. Hudson had gone out to eat. Mary & I fixed salmon, broccoli, tomatoes, and rice.

6/21/98 Sunday
– I’m back home again. Mary & I said a sad farewell yesterday. In the morning, we got to eat donuts together. We went to Mister Donut and split five donuts between us.

This morning in Sunday school, we went outside to the playground next to our church and played some Bible games that my mom had invented. The games had to do with the patriarchs of Israel, since it’s Father’s Day. There were only about six kids this week, but there were just as many adults participating, so the relay races went well.


6/24/98 Wednesday
– This evening, Mama and I went to a piano concert. There was just one fellow playing one song after another, and all by memory. He sure looking funny, bouncing every time a note was accented. It made me think, “If that guy were wearing a wig, it would have fallen off a long time ago.” During a particularly energetic passage, I thought for sure he was going to pop off the piano bench and shoot through the ceiling like a rocket!

6/26/98 Friday
– I guess I’d better explain first about the Bishops being in Iwaki. Paul Bishop (who grew up as a missionary kid in Japan) was the pastor of Satogaoka Baptist Church when my dad joined him as assistant pastor. Now the Lord has led the Bishops to return to America for good, leaving my dad to become the next pastor.

This time, the Bishops are in Japan for just a few weeks, to pack up their belongings in the parsonage and send them back to America. I first saw them on Monday this week, and they’ve been frequenting our house every day (and sometimes night) since then. Miss Susan had been giving away to us all kinds of things that she doesn’t want anymore. Looking at some of them, I think, “Oh, neat!” and others, “What in the world are we going to do with that?”


Anyway, this day, we got two shelves, two file drawers, and a china cabinet from them. 
Our new cabinet looks really nice, and we put a lot of dishes in it already. It’s bigger than the old cabinet, too.

6/28/98 Sunday
– Over 30 people came to church to see the Bishops and say good-bye to them.
In children’s church, we had a few Japanese children, as well as the Bishops’ three kids: Joel (age 7), Kayla (age 4), and Jeremy (age 2). So the plan was for Mama to tell the Bible story in English, and then I would translate into Japanese. We started out that way, but Mama kept forgetting and saying it in Japanese. Then I had to translate into English! By the time the story ended, I was telling it in Japanese, while Mama repeated in English what I had said.

When the story was over, I went down to the nursery with little Jeremy Bishop. He’d been getting a little antsy upstairs in children’s church. In the nursery, Jeremy played a game which consisted of his hiding behind a futon, telling me in a loud voice to “Hide! Down!” and then popping up from behind the futon and looking pleased with himself.


After the worship service, everyone stayed for lunch. Indeed, even more people came at lunchtime. I went around snapping pictures left and right. I used up nearly a whole roll of film!



This day was also time for the ladies’ group to present Miss Susan and Kayla their matching handmade smocked dresses. I don’t know how it happened, but I’d had no hand in making those dresses, though I knew how to smock. Anyway, I took a good picture of Kayla wearing her dress and playing on the swing.

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