Visiting Teaching?

It's official. I am officially a part of a family ward again. It has been an interesting journey thus far, not too difficult, just interesting. There is this amazing family that has kind of taken me under their wing, and I'm grateful for that, it makes the transition smoother. I am slowly getting to know more people in the ward.

I had my records moved to this ward in February, and had a visiting teaching route immediately. ( : I like that. I don't like to be too idle for too long. My companion and I were assigned three sisters to visit. Since my companion hasn't really done much visiting teaching, I decided to take the reigns and set up the appointments for last month. I called everyone on our list, only to discover that two of the numbers were wrong. Sweet. One of the sisters was easy to find because she is active, so I just chatted with her at church to set up an appointment. The other one is someone that I have never met before, so I didn't know what she looked like, or how to get a hold of her.


One afternoon I decided to pull out some dusty missionary skills and simply track down the address. Easier said than done. I found the address, which wasn't really on the street that it was supposed to be on, but rather on a side street. The FIRST problem in trying to contact this sister is that she lives in a very small gated community. When I say gated community, I mean that there are literally gates around the entire three blocks-no openings on the sidewalks or anything. The SECOND problem was that each address has six units, and I had no idea which unit she lives in.


After driving around the perimeter of the gates, and trying to figure out how to get in, I decided to park and wait to see if anyone would come in the next few minutes. As I was sitting there waiting, my overly anxious uncle called me and wanted to talk. I was more than happy to pass the time with my uncle on the phone as I was doing my visiting teaching, which felt a whole lot more like stalking than it should have. After only a few minutes on the phone with my uncle, a little truck drove up to the gate and drove in. I quickly grabbed the plate of goodies I had prepared, got out of my car and ran through the gate right before it closed. Since I didn't know which unit my sister lives in, I decided to seem like even more of a stalker and followed this truck to its garage, then stood there and waited until the driver got out and eyed me with more than a little suspicion.


I pulled my phone away from my ear as I asked my uncle to hang on for a second, and asked this guy if he knew where a Stephanie lived. Still wary of me, he asked for the name again, and a little more information. Since I'd never met this woman before, I told him that I think that she and her mother had recently moved in to the building. He pointed me toward a door and told me that he thought the person living there was the most recent to move in.


Relieved, I finished the conversation with my uncle and went and knocked on that door. No one answered. I had not thought to bring anything to write a note with, so I didn't want to just leave the cookies. I walked back toward the gate, and realized that I didn't really have a way to get out, other than jumping the gate. There was snow on the ground, and this was not a chain-link fence. This was a gate, a wrought-iron gate, with spikes on top of each rail. I pushed the cookies under the gate and then went to the side and, after a few attempts, was able to get over.


I went back later that night, when I thought Stephanie would be home. I parked by the gate once again, and only had to wait 15 minutes for someone to drive in so I could sprint in behind them. I went to the door that I had tried earlier and found that Stephanie did not live there. The woman who did live there pointed me to her next door neighbor's door. No answer. I decided to simply try all of the doors of the building; there were only six. Three didn't answer, and two didn't even open the door, but stood in the window and asked me what I wanted. After not being able to find Stephanie on the last door, I decided to call it a night, and was heading back to jump over the gate again, when I saw a woman pulling up in a cab. She opened the gate and was walking towards the building I had just canvassed. I walked up to her in the dark, with my plate of cookies (and my black eye), and asked if her name was Stephanie.


Understandably, she was a little taken back by my boldness and the circumstances in which I was approaching her. She asked, "Why?" After all of my searching that day, I simply said that I was just looking for a woman named Stephanie that lived in that building. After admitting that her name was Stephanie, I introduced myself as her visiting teacher and she let me come in and warm up my hands for a bit as we got acquainted. I got her correct number and even got her to relax a little bit after being approached by a stranger in the dark, holding a plate of cookies and sporting a black eye. I still had to hop the gate to get out, but at least I didn't have a plate of goodies the second time around.