At least two crazy but really cool things

Facebook has brought me back in touch with many people from my past but a few have been really crazy and cool.
A girl that I was friends with in High school added me as her friend. I saw that someone with a last name I knew very well had posted on her wall that that the church had really changed B's life.

Okay so let's go back a few years.
The summer I was fifteen I ran away from home. I spent that summer in Chelan. I had a friend that was working there for the summer and I stored all my stuff in his car and slept there when I couldn't find anyplace to crash. I partied a lot that summer and got into way too much trouble. All of my clothes were stolen and the girl I ran away with- well let's just say her parents tracked us down and dragged her home by her hair (literally). I can still see her mom dragging her to the car by her ponytail. Anyway back to the cool part of the story. The friend who's car I slept in and who I hung out with a ton once we both went back home was named B. So upon seeing this message I was like no way B is a member of the church, and here I thought I was getting most improved player award when we get to Heaven. Anyway I messaged Ch and confirmed that we were indeed talking about the same B and that she has stayed in touch with him all these years. To say I was shocked that he was LDS would be a HUGE understatement. I told her that I would love to talk to him. I was totally stoked to let him know I was LDS too.

Well we ended up talking on the phone for like two hours. I can't believe how much the gospel has changed both of our lives. I guess he grew up a member of the church but started to go inactive when he was 12 or so. After HS he joined the Marines, got married, divorced, remarried and moved to Virginia (of all places). They had some neighbors who they really liked and one day they saw the missionaries in these neighbor's driveway. They were curious and asked the couple if they were LDS- which they were. B told them that he was too but just wasn't living the gospel right then even though he still believed (sounds so much like Travis when I met him). So this couple invites them to go out on a date one night, they tell them ElderOaks is speaking at the church and ask if they would like to come listen. B and his wife said sure but they had no idea who Elder Oaks was. After hearing Elder Oaks speak B's wife decides she wants to join the church and the rest is history. One year later they are preparing to take their two little boys and be sealed as a family in the WashingtonDCTemple probably sometime is February or March and he wants me and Travis to come up for the sealing. Travis and I were sealed in the Washington DC temple on July 24th 1999 and that is the only time I have ever been there but I can't wait to go back- especially for this.

It was almost a surreal experience to be sitting there talking to him for hours about the gospel. I can guarantee that anyone that knew either one of us in High School would have never guessed such a future for me or for him. I remember when I first joined the church I wrote a letter to a friend of mine from HS that I knew was Mormon. He was serving a mission in Argentina. He wrote me back and said of all the people in our HS I would have been his last choice for church membership, he said that it made him realize that we never know who will accept the gospel or when.

Okay let's go back just a few more years
I was born in Chelan, Washington and grew up in a little tiny town called Manson (it is a super touristy place now with casinos and the like). When we were living in Manson things were kind of rough. I counted once and I lived in 22 houses before I was 11 years old in this little tiny town (23 if you count the short time we lived in our car). If you click on the touristy link and look at the picture of downtown Manson you can actually see one of the places I lived. On the left had side of the street there are shops and when I was a kid there were apartments above the shops. Anyway when I was about seven and my mom was pregnant with my brothers we moved to a house on Harris Street and we actually lived there for a few years. There was a family next door ( I think they may have owned the house we lived in), anyway they had a ton of kids. I think three sons and four or five daughters. They had a daughter that was just younger then me and most of my childhood memories revolve around the things we used to do together. I could write a whole blog about all the things we used to do. I think know we had the BEST imaginations in the entire world. They were LDS but at the time I wasn't really sure what that meant. I can remember teasing the youngest boy telling him that he couldn't drink pop because it fizzes. I moved away from Manson shortly after I turned 11 and she and I lost contact.

Okay so fast forward 22 years or so and I found a couple of kids that I went to Manson Elementary School with on facebook and added them as friends. Then one day I log in and see a message from another childhood friend from Manson. She and I send a few messages back and forth and catch up and it was like a blast from the past. Well I decide to look through her friends and who do I find there but the girl from next door. I chatted with her online as long as I possibly could before leaving to get the kids from school today and it was very very cool. She lives in Provo is married and expecting her first baby (a girl) in March. I really hope we stay in touch. It was so great to look through her pictures and see how beautiful her family still is. And I can't believe she is a great aunt. None of my siblings even have kids yet. At least Travis' family has given me some nieces and nephews.

And more amazing to me is these people from my past that I truly loved growing up share the same beliefs and values as I do. It's amazingly cool.