For many years I actively avoided thinking about my mission. When I finally did allow myself to remember it again, the memories were mostly bad ones (with some happy exceptions). As time passes, more happier ones are bubbling to the surface.
I served in the Switzerland Geneva Mission in 1982-83, first under David J. Bennion, a man so good that I still listen for his name when new callings are announced at Conference, although by now he is past the retirement age for Seventies. The last 12 months was served under a man named R. Bay Hutchings.
My last mission area was Toulouse – a beautiful city, Roman-old and rocket-new, with a river, and a tree-lined canal, and a monument to Napoleon on a hill next to our apartment complex. Thomas Aquinas was buried in a church we often walked by. The non-standard accent was delightful (my introduction to it was the train conductor’s announcement on the day I arrived: “Toulooosa, Toulooosa, cinq-a minut-a arret-a!”), the sun was warm, and the people were welcoming and as laid back as that southern sun.
There was a problem in the branch, though. Branch members were unaccountably mean to each other. Week after week, one woman or another would leave Relief Society, in tears, before the lesson was over. The feeling was no better in Sacrament Meeting. Although we missionaries couldn’t pin the problem on any member or group of members – we thought they were all wonderful people – the overall effect was awful. We had investigators that spring, but we didn’t dare bring them to Church.
Then one of the elders suggested we try an idea that we had all heard from Derek Streeter, director (or whatever his title was) of the French District in the MTC. It sounds corny on the surface, but the way he had talked about it, the essential rules he had impressed on us, and his emphasis that it couldn’t be used except in an emergency, and with our complete devotion to making it a success, made us hope it was the silver bullet we needed. We all solemnly decided that now was the time, so L’Ecureuil was born.
“L’Ecureuil” was “The Squirrel” – a word chosen mostly because one of the elders had just learned it, but it was perfect for any number of reasons: To begin with, it was not in the standard missionary vocabulary, and its vowel sounds were extremely difficult for Americans to pronounce. And one of the requirements for the project was that no missionary ever be suspected of involvement.
The corny project was simply that after dark, or at other times when anonymity could be preserved, we would leave notes, with a simple treat like a chocolate bar or a boxed pastry, at the door of a member. The notes would thank the member for something simple and specific – a good comment made in a class, a talk given in Sacrament Meeting, holding the door open for a stream of members to enter the building – something, anything, that was positive. Notes were all signed “L’Ecureuil.”
The idea was to make members realize that their good deeds were known and appreciated by fellow branch members. It was imperative that they not know the missionaries were involved, but should cause them to look at each other with new eyes on Sunday, wondering if it was her, or maybe him, who had noticed the good deed? And since they couldn’t be sure who their secret admirer was, the hope was that they would treat everyone with greater kindness, just in case.
This need for avoiding suspicion of missionary involvement meant that none of us could write the notes ourselves. Even if our written French were perfect in every detail, our handwriting could never escape notice – French and American children are taught two very different systems for forming the same letters, and our handwritten “accent” was even more distinctive than our spoken accents. So we needed to get native Frenchmen and -women to copy our notes for us in their own handwriting.
This wasn’t usually difficult. We explained what we were doing to our investigators, and to the neighbors in our building with whom we were friendly, and with some of the shopkeepers on the ground floor of our building. Corny as it was, every last one of them fell into the spirit of the thing, copying our notes, correcting our grammar and spelling, with broad smiles and requests that we report how the plan worked. Even one man who was at first embarrassed by our request, telling us that he hadn’t done very well in school, was pleased to help when we assured him that he would add a realistic touch to the note.
One day, though, my companion and I needed a note when there was nobody handy to write it for us. No matter – we would approach any friendly looking woman in the park around the Napoleon monument, and ask her to help. Everybody, without a single exception, had been so charmed, somehow, by the “L’Ecureuil” experiment that it never occurred to me that anyone could have any different response. So, with heart wide open and with joyful expression on my face, I approached a woman seated on a bench and began to explain our request.
I have never, before or since, been met with such undisguised hatred. Can’t tell you now anything about what she said, other than that it was cold, and calm, and filled with hate. I don’t remember now whether there was any religious element, or anti-foreigner sentiment, or what her complaint was, but I can tell you it was pure evil. When she finished, I nodded and turned wordlessly and led my companion back to our apartment, where I lay on the bed silently shaking for much of the afternoon. I think perhaps the reason it overwhelmed me so is because I am an extreme introvert and I can’t even relax fully around friends – those defenses against being hurt are too strongly ingrained. Yet on that day in Toulouse, I had left all my defenses behind in the joy of what we were doing, had approached a stranger expecting to be met with the same love that all our friends and investigators had shown toward this project, and someone had reached inside of me and tried to kill me. That is how it felt, anyway.
And the reason why “L’Ecureuil” opened such joy in me was because it worked. After only a couple of weeks, we began to hear branch members speculating about who L’Ecureuil was. Nobody suspected missionaries – everybody was sure it was someone – or some severals, because they had compared notes and realized there were multiple handwritings – in the branch. We sisters even shared the note we ourselves had received from the Squirrel.
Three weeks after starting, the Relief Society president walked into Relief Society with a photograph of a squirrel and a note of gratitude, and pinned it on the bulletin board. No one left the meeting in tears that day.
I was released from my mission while L’Ecureuil was still in action, and I do not know how long he lasted, or how lasting his effect was. Just before I left, one team of missionaries leaving a note from L’Ecureuil was caught by the branch members, and we were unmasked. What to do? Why, of course we drafted that single mother with her several children to join us as honorary squirrels, to keep our secret, and notice good acts, and let branch members know that their goodness had been seen. I hope they did. I don’t know, but I hope L’Ecureuil had a permanent effect on changing the mood of that branch.
It is, over all, one of the better memories that has come to me. Even trying to understand why the response of that stranger in the park was so crushing has been a good memory as I’ve realized that, in contrast to her, I was happy and doing good, as small and silly as the effort was. And I can still see the look on the face of the Relief Society president as she pinned her “thank you” to the board that day.
“Can any good come out of a squirrel?” Though I long had thought the answer must be no (it was the NYC Parks Commissioner, after all, who explained years ago that squirrels are just “rats with bushy tails,” and I believed him), you’ve proved me wrong, Ardis!
What a great memory! Thank you for sharing it!
Wow, Ardis, this is really cool! Thanks for sharing it. I’m glad that it worked so well. I’m sorry about the woman who was so rude to you when you had let your defenses down. Your explanation for why it was so painful totally makes sense.
I loved this. I’ve noticed before, it doesn’t always take much to make people happy – thanks for sharing!
You know, I remember my high school French teacher, a Belgian woman who broke metre-sticks on the desk and occasionally threw chalk, telling us that “ecureuil” was the hardest word in the French language for English speakers to pronounce because neither the vowels nor the half-swallowed R sound are familiar to us.
She also told us that one of the English words that gave French speakers the biggest challenges was “Kree zahnss ee moom.” You know – chrysanthemum.
Beautiful story, Ardis. It makes me wish I had known of this on my own mission, as the Ardilla of Brooklyn could have done a lot of good. I’ll send this to my sister on her mission, maybe it can help her sometime.
Ah, Derek, alive and living well, and presumably happy, in St. George.
This is a great story. I love how missionaries are so fearless with good ideas and expect the best.
My first mission ward was very politically divided and there were harsh feelings. We had an activity that was all just doing foolish and goofy things. All the men (down to newborn age) got a mustache drawn on them with a burnt cork when they walked in and the women got a flower in their hair (the babies’ little flowers were glued to their heads with a dab of corn syrup). We had a bull fight and a melodrama and it was so unexpected. They couldn’t help grinning at each other the next morning in church.
This is such a lovely idea. What a fantastic, loving plan, and so ingeniously executed! Thank you for sharing.
What a great story!
There is a certain joy that comes only from doing good without being caught.
“I served in the Switzerland Geneva Mission in 1982-83, first under David J. Bennion, a man so good that I still listen for his name when new callings are announced at Conference, although by now he is past the retirement age for Seventies. The last 12 months was served under a man named R. Bay Hutchings.”
I see what you did there. And it’s very eloquent.
I had plenty of moments on my mission that still make me wince, but I wouldn’t say I’ve actively avoided thinking about my mission. My thoughts are more along the lines that I believe I gave the best I could, and I’m very happy I went, but I do wish my best had been a whole lot better.
Regarding critters:
We were tracting one day in the little down of Dardanelle, Arkansas. (My mission was wideflung; I worked in Jerusalem and London as well, and that was just one area …) We had made one of those silly missionary vows that we would tract every house on the east side of a particular street before calling it a day. We came to one house and there was a very large Great Dane parked in front, eying us with that perpetually suspicous look all Great Danes seem to have been born with.
I reminded my companion, Elder Brown (no, really; that was his name), that we had made a vow. He looked at me for a moment and said, “All right, Elder Budge. You go first.”
We walked up to the door, and the dog merely eyed us, much to my relief. Knocked, gave our door approach, got turned down, started back to the street. Halfway there, I felt teeth on my coat sleeve (it was winter) and thought “This is where I get devoured by a dog the size of a small elephant.”
Then the dog let go for just a moment — long enough to get a good grip on my sleeve without there being any arm between his teeth. I suddenly realized he just wanted to play. And, with a dog that large, when he wants to play, you play.
I let him tug me around for a few minutes, then, hitting on a handy expedient, took off my woolly hat and let him play with that. He was delighted, I had my sleeve back, and the only catch was how I was going to get my hat back. I don’t recall for sure, but I think I just let him play with it until he got bored, then retrieved it.
The next day we went out to tract the other side of the street. Sure enough, Mr. Great Dane was parked in a yard on the other side of the street. You’d think he was there waiting for us.
Lots of other dog memories from that mission. Ironically, while I had some close calls, the only vertebrate that managed to sink teeth into me during my mission was a member’s pet cat. Which I had been petting for several minutes, to the cat’s apparent delight, before she decided she was done and let me know by puncturing my hand. It was then that I learned that cats are minions of the Devil.
That was awesome! Thanks for sharing.
Gary, the last time I heard of him was in an article at about the time of Prop8, living with his husband in St. George. I hope he is still happy, and if you have a contact address I’d love to write to him.
Ardis, I’ll send you what I’ve got in an email.
Another great story I plan on telling my missionary prep class this week!
Unexpected hate is a hard thing to deal with.
Knocking on doors in Japan we were used to rejection — usually polite, sometimes curt or annoyed, and very occasionally rude. But I remember two times when it was more than that, something that seemed to transcend the five senses and hit with a spiritual impact. Once was a “hot” hate — not yelling or anything, but clearly with a burning hatred of Christianity behind the reasonably polite words.
The other was even more polite, but cold. I don’t recall anything in the words or tone of voice that was anything out of the ordinary, but it felt that rather than a warm, living body standing in the doorway, there was a massive slab of stainless steel cooled to dry ice temperatures, threatening to suck the warmth and life right out of us. It’s one of the creepiest things I’ve ever felt.
Now on to the good part…
What a beautiful story! It’s amazing the power that can come from such simple, anonymous acts of kindness.
Thank you so much for sharing!
Great story. I don’t think we ever did anything so underhandedly charitable in France 🙂
Great story. Incidentally, the vowels in “l’écureuil” are especially difficult to pronounce correctly when one of them is missing.
Thank you, Bill. Something didn’t look right, and now we all know why.
I don’t mind being corrected — I appreciate it, in fact, most of the time. It’s only been two days since I wrote to someone to thank him for his willingness to doublecheck me on particular types of facts. I reminded him that I usually have to work on a very fast schedule (would you happen to know how many unpaid hours I put in for Keepa every week, year after year after year?) so virtually everything I post is a first draft, sometimes a rough draft. I don’t have an editor. I do my best, which sometimes is okay and sometimes is not, and I told my friend that while it can be embarrassing to have to acknowledge and correct error, I would rather have things be as correct as possible, so I truly did appreciate his help.
I will correct the spelling when I have a moment today — I’ve just gotten up after working until almost 3 this morning, and I’m already behind for today at just past 7:00. Your comment will remain so that forevermore you will have the glory that follows from such a correction.
I didn’t recognize who you were, so I did take a moment to use the WordPress feature that calls up all the comments left by a given commenter. You have read Keepa, at least occasionally, since 2009. In all those years, you have graced the page with 13 comments, the one just previous to this all the way back in 2014. Every last one of your comments has been as snarky, as “look at me! I’m so smart! you’re so not!” as this one. Because you look solely for faults and never — never once — have joined in the spirit of the blog by sharing your own experience or enjoying the Mormonness of a story, I shall take comfort in the apparent fact that, in all Keepa’s 6,559 posts to date, you have found only 13 instances that called for your helpful, humorous, supportive touch.
Thank you for the correction.
Ardis, for this post and especially for the last comment to Bill –
You are a treasure.
I’m proud to have even the most tenuous link to you, even if that link is Susanville. 😉
I appreciated this memory of yours. I could be wrong because 39 years have passed but I think Elder Streeter was teaching at the LTM in 1978. The missionaries going to Tahiti (all 6 of us) were assigned to the French district.
Ardis, Thank you so much for these memories from your mission, particularly the Squirrel. I can think of a ward that needs one. I’ll think about what could be done about it. (I served next door in the Switzerland Zurich Mission. We had some of the same issues, but I at least had not found such a solution. I’m glad to hear of your success.)
I have heard many descriptions of disunion in French wards un particular. I do not know why France, but that is how it goes. Recent events here led to similar divisions in my ward. Having friends in both camps makes it dicey, but six months on things seem a lot cooler. Following the Johnson Amendment’s principles is probably best. My houshold split three way last election, so it is a good thing we respect each other’s views, I just wish it had been so at church. It is behind us now, but I fear new breakouts as future political events rile us up. Maybe I can play squirel if they do.
Thank you for such a lovely story. It reminds me of something that happened to my daughter-in-law’s family when her grandparents immigrated to the US. They had come with great hopes but felt those hopes turn to ash. The US and their 1940s Utah ward, it seemed to them, was full of greedy, wasteful people.And then someone anonymously left wrapped Christmas presents on their doorstep. They spent the next years trying to figure out who in their ward had been so kind, and they started noticing the goodness in many, many people.
I sometimes consider writing a succinct mission memoir for posterity. I haven’t, wanting to delay the project until my conclusions about my service reach some level of stasis. But 20 years on, I still can’t decide what to make of my service.
I appreciate the story of the squirrel squad. I also appreciate the honesty of your opening paragraph. Maybe someday I’ll be able to write as poignantly as you do.