Dear Grandchildren,
It continues to amaze me how much my old chosen major of Classics still pulls me toward it whenever present. Last Monday, Grandma, the MP and his wife, and I climbed on a bus and headed north. Almost seven hours later, we were in Çanakkale and in a nice hotel. Two other senior couples joined us from Istanbul. The day was mostly overcast, windy, and very cool. The next day we headed for the ancient site of Troy, the place that saw the eleven-year war between the Greeks and Trojans as celebrated in Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey. I had visited once before with a group of faculty colleagues in the summer of 1997, almost twenty years ago. As on that occasion, I recited the opening lines of he Iliad, lines that I memorized as a student more than fifty years ago. Remarkably, no breeze, a bit of sun, and very few tourists and visitors at the site. As I walked around, I tried to visualize the city as it stood more than three thousand years ago, the setting for Homer’s long poems. It surely did not appear as it does in Hollywood recreations of the town.
From there, we drove north with our guide, a good friend. On a ferry we crossed the Dardanelles, the waterway between Europe and Asia. We landed on the Gallipoli peninsula, the scene of a set of very costly battles in 1915 between the Turks and the allies of the British Empire. (The peninsula was also the scene of the decisive battle between Athens and Sparta at the end of the forty-year Peloponnesian War in 405 B.C.) At least a quarter million soldiers lost their lives in the protracted conflict of 1915 as the English and their allies tried to push to Istanbul to get the Sultan to submit. The Turks, who resisted with all their might, kept them from their objective. The conflict had to major effects — the allies of England began to doubt their roles in the British Empire, sending cracks in the Empire’s unity, and Mustafa Kemal Atatürk came to the fore as a military leader, the man who would give shape to the Turkish Republic that would replace the Ottoman Empire. For me, it was a melancholy day, even though it was full of sunshine and no breeze. To walk in a few of the cemeteries that dot the peninsula, with tombstones that name the dead soldiers, most of whom died in their early 20s, slowly tore at my soul. I believe that everyone else in our group felt the same way. I had read a book on this campaign perhaps thirty years ago, but I recall almost no detail, just general impressions. In all, it was well worth the trip.
The next day, as we returned in a car that the MP had rented, we were under rain most of the way back. We need rain badly in these parts, but little has come. I can only hope that lots of moisture hits this place in the next couple of months or harvests from the fields will be a big challenge next summer.
We were all chagrined to wake to the news this morning about the murderous attack on New Year’s revelers in the night club in Istanbul early this morning. These sorts of things always have an affect on life around here. I can only pray for the Lord’s comfort to be with the families and friends of the dead.
My cell phone has a crack across its screen, the result of an accidental drop. I did not mean it. I promise. My laptop has a number of indentations, at least my mental indentations. I have not actually struck it. But my patience with certain functions runs short on occasion, I am sad to admit. Grandma is regularly trying to get me to calm down. She will even get into the middle of my online crises to solve them. And she almost always does. I was snorting around here about not being able to get into the computer that the Church supplied to take care of tithing entries and the like. She took my notes with a number of passwords scribbled among them and, with a little patience, figured out which the right password is. Because of my challenges with electronics, in my worst moments I have thought about going dark when we get home, dumping all but the most essential services. I don't know. For some reason, I don't seem to be cut out for the world that electronics presents me. For example, if I want to find a library book online, I have to know the name of the author or the title. If I miss, there is no forgiveness in the system. None. In the old days, I went to the card catalogue and, besides the book that I was searching for, I would sometimes find a bunch of other books that were relevant to my interests just from browsing among the nearby cards. A totally different experience which I have relished in my advancing years.
On a cheerier note, we were twenty-five in our Fast and Testimony Meeting this morning, sixteen in the room and nine joining by Skype. Of the eight who bore their testimonies, three were non-members. For two of the three, their membership in the Church will be secured during this month, plus two persons who have been with us by Skype for about five months. I was encouraged to see twelve brethren in our priesthood meeting, four of whom are YVs and three are non-member investigators. I am happy with the promise of better things marching steadily toward our branch.
I love you and pray for you always.
Grandpa Brown
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