Of Men and Mountains
By Susan Law Corpany

I live on the Big Island of Hawaii, home to the world’s tallest mountain, Mauna Kea.  There are those who say that Mount Everest is taller.  Mt. Everest is a monumental 29,035 feet above sea level, you see, and Mauna Kea is a mere 13,796 above sea level.  As a result, Mt. Everest gets a lot of press, but if you measure Mauna Kea from its origins on the ocean floor, it is an impressive 33,480 feet tall.      

When I learned of our mountain, it reminded me, somehow, of a man I met several years ago in Atlanta, Georgia.  I was spending a week there with my friend Carolyn at the home of a fellow ward member who was serving a temple mission there.  The two of us had accepted the assignment to drive the youth from our ward in south Florida to a week-long youth conference in the area. 

The day before we were to head back home, Carolyn had invited some former friends from the ward to come by for a visit.  Brother and Sister Ledbetter had moved out of the ward before I had moved in, so this was the first time I had met them.  Sister Ledbetter was short and sweet.  Brother Ledbetter was long and lanky, what they used to call a “tall drink of water.”  Carolyn invited them in and made introductions.  We made a little small talk. 

Based on Brother Ledbetter’s drawl and his poor grammar, I judged him not to be very well educated.  Basically, I sized him up as kind of a hick and figured he probably fit in better in rural Georgia than he might have had they still lived in Palm Beach County. 

In an attempt to draw him into the conversation, Carolyn asked him how his health was.  “Ah’ve been havin’ some trouble with muh...” (If I told you what those three little dots represent, you would likely get the giggles, just like I did.)  Somehow Carolyn managed to maintain her composure during Brother Ledbetter’s description of his intestinal woes. (Her example of self restraint is my definition of “gracious,” a word I’m afraid is not likely to be engraved on my tombstone.)  

Having an open Reader’s Digest in my lap saved me.  I pretended not to have been paying attention to the conversation and excused my mirth by reading everyone a joke from “Laughter is the Best Medicine.”  Then I behaved myself.  Mom would have been proud.

As they were getting ready to leave, Carolyn asked Brother Ledbetter if he would be willing to give each of us a priesthood blessing to help us on our drive back to Florida.  He agreed.  When first I felt his hands on my head, I replayed his earlier commentary on his health, and it took great exertion of my mind over my matter to keep from getting the giggles again. 

Composed, I listened as the old hillbilly disappeared.  He still spoke slowly and I don’t suppose his grammar improved either, but I don’t remember noticing any of that once he began speaking.  He pronounced a blessing that addressed all the difficulties in my life, things that would have been known only to someone who knew me intimately.  Words were spoken that I needed to hear, spoken in a way gave me hope and renewed determination.  Toward the end of the blessing he told me that on the trip home we would encounter a problem while I was driving.  He blessed me with the good judgment to know what to do when the problem arose. 

Although I had started out the blessing squelching the urge to giggle, I ended it with tears running down my cheeks, with no attempt made to staunch the flow.  Carolyn received a similar blessing, addressing things I had become aware of in her life, but which I had not heard her discuss with Brother Ledbetter as we visited.  She was crying at the end of her blessing as well, aware that the lines of communication between heaven and earth had been opened and that priesthood power had been exercised in righteousness. 

I realized that I had greatly underestimated the man based on his appearance and demeanor, and I felt bad for my short-sighted estimation of a man who was obviously in tune with the spirit in a way few are.

When I had first been asked if I would be available and willing to help drive a group of youth from south Florida to Atlanta for the youth conference, I had declined.  Things were tight financially, and I had been working temp jobs to help out.  I hadn’t had anything lined up for the week in question, but I had needed to remain available.  Also, even though the gas would be paid for with Church funds and our lodging was arranged, at that time I had not even been able to justify spending the extra money I would need to take along to purchase food for the week we would be in Atlanta.

Later that week, a call had come in from a temp agency with a job for the week of the youth conference.  I had accepted the assignment without hesitation because we needed the money, but I could not deny the feeling I’d had as soon as I hung up that I should not have accepted.  I know what a prompting feels like, but I am also inclined to question those that come that seem contrary to common sense. 

As I had conducted the inner debate, wondering how I could justify turning down work, the phone had rung again.  The temp agency had called to tell me that the employer had called back and had cancelled the work order.  I had felt relieved that the decision had been made for me and wondered why it was that I had felt so strongly that I should turn it down.  In less than five minutes there had been another phone call.  It was Carolyn.  She had accepted the assignment to drive to Atlanta, but they were still looking for one more driver. 

“Susan, I called to see if you would reconsider driving to Atlanta.  Kay is going to the temple, and she has agreed to be the other driver for the youth rather than take her own car, but my husband isn’t comfortable with me going if she is the other driver.”  I didn’t know Kay as well as she did, but I knew she was quite a free spirit, and I would have had reservations if she was driving my youth on a long trip. 

I had sighed.  “I’ve been fighting it, but I’m getting strong feelings I’m supposed to go.”  I had told her of the temp job that had come and gone.  “To be honest with you, Carolyn, things are really tight financially right now and I can’t even come up with the spending money it would take to eat for the week, but it feels like I am supposed to go.  Let me see what I can juggle and I’ll call you back.”

She had called back shortly.  “My husband says that if it will make the difference in whether or not you can drive, he’s willing to cover your food for the week.”  It’s hard, but sometimes we need to be willing to accept help.  I had taken him up on his kind offer. 

It was a 15-passenger van, filled with twelve youth and two drivers.  I’d personally had television sets that were smaller than the side-view mirrors.  We had started our twelve-hour journey early in the evening and would be driving all night in order to arrive the morning the youth conference started.  We had offered a prayer and had begun the journey, conscious of our responsibility for the van full of youth. 

As the kids had begun to quiet down and nod off, I had learned that Carolyn was also facing challenges in her life.  Her husband was being transferred, and his employer was going back and forth regarding the move.  One week they were going to pay the relocation costs, the next they were not.  The company would buy their house if it did not sell within a few months, but the price offered seemed less than fair.  The burden fell largely on her to fix it up, apply fresh paint and get it ready to go on the market in hopes that it would sell quickly.  This had not been a week she could easily take out of her life to drive to Atlanta.

Carolyn and I had agreed to talk to help keep each other awake while the other was driving.  As she had driven, I had shared some of the challenges of my life at that time.  My troubles covered the lion’s share of the way, from Vero Beach to Valdosta.  We traded drivers and covered the rest of the ground discussing the challenges of her life.    Eventually, I had asked her, “Do you think they could have found two more strung-out women to trust with the safety of the youth on this trip?”

Whatever other reasons existed for us being in Atlanta that week, it had provided a break from the problems of our lives.  It was a week with access to a temple, a swimming pool, and a nearby state park.  We had made use of them all, not necessarily in that order, renewing our bodies and spirits. 

One morning on a walk I had discovered a trail that led down to the Chattahootchee River and had found a clearing in the woods that looked just like the pictures I had always seen of the Sacred Grove.  I had taken Carolyn down the next day to see my find.  After spending a few minutes there, we had hiked the rest of the way down the trail and had sat on the river bank across from some kids who were launching themselves into the water from a rope swing.  It had felt like we had stepped back in time.  Instead of feeling that I was sacrificing a week out of my life, I soon realized that the week in Atlanta was a gift that had been given to me, to both of us. 

Our drive home was stressful, especially for me, because of the warning from the blessing.  I drove the whole time waiting for the other shoe to drop.  I even wondered if the warning was just God’s way of helping me stay awake during the long night’s drive. 

At first, we attempted to caravan with Kay, to keep her in sight in case she had problems along the way.  She was driving a sporty compact car, and we were driving a cumbersome, oversized van.  She zipped in and out of traffic and drove faster than was safe for us to go.  When Carolyn was driving, she did her best to keep up with the little red car darting in and out of traffic. 

When we had our first bathroom break at a rest stop, we talked to her about driving so that we could keep up.  I replaced Carolyn as the van driver.  For a while Kay drove more conservatively, but soon her lead foot kicked in again.  As nightfall approached, I decided that if she wasn’t going to drive so that we could keep up, she was on her own. 

I told Carolyn, “I’m making an executive decision.  I know you worry about her, but we have to worry more about the kids in this van than about keeping up with her.  If she’s going to drive like that, she’s on her own.”  I wondered, “Was that the problem Brother Ledbetter warned me of?” 

(The next morning we would learn that somewhere close to the Georgia/Florida border she had run out of gas, driving around looking for a station that was open that took the one gas card she had.  She had ended up calling and waking a Mormon bishop in the area to come to where she was and loan her some gas money.) 

Then we ran into torrential rainstorms.  “Is this the problem?” I wondered, slowing to a crawl, “Or is this what is going to cause the problem?”  I was poised at the alert, ready for a dog to run out in front of me or a street sign to fall on us from overhead, the tension registering in my muscles as I braced myself for having to make a split-second life-altering decision. 

I realize that this story would be more compelling if I could tell of some impending disaster that arose and how my quick thinking averted tragedy, but as often happens, we are blissfully unaware of what might have been and sometimes even dismiss the validity of the warnings if nothing dramatic occurs.  I am grateful to say that we eventually arrived safely back at the church parking lot in West Palm Beach without major incident.  I breathed a big sigh of relief, and we gladly dispersed the youth to the care of keeping of their waiting parents.

Beyond the short-term warning, though, had been the long-term help in the other words of those blessings — the gift to both of us of renewed strength to deal with the challenges of life, and a sense that we had a Heavenly Father who was mindful of us, aware of our struggles, and who had blessed us with the things that were needful in our lives at that time.  Among those blessings was the unexpected gift of a week of rest and renewal, something those two “strung-out women” had sorely needed and would not or could not have chosen for themselves. 

And I learned from a slow-talking man in Georgia never to take measure of a man or a mountain based only on what you can see.