In Arizona New Job New Friends
September first of 1986, I lived with my parents in Arizona in Tempe in a Townhouse. I moved in with them for awhile, my brother Randall was still living at home. Let me see, Craig was married with one baby already here, Kevin was still up at Utah State, kind of thinking he was getting married, he was married the next summer, Kevin was still at Utah State, Suzanne, Keith was living up in Logan and working, and Suzanne was going to BYU Idaho or Ricks College as it was at that time. So it was just my brother Randall and I there for awhile just about 4 months till I moved into an apartment with some girls that were there.
"The very first Sunday that I was there I went over to the Student Ward that was there at Arizona State University over there. They were having a linger-longer there after church, one of the girls that introduced herself to me, her name was Katherine Chesworth. She told me she worked for a long distance phone company and they were looking for somebody to work (?) service. She kind of looked me deep in the eye, and she said, “I think you would be very good at it, Why don’t you come interview tomorrow.” “Okay! I could do that.”
"It was downtown Phoenix. I had left my car up in Logan – my little Dodge Omni that I just loved, because of the fact that it did not have air-conditioning, I knew Arizona, Phoenix area, you have to have air-conditioning. So I decided to leave it up there. My brother Kevin took care of getting it sold to somebody or other, I didn’t make any money on it, I was just at least able to sell it.
"My parents had a little Volkswagen Rabbit, I think that’s what it was - the run around car, the loaner car for the kids, and so that’s what I used to go in for this job interview. I met Bob Edwards, he was the owner of the company, “Protocall” was the name of the company and I got the job. So I started a couple of days later and they gave me what I wanted to be paid and that was nice – I should have asked for more but it was great to be making money and I got to use my parents car for a little while.
"It was unbearably hot. I remember one time I was stuck in traffic going ---. Phoenix and Tempe – I had all the windows down, there was no air-conditioning in the car – yes I left my car in Utah because it needed air-conditioning but this one had no air-conditioning. I was stuck in traffic, I was dying of heat, I actually peeled off my pantyhose while I was sitting there in the car in traffic because it was so hot I thought I was going to die. So I started working for Protocall. Bob Edwards was LDS he lived in Mesa, was married with a bunch of kids and Katherine and I were the customer service department, there was Henry who was in charge of the tech side of things, it was a small start up company. It had just started getting into the phone service, I learned a lot about customer service and I was there for about a year and a half till I moved to California."
"Katherine was a lot of fun, we got to know each other and in about January I moved in with Katherine and a friend of hers Mona who was also attending the student ward there. Then we got another girl by the name of Julie who moved in with us. The four of us lived in this townhouse there in – a mile from my parents. The girls got to know my parents and Randall very well, we just had a good time. Went around town, went to church, and had fun. I enjoyed it, it was very hot and you just got used to it. You went from air-conditioned house to air-conditioned car to air-conditioned work to air-conditioned stores or whatever you need to do. Then it cooled off finally and it was quite pleasant. I felt a little bad that I wasn’t working in Music Education but I hadn’t felt any strong feelings about any of the jobs that I had been offered and I just figured, you know Heavenly Father has plans for me and I just needed to trust in Him. I felt very strongly that I just needed to move to Arizona."
"While I was there I got to know a lot of people, I went to single adult activities, they have a huge, huge, contingency of young single adults there in the Mesa, and Tempe, and Phoenix area. There are a lot of LDS people there, a lot of families. There’s a temple there, we went to a mission reunion. Kathleen is a return missionary. Kathleen and I – oh funny thing, my mission president was Gary Bunker, her mission president was Gary Bunker, she served in Pennsylvania with the mission president I had, after he left Belgium he went to be her mission president, so that is rather ironic. Kathryn was a great roommate and a lot of fun. Mona was a great roommate and lots and lots of fun. She was working.
"All of us wanted to be married, Julie was the first one to be married. She was working as a receptionist for the long distance phone company and she married, I sewed her wedding dress for her which was kind of fun. About in the Spring of 1987, there was a country swing class dance class that was going to be taught. They were having this couple come in to teach us – a bunch of young single adults that were taking the class. My roommates and I decided, Sure why not!? We decided to take this country swing dance class. And there was a young man there by the name of Kevin Lambert, nice guy; I got to know him a little bit, but there were a lot of kids that I got to know.
"In the Spring of that year after BYU Idaho finished, my sister moved to the area, and Julie had gotten married – so my sister Suzanne moved in with us. That was great! To have my sister as a roommate. I’m seven and a half years older than she is, so when we were living in Benson together, I was in high school and she was in elementary school and we shared a room and that was not always a pretty sight. We’d get mad at each other and slam the doors and it was really hard for us to learn how to get along because we were at totally different stages of our life. But at this point, I was 27 she was 20 she had gotten her associates degree from BYU Idaho and decided that she was done with college and she went to work for a law firm as a receptionist there in Phoenix Mokeenian, Kiger, and Derry , don’t ask me why I remember that. She was the receptionist there for several months until she actually got a job offer when I was going to be leaving Protocall and then the got her to come over and work in the customer service department and she worked there for several years. But it was really great to have her as a roommate and lots of fun. It was Mona and Kathryn and I and Suzanne."
"The very first Sunday that I was there I went over to the Student Ward that was there at Arizona State University over there. They were having a linger-longer there after church, one of the girls that introduced herself to me, her name was Katherine Chesworth. She told me she worked for a long distance phone company and they were looking for somebody to work (?) service. She kind of looked me deep in the eye, and she said, “I think you would be very good at it, Why don’t you come interview tomorrow.” “Okay! I could do that.”
"It was downtown Phoenix. I had left my car up in Logan – my little Dodge Omni that I just loved, because of the fact that it did not have air-conditioning, I knew Arizona, Phoenix area, you have to have air-conditioning. So I decided to leave it up there. My brother Kevin took care of getting it sold to somebody or other, I didn’t make any money on it, I was just at least able to sell it.
"My parents had a little Volkswagen Rabbit, I think that’s what it was - the run around car, the loaner car for the kids, and so that’s what I used to go in for this job interview. I met Bob Edwards, he was the owner of the company, “Protocall” was the name of the company and I got the job. So I started a couple of days later and they gave me what I wanted to be paid and that was nice – I should have asked for more but it was great to be making money and I got to use my parents car for a little while.
"It was unbearably hot. I remember one time I was stuck in traffic going ---. Phoenix and Tempe – I had all the windows down, there was no air-conditioning in the car – yes I left my car in Utah because it needed air-conditioning but this one had no air-conditioning. I was stuck in traffic, I was dying of heat, I actually peeled off my pantyhose while I was sitting there in the car in traffic because it was so hot I thought I was going to die. So I started working for Protocall. Bob Edwards was LDS he lived in Mesa, was married with a bunch of kids and Katherine and I were the customer service department, there was Henry who was in charge of the tech side of things, it was a small start up company. It had just started getting into the phone service, I learned a lot about customer service and I was there for about a year and a half till I moved to California."
"Katherine was a lot of fun, we got to know each other and in about January I moved in with Katherine and a friend of hers Mona who was also attending the student ward there. Then we got another girl by the name of Julie who moved in with us. The four of us lived in this townhouse there in – a mile from my parents. The girls got to know my parents and Randall very well, we just had a good time. Went around town, went to church, and had fun. I enjoyed it, it was very hot and you just got used to it. You went from air-conditioned house to air-conditioned car to air-conditioned work to air-conditioned stores or whatever you need to do. Then it cooled off finally and it was quite pleasant. I felt a little bad that I wasn’t working in Music Education but I hadn’t felt any strong feelings about any of the jobs that I had been offered and I just figured, you know Heavenly Father has plans for me and I just needed to trust in Him. I felt very strongly that I just needed to move to Arizona."
"While I was there I got to know a lot of people, I went to single adult activities, they have a huge, huge, contingency of young single adults there in the Mesa, and Tempe, and Phoenix area. There are a lot of LDS people there, a lot of families. There’s a temple there, we went to a mission reunion. Kathleen is a return missionary. Kathleen and I – oh funny thing, my mission president was Gary Bunker, her mission president was Gary Bunker, she served in Pennsylvania with the mission president I had, after he left Belgium he went to be her mission president, so that is rather ironic. Kathryn was a great roommate and a lot of fun. Mona was a great roommate and lots and lots of fun. She was working.
"All of us wanted to be married, Julie was the first one to be married. She was working as a receptionist for the long distance phone company and she married, I sewed her wedding dress for her which was kind of fun. About in the Spring of 1987, there was a country swing class dance class that was going to be taught. They were having this couple come in to teach us – a bunch of young single adults that were taking the class. My roommates and I decided, Sure why not!? We decided to take this country swing dance class. And there was a young man there by the name of Kevin Lambert, nice guy; I got to know him a little bit, but there were a lot of kids that I got to know.
"In the Spring of that year after BYU Idaho finished, my sister moved to the area, and Julie had gotten married – so my sister Suzanne moved in with us. That was great! To have my sister as a roommate. I’m seven and a half years older than she is, so when we were living in Benson together, I was in high school and she was in elementary school and we shared a room and that was not always a pretty sight. We’d get mad at each other and slam the doors and it was really hard for us to learn how to get along because we were at totally different stages of our life. But at this point, I was 27 she was 20 she had gotten her associates degree from BYU Idaho and decided that she was done with college and she went to work for a law firm as a receptionist there in Phoenix Mokeenian, Kiger, and Derry , don’t ask me why I remember that. She was the receptionist there for several months until she actually got a job offer when I was going to be leaving Protocall and then the got her to come over and work in the customer service department and she worked there for several years. But it was really great to have her as a roommate and lots of fun. It was Mona and Kathryn and I and Suzanne."
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