A Good Excuse

For anyone reading this who is unfamiliar with the LDS church (Mormon), we are organized into wards and within the ward, all the women are assigned a partner to go visit with and help serve usually a couple or three other women. (you know, take them green jello with carrots and such)

Okay, I admit it. I haven't always been a great visiting teacher. One of the reasons is when I have a bad attitude about it and can sometimes feel like it is a burden because it is one more thing I can be convinced I have to do instead of want to do.

Our ward just recently got realigned and now the majority of the people in my ward is new to me. I just got my new visiting teaching assignment and it hit me that now I have a good excuse to get to know a new young mom in our ward and plan lunch dates with another young mom that was already in my ward. And I get a good excuse to teach these moms what not to do. They get to learn from all my parenting mistakes. Lucky them.  I also get a good excuse to hang out with my partner who I love being with.

In a world that is ever increasingly disconnected and isolated from neighbors, what a great opportunity it is to have the excuse to connect with other women. Let's face it, if I were to just randomly call them up and say I want to come visit, they would think I am a little creepy. But visiting teaching gives me a good excuse. They will still probably think I'm creepy.