It’s not what you think. For the last two weeks I have been volunteering at the Vancouver Temple open house almost every other day. Most days I am in my element as a tour guide, but every now and then I am assigned to be on booty patrol.
In order to keep our brand new temple looking just as pristine as it was the day we first opened the doors the to the public, our guests are asked to wear white plastic booties over their shoes. Certainly not too much to ask, especially when we provide you with someone to actually put the booty on for you. Simply hold onto the bar, lift your foot, and voila! Ready to walk the floors of the temple (with marble tiles from Spain and carpets hand-woven in China)!
So today was my turn for this glamorous job. For six hours, from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m., I got to sit in a little chair designed for six year olds, and bent over I got to admire the feet of about a thousand people. Big feet. Small feet. Old feet. Dirty feet. Wooden feet. Yes, in that position, for that many hours, I placed shower cap like plastic bags over the shoes of all of our guests.
At one point one of the ushers came over and asked if we had recently “booted” a Chinese woman and her children (this was during a mad rush of people). We had to apologize and say we didn’t know – unless he could describe what type of shoes they were wearing.
I’ll be honest; at first I wasn’t very thrilled with my assignment. And then I remembered that Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the World, had sat in the same position and washed the feet of his apostles. I was sufficiently humbled. My back still hurt, but I continued my labour with a new attitude. These were the feet of my brothers and sisters.
Their reactions were interesting. Most people were very appreciative. Some were surprised that we would perform such a service. A few were embarrassed and almost wouldn’t let us serve them. This made me sad. Sometimes we become so independent that we don’t let others help us and then slowly we stop helping others.
This experience has made me more determined to forget myself and serve others. And so, I am officially on the look out for more booty duty opportunities (or some variation thereof).
4 comments:
I'm so thrilled to have a temple in Vancouver!
And what a wonderful lesson you learned. Thanks for sharing!
I was able to help out with this at the Rexburg Temple Open House. I took the booties off though. My favorite part was asking the little kiddos what their favorite part of the temple was; they were so cute! Then I loved telling them that there were cookies at the very end. I loved seeing their excitement and the look they gave there parents as if to ask if it where true and if they could really have one. :) Always lots of excitement with a new temple!
Jade--I so wish I could underline certian parts and make comments directly under them. I laughed out loud a few times--especially the fact that you have a "booty call" in refrence to the temple. really, I love that story, so beautiful.
~w
I've been there my friend. As a youth (before I aged) I did booty duty at two temple open houses: Winter Quarters and Nauvoo. And I love that it's called booty duty everywhere.
Post a Comment