My dad was a small town funeral director and had the local ambulance service. Since we lived above the funeral home, we were also asked to have the local fire phone and police phone. Because of these phones, we always had to have someone there to answer them. It was exciting; we were the first to know what was happening in our small town. But because of these phones and the ambulance, we as a family never had a vacation. In fact, my first time leaving the local area was when I was a junior in high school and my church Luther League went to Seattle for the National Luther League Convention. We traveled on a special train with over 500 youth from Minnesota and North Dakota. What an experience to see that there was a world outside of northwestern Minnesota. It was the church that opened my eyes to a world bigger than what I knew.
