by ashitaka 8 Replies latest jw friends
What physical humiliation did you suffer in field service?
I froze my little hands off in the winter and sweated until i got headaches in the summer....got yelled at if I complained about it....even if I was so hot or cold that I got sick afterwards.
At times it was like calculated torture.
You?
Sorest feet eva. I often had to go out with an elder (had to break us three kids up - we were terrors together!), so we'd be at a door for at least a half hour each time!!!!!!!!!
Boredom was another torture, but I usually compensated for that by kicking dirt around or playing with the potplants on the landing...
Thirst, hunger, stress, sunstroke, nastiness. I don't think a child should be subjected to constant slamming doors, insults and abuses and just out and out rudeness at the hands of adults...makes not wanna grow up!!! Oh, I just realized my own problem...love self-enlightenment.
I never recall any physical humiliation. If I had body odor, sweat, etc ... I left and continued after clean up at home. But, I have had some really fun emotional humiliations and embarassments. Like the time I was working with a young attractive sister, and I knocked on the door of a young women I knew in school ... who promptly asked me what I was doing out with another girl than my wife ... where was my wife, and would she approve of this? Being out on a religious activity in the company of another girl? It was too difficult to explain how this is how Field Servie arrangements sometimes work ... and that my wife might be out at a door with another man.
Following Bible principles, we will avoid trying to live - or demand others to live - by an extensive and rigid set of dos and don'ts that go beyond the teachings of the Bible. The Watchtower, 4-15-02, pg 22, pp 15
As a kid, I was forced to go knocking on doors around the corner from my house. Tough enough, but this was in the dead of a long, cold winter.
My service partner, and I (not yet even teenagers), went to a certain house on a particularly cold and nasty Saturday morning. Before we could finish the presentation (aka - sales pitch), the woman at the door shook her head in disbelief...
'I can't believe they send you kids out on days like this.'
Without missing a beat, my young partner replies...
'They're not sending us - this is OUR CHOICE!'
Hmmm, maybe that was his choice. It certainly wasn't mine, at least not on that brutal day. Therefore, there was no way it was OUR choice...
And that's how we were taught to lie for God. Just like good JW children should.
Violet,
Self-enlightenment, what's that?
Amazing,
good point. the only time I remember enjoying service, though, was when i was assigned to work with a pretty girl (I was as ugly as a mauled hound), so the elder thought nothing of it. Good old chaste ashi. Which I was. Had no choice.
BTW, did that lady stump you?
Hybrid,
'our choice'.....I spoke those words once, too. Thought I was in the heart of God for saying it..but it was so empty. I was doing it to put hours on a sheet to prove to men that I was good. God had nothing to do with it.
ashi
The worst thing that happen to me out in the service was when I was a teenager and these kids followed us from door to door and heckled us.
Will
"I am quite sure now that often, very often, in matters concerning religion and politics a man's reasoning powers are not above the monkey's."
Mark Twain
I was working solo and I went up to the door. The magazine was talking about death being removed by God.
I knocked and an old lady (about 80 years old) opened the door and pleasantly asked me what I wanted.
I replied, "I'm here to talk about death!"
Her eyes got big and she quickly slammed the door.
She must have thought I was a cemetary plot salesman. LOL!
The worst thing I experienced was when I was a new publisher...it was my second time out....I was working with a stuffy and judgemental sister (aren't they all) when a kitten from one of the houses followed us out onto the street. I picked it up and shooed it back into its driveway...and we continued on down the street. I made the comment that it was a cute kitty...wouldn't mind one like that myself.
I get home...phone rings...brother elder calling...asks me I had by any chance stolen the kitten we had stumbled across on field service [>:(] The householder had rung the JW listing in the phone book accusing us of stealing their kitten...and because I handled it...I got the blame. I told the brother that I wouldn't dare do something so stupid...and he counselled me for making the comment I did about the kitten. Why oh why didn't I leave way back then!!!
Beck
The thing that sticks out in my mind is the one time I went to a door and got stopped by a dog. Now I don't dislike dogs, but when I see a big dog it scares me s***less. So anyway I was about 8 years old going from door to door, my dad was working alternate houses, each of us alone. I went to this house, as I was walking up the driveway a German Shepperd came out to greet me.............. OHHHH man that dog looked like he was about 10' tall weighing in at about 500lbs....... growling, barking, I was stuck I couldn't move....... my feet were frozen to the ground (and it was summer). Everytime I even looked like I was going to go somewhere the dog moved closer to me........ What to do???????????????!!!!!!! I think I was stuck there for what seemed to be an eternity, finally my dad walked by, and ran in the driveway and grabbed me. If I remember I had to change my shorts LOL. That is my worst memory.
Seedy
