Bethel Memories Good and Bad

joelbear

Dave inspired me with his story of his week at Bethel. My memories aren't nearly as interesting but here goes.

The fish in the pond outside the E Building at the Watchtower Farm would eat out of your hand, very cool.

The fall colors of the mountains with the morning sunshine on them outside the dining hall at the Farm were spectacular.

At breakfast you got whole milk, yummy (NOTE: Skim milk for lunch, water and koolaid for dinner.)

Pizza night for evening meal was glorious.

Chicken a la King for evening meal was not glorious.

Getting my picture taken by tour groups from all of the world while sitting at my Graphotype machine was way cool.

Having to go to the Subscription department supervisor and beg for a new magic marker that was not down to the nub was humiliating (NOTE: Markers were used to mark corrections on the address stencils. I finally bought my own supply). I remember a nice young sister quietly warning me not to ask for a new marker. I look back on this with incredulity still.

Having my actual Bethel application shown to me so that I could see my signature where I signed I was morally fit when I was dismissed from Bethel for coming out to another brother and admitting I had feelings for him. (NOTE: I stayed celibate and a virgin for 10 years after being dismissed from Bethel.)

Having a sister race me to leftovers at a lunch meal and grab them and whisk them away instead of offering to share them with me. (It was a fricking casserole dish full of roast beef)

Playing ping pong with Gilead students was interesting, especially noting how competitive they were.

Not feeling like I was doing enough by being at Bethel, I auxiliary pioneered one month. My pioneer partner and I ran from work to change clothes on Wednesday nights and then drove 1 hour to our congregations territory. In order to get started a few minutes early I would cut my lunch hour short by 1/2 hour and then head out at 4:40, 1/2 hour before regular end of day. My dept overseer called me over and told me I had to work the same time periods as everyone else. I explained that I was auxiliary pioneering and just trying to get my time in, plus I was making up my work time at lunch. He said Bethel work came first. I look back on this with incredulity still. (NOTE: We put in one 11 hour day in seldom worked territory one Saturday that October, the most memorable moment was calling on a house with a woman raising a severely handicapped daughter whose husband had left her. Telling her that her daughter had hope of a whole life seemed to make that 11 hour day worthwhile.)

Being put on the plumbing crew for 2 weeks when subscriptions were down (I typed address labels all day every day as my normal job) and having to run a jackhammer for the first (and last) time in my life in a cow barn in which we were installing a new watering system for the cows. They gave me a broken jackhammer whose bit would fall out everytime I lifted it off the floor. (NOTE: The guys on the plumbing crew were majorly hot.)

Having THE Bethel Home Overseer come storming into the graphotype room in a rage because the sister cleaning our room had found a towel that had been used to clean up a spill from a potted plant. He was literally red with anger. He asked me who had done it and in my frazzled brain I blurted out the truth which was that my roommate Jeff had bought the plant and must've used the towel. He shouted at me that he (my roommate) would have to pay for that towel. I look back on this with incredulity still.

These are a few of my memories good and bad that I experienced in my 7 month stay at Watchtower Farm.

Peace out

Joel

acsot

Thanks for posting Joel. Imagine - markers and towels bring on the rage of the higher-ups at Bethel. And these are the people who supposedly will get through the most horrendous tribulation the world has ever seen and be tortured and god-knows-what-else and never squeal on their dear brothers or sisters. I hope the poor souls in Malawi and other places never have the opportunity to find out about the crud dirtying many of the breathing spaces in Bethel.

Incredulous, pitiful and maddening.

Dogpatch

Hi Joelbear!

Thanks for sharing. Bethel was quite unusual in many ways.

I had some good times, too. More undercover perhaps...

http://www.freeminds.org/bethel/toons/cabeen.htm

Randy

proplog2

Joel:

I didn't realize you went to Bethel. Do you know how many on this forum went to Bethel? There is no way I could live that life for more than a week. It seems you are a "people" person and you thrived on the proximity to the simulated closeness of a group of people all working for a common goal.

Have you found a replacement yet? Is that an aggravating factor in your battle against depression?

Room 215

Bethel lie as I recall had much in common with any sort of institutional life, i.e. surrender of privacy, regimentation, grudging submission to arbtirary rules, army-style griping among kindred spirits to whom one often bonds for life, thanks to the shared experience. In my case at least, it wasn't unalloyed misery but I can't imagine anyone coming out of there with their idealism intact.

jschwehm

Hi Gang:

I worked on the Paint and Scaffold Crew at Brooklyn. I was assigned to help paint on Factory Bldg No. 5. There were around 6 of us there I think. We had an overseer who really loved himself. He liked to throw his weight around too.

One day, I was getting into my dress clothes at the end of the day when the overseer came into the locker room and announced to everyone that he needed to see me in his "office". His "office" consisted of a very old desk in the corner of this floor that was undergoing renovations. We had our painting supplies all around us. He had me sit in an old dilapitated chair.

He told me that he had a question to ask me. He wanted to know why I smiled so much. I could not really answer that question. I think I was too shock to think of an answer. In any case, I got a lecture on the evils of smiling too much while working. It lasted a good 30 minutes I believe. At the end of the lecture, I was told not to discuss with anyone what we had talked about. Then I was dismissed.

When I got back to the locker room, my workmates who also had their own run ins with this guy wanted to know what we had talked about. So, naturally, I told them.

By the way, at the end of the discussion with this guy, I smiled.

Jeff S.

joelbear

Prop, Yes you know me well. I loved having people all around me all the time and always having someone to play table tennis or shoot pool with or simply talk to in the library. I thrived on the connection. I have only experienced something similar in my life once while a teenager and spent a summer with other academically high level students at something called the Governor's Honors Program of Georgia. There too I lived in a dormitory and always had someone to talk to. No I have never found a satisfactory replacement for either of these experiences in those terms. Jeff S. First, wow you are handsome and second, did you know a guy on the paint crew named Chris Bank. He was my best friend growing up. take care Joel

jschwehm

Hi Joel:

Thanks for the compliment. I did not know your friend Chris. However, I did know a guy named Joel who worked in the press room at the Farm. He was from Bogalusa, LA which was a little town just up the road from where I grew up. We pioneered together every once in a while. Did you know him?

Jeff S.

Michael3000

Hey, Jeff - who was that overseer? I seem to remember you & I being at Brooklyn around the same time (I was there from 1986 - 1989). My best friend at the time got dismissed from the Commuter Bethelite program (after four years!) for not smiling enough. What a bunch o' blowhards.

frankiespeakin

I actually don't have any fond memories,spent only a year and a half there back in the middle seventies.Left to get married 1976.

Reading some of the memories posted made me recall one.

It was just after lunch, and I was filling the glue trays on the book signature sewing machines. When you did this you had to yell something to let the brother who was operatining the machine you were filling the glue tray, which I did but this brother was a real go getter and so didn't like to stop very long and started up the machine before I finished which caught my middle finger and smashed it pretty good.

My entire nail was black from the being smashed, the pain was so unbearable I got a razor blade and dug 5 holes in my nail to relieve the blood pressure under itl. The next day the floor overseer(martin martinez?) came up to me and showed me the glue bar that was broken when it smashed my finger, and he also mentioned they had to adjust all the cams, because of this incident. He told me the glue bar cost $55. and gave me the impression that I was responcible for the expense, I just looked at him like he was an A$$ Ho!e, and walked away.

It's little incidents like these that made me sure I didn't want to spend the rest of my life in Bethel, for if you ever got into trouble (commit a serious sin)they would kick you out on your a$$ and if you spent 30 years there, you would really be in a fix.

Bethel Memories Good and Bad

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