Memory Lane

by exjdub 25 Replies latest jw experiences

• 

  Corvin

  1983. Dodgers Stadium.

  We were camping in our camper in the stadium parking lot with many many other JW's from out of town. Danny, a local brother from our hometown was camped, along with his wife and kids, just a couple of spaces down from us. One evening he appeared at our site to see if one of the sisters hangin out with us had a maxi-pad.

  We all assumed he was asking for either his wife or one of his daughters, but it was kind of odd that he was the one asking . . . and so openly too.

  Turns out that Danny's hemmoroids were on fire! What was the old boy's protocol for relief? Slather a gob of vaseline on a maxi-pad and stick it right between your buttcheeks!

  When some of us younger brothers gave him a ribbing about it he simply replied, "hey, when your butt is on fire, you do what you have to do. Besides, it sort of feels like you are riding a bicycle . . . it's not bad."

  Corvin
• 

  xjw_b12

  exdub. Perhaps they were only 7 days, just felt longer .... lol
• 

  xjw_b12

  Sassy. Thunder Bay used to be the twin cities of Port Arthur and Fort William until 1970?
• 

  calamityjane

  I can remember many excruciating hours at assemblies but one stands out in my mind. I was 14 at a Fargo, North Dakota, held in a stadium, stinkin hot, no air conditioning and the hardest skinny bleachers I have ever sat on. My butt would fall asleep needless to say I would have loved to have nodded off.
• 

  Jahna

  Fredericton New Brunswick. If you were lucky, you had a seat with a back on it, if you were not lucky, you sat all day on a bench! No air, the only bonus, it was very small.
  
  I might take that over Skydome Toronto or Copps in Hamilton, where the masses of humanity made you dizzy, hot, and well, pissed off before you got there as you battle traffic and crying kids (before during and after the sessions). Yet, at least it had air conditioning such as it was.
  
  Jahna
• 

  oscar

  Hawthorn race track in Cicero IL. I could not wait until they were over I remember the meal tickets I do not miss those days at all.
• 

  Sassy

  Sassy: Those are the ones you can look back on and laugh, but at the time it must have been the worse...but then again, you had your wits about you enough to go into the boys tent! Your instincts were good even back then eh? lol xjdub

  well if you were to ask my mother about her memory of this, she will tell you that this convention was so much work that they (the adults) got nothing out of it.. Her and that sister made a pact to never camp again.. Now us kids had fun..... there was a mall within walking distance and we would skip out of the program and go shopping.. go get those goofy pictures taken in those photo booths with the curtain

  Sassy. Thunder Bay used to be the twin cities of Port Arthur and Fort William until 1970?

  hmmm... xjw that sounds familiar.. but I was thinking this was around 74. Would some have just still called it by the old names?
• 

  exjdub

  One more thing that popped into my head...

  Remember the smell of the bathrooms at the district conventions? Indescribable. I used to try and hold my breath, dash in, try not to whizz on myself, and dash out without taking another breath. The poor sisters couldn't do that because of the god awful lines they had to endure. My wife always said the trick to the sisters' bathrooms were to go during the drama because everyone was siezed by the excitement of such fine acting and lip synching.
• 

  Huxley

  I know that awful smell exj...it's like rusted steel, urine, and sweat-laden polyester combined.

  At least that's how the men's room smelled in Tacoma...ecch!

  Huxley

  "Happy to be convention free."
• 

  Insomniac

  I remember a big district convention in Montreal, Canada, probably 1988 or 89. It was a really hot summer, and there did not seem to be enough oxygen in the dome where the assembly was, so I passed out. I couldn't believe I fainted, but I was not the only one, a bunch of people just keeled over and had to be taken to a room and made to sit on the cold concrete floor to recover. I guess when you consider the heat, size of the closely-packed crowd, and the fact that I was wearing pantyhose, slip, long dress, etc., it makes sense.

  The only good part about that experience was the scorchingly hot brother that I got to lean on when I was walking- brown eyes, a French accent, and heck, a wedding ring. Still a cutie, though.

  That was the same assembly where my mom, practicing a phrase I'd taught her in a foreign language, used the wrong word and said something incredibly obscene to a young man of that nationality, scarring him for life.