Meet Bro. Wagelaar, he lives in a home for the elderly. He kept talking about the Parking Zone and we could not figure out why he was worried about where we were parking. Well we finally figured out that he was telling us that he has Parkinsons. O.K. people listen with both ears and with an accent next time. He also has diabetes and says that mealtimes are no fun anymore because he can't eat anything good. He gets four injections everyday. He has no wife or children and is very lonely. He used to take care of the church building and garden before he got sick but now he can not even walk. They try to put him in a wheelchair but he insists on trying to use a walker. He just does not want to give up. He told us that when the pain gets really hard to handle they give him an aspirin for the pain.
He asked for a Book of Mormon so that he could slip it into the home's little library. When we gave him a new one he said he was going to keep that one and just put an old one on the shelf. He became very emotional when he talked about not being able to come to church any more. It was really hard to watch. He told us that he used to be the caretaker of the Baptism monument not far from here where the first baptisms in the Netherlands were performed. He was worried that no one was keeping up the grounds. We are planning on asking permission to take him there to show him that all is well and someone is actually caring for the place. (see blogging post on Jun 29th for picture of the monument)
He was so grateful to have someone visit. He is only 68 years old but looks like death warmed over already. Hopefully our visits will cheer him up somewhat.
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