Accident

On December 18 Elder Jones fell hard on the public tennis court while playing tennis with our dentist friend, Dr. Ventura. We were always careful not to play tennis during our early morning excercise time after rain because the courts were slimy and slippery. Tuesday, December the 18th was on a beautiful dry morning. He didn't slip, but got his feet tangled up somehow. We went to the hospital near the tennis courts where we learned he had fractured his right hip bone near the artificial hip which held tight, and severly tore his right rotator cuff. It could have meant an early end to our mission, but it turned out that staying here to heal was the best option. We carried on in our work, with people visiting us and our classes held in our apartment as shown in the previous post. The first time Elder Jones left the apartment was after 16 days of study and teaching from the couch. The missionaries carried him down three flights of stairs on a chair to Zone Meeting when President and Sister Mecham came to Saipan. Two days later on Friday he spoke at the Baptism of Ariel, Josie and Angelica Urbano who are also pictured in the previous post. The next day was a big day when we went to Guam for senior conference. I will post a picture of the Elders carrying him carefully down the stairs early in the morning to catch our flight. We enjoyed a great conference with 13 other senior couples. We also had an appointment with an orthopedic specialist while in Guam who confirmed the hip was healing and the recommendation to wait 3 months for possible surgery on the shoulder worked just right for our mission. We were blessed in the timing of all this, and enjoyed the conference all the more!