Easter Letter, 1974

My Aunt Marian kept many of the letters my mother, Donna Biel, wrote to her.  She returned them in 2010.  Most are recorded here.  They were not entered in chronological order, so the best way to view them is by year, found in the index on the sidebar.



Dear friends in Christ:

Greetings to you all!  Did you have a good Easter?  And, you mothers, was your Mother's Day a happy one, and bright?  A salute to you mothers!  A child's such a messy little thing, so slow to grow and learn.  It's born with a will full-blown, a gale wind that fills its sails yet has no captain to chart its course.  Slow, so slowly, by fits and starts through long slow years of creeping growth, the child, weaned, blends into his destiny.  Some call their mother blessed, whose years of youth and strength in the slow years, a mother's strength molded to the child's weakness.  And, then it's mind, a darkness into which, probing, pushing, come filtering the first weak tentative rays:  words the child hears, repeated, first empty sounds, that pattern themselves into its life, and then spill out in childish jargon groping for the sense of what's about.  And when the mother's there it's her wisdom that first lights its mind, putting the tiny hand to the wheel that steers life's course.

To all who have a mother's heart, this toast!  God grant the grace to have joy and peace in fitting His children to their destiny.

We've been having a busy time of it.  Some of the highlights:

At the Maringa church there was a record number of communicants on Good Friday:  96.

We dedicated a church in Ivaipora.  They have just a small congregation:  18 families.  However, they managed to build a very nice little church without any aid from outside the parish.

Until now we'd met in the home of a member.  I am temporarily taking care of the church and have been for the past two years.  We have services twice monthly, when possible.  Until then, the maximum they'd had was services six times a year.

At Borazopolis, which is on the same road, we had the special joy of seeing a family reunited which had been split by business dealings mixed with avarice and wine.  They all communed together on Holy Saturday.  The wounds heal slowly, they only get together under the sign of reconciliation: worship, in the name of Jesus.

Sunday school seems to have been rejuvenated in Maringa by moving the hour to the same as worship and calling on mature members as teachers.  About 35 are enrolled.  On Mother's Day they did a very nice program in the afternoon.

A new man has come into town: a Swiss who speaks English, French, German, Spanish, Swahili, and a little Portuguese.  He's an engineer and worked for many years in Africa, then came to South America and is "trying out" Maringa.  His driving interest seems to be making money and loneliness brings him to church.  He's an outspoken, rabid racist and and anti-Jewish.  He has been strongly influenced by a so-called "Jewish Manifesto".  Now this is where I want some help from some of you.  Who can tell me anything about a "Jewish Manifesto"?  I'd be much obliged.  The copy he's got was published in Spanish, in Argentina.

Right now I'm a little laid up with a cracked ankle-bone.  I'll have a cast on until the end of May.  coming soon after a bum knee makes me think I'll have to give up playing futebol de salao (court soccer) with the young adults.

We had very good participation in a Bible camp in February.  About 30 youth from the parish went.  Now we are looking forward to the retreat in July which we will be in charge of as it will be on a farm near here.  The farm belongs to a doctor and it is used mainly for retreats.  With the bunk beds, there is room for 75 people.  The theme will worship.

Helen's bladder problem was finally diagnosed and operated: a cyst near a urethra.  She was operated on in Sao Paulo by a surgeon considered to be one of the best urologists in the world, and is recovering well.  She is still taking medicine and has monthly urine check-ups in the nearby city of Londrina.  She has no more wetting in the daytime, but still needs diapers at night.

Rachel is doing much better in school lately, is as tall as her mother, has begun confirmation study, works on her stamp collection and is teaching English to a class of neighborhood children she got together.

Charles goes every day after school to a nearby park to visit the animals there.  His allergy to dust has been bothering him.  He is taking a vaccine by drops for six months which we hope will relieve the stuffed nose and sneezing.

Power to you all, in what's right.

Clifford Biel and family

P.S.  Farmers are hurting: soybeans are only $4 a bushel (30 kilos)

+++++++++++++ On the backside of the above, typed letter, a handwritten one to the Beiwel's:

Dear Frank and Marian:

Well, the last ones on my list!  I've been writing letters all yesterday and all day today, to my family and Donna's.  Today I was to have gone to a meeting in Joinville, traveling all night by bus each way.  But my foot swells to much yet when it's down, so I didn't go.  Instead, I've been sitting on the bed, listening to the record player and writing letters.

We gave Rachel a record for Christmas and enjoy it more than she does!  Andy Williams, "Alone Again".

You really shouldn't spend money sending candy every Christmas- We eat it all up and then - wait.  For the next Christamas!  We hope to be home for furlough for Christmas, '75.  We're talking about that.  It fits the kid's school vacation and they want to see SNOW!  and feel COLD!  Yek!  And, maybe everybody won't be so busy like they are in the summer.

Sounds like everybody is really skimping there in the States.  We're also pinched, but I think we'll break even this year.  The cost of living here has jumped 25% in three months while income has held steady.

Saturday we're going to Marilia (about four hours drive from here) for the silver wedding anniversary of our colleague there.  I'll be preaching, but what can you say to somebody who's been hitched that long?

There was a hilarious cartoon in TIME.  Gold Meir and Willy Brandt were sitting on a park bench.  He says to her, "If this were a week earlier, they'd call our meeting a summit conference."

A girl just stopped by and gave us an invitation to her wedding in the Catholic church.  Five years and she's never come to church here.  Her brother is Antonio Roberto, who is studying to be pastor (Lutheran).  Her mother is a spiritist.  She's marrying a Japanese.

Well, carry on.  Let us hear from you.

Yours,

Joey and family

Letter to Marian and Frank, April 19, 1974

 Biel Family, mid-1970's, Brazil

My Aunt Marian kept many of the letters my mother, Donna Biel, wrote to her.  She returned them in 2010.  Most are recorded here.  They were not entered in chronological order, so the best way to view them is by year, found in the index on the sidebar. 


Dear Marian, Frank, Lisa, Eric and Julianna,

We received your package the day before Easter.  Joey brought it when I was trying to decide what to make for dessert on Easter- we made the cake.  Delicious!  We will have the other one on Joey's birthday.  Needless to say, we enjoyed the candy, too.  Thank you for the "sweet" gift.

We heard that you were going to Julia's for Easter.  I imagine you saw several changes in her house for Harvey wrote that he had been puttering around there and Julia said Martha went to help one day.

We remembered Julianna's birthday even though we didn't send a card.  It is easy to remember since Marian's is the next day and my sister Marian is on the 14th, too.

I suppose you are starting to enjoy spring weather.  We still have summer although the mornings and evenings are cooler.  It was chilly when we went to a mission meeting at the end of last month.  It was held at a city in the mountains of our southernmost state.  We traveled 24 hours by bus to get there, stayed two days, then spent another 24 hours traveling back.  That shows you are far away we are from some fellow American pastors.

Cliff Biel doing the Hamburger Skit

You would have enjoyed seeing Joey in a skit at the mission conference.  He did it at the fun night at Bible Camp and the youth really thought it was good.  A man who owned a hamburger industry liked to try hamburgers out at different places to see if anyone served better hamburgers.  At the place where Joey was a cook, he thought the hamburger had a different flavor so he asked for the recipe.  When he found out the same ingredients were used, he asked to see the cook making them.  Out came Joey, shirtless, oil on his skin and then water poured over to look like a lot of sweat, cigarette hanging from his mouth and a tattoo on his heart saying "meat".  He demonstrated and at the end, to flatten the meatball, he put it under his armpit.  That was where the different flavor came from. 

The next day, when Joey came late for breakfast, I told the people at our table that he was helping to make more hamburgers.  We had hamburgers that noon but round ones.  Several people told us that if and when they came through our city, they hoped we won't serve them hamburgers.  We have been having the mission meeting with wives every two years.  The men get together once a year for a business meeting.

Helen is doing fine.  I called the doctor yesterday after receiving the urine results done last week in Londrina.  He says to keep on giving medicine to keep the urine free of germs and do another urine test in a month.  Apparently, this will go on for some time.  It take three hours to get to Londrina by bus, about 15 minutes to do the urine exam, have lunch with Gaylord Grant's and then come back.  Thus, it takes all day.  We leave at 8:30 and get back at 5 p.m.  We have a laboratory here but the medical care is better in Londrina so the doctor thinks they are more careful in doing lab tests.

Helen saw an unpleasant sight when I took her swimming  two weeks ago.  While we were there, a 16 year old boy was pulled out of the deep end of the pool.  They don't have lifeguards at pools here.  No one did anything-  I went and turned him over and barely started giving chest-arm respiration when a doctor who was playing tennis started mouth-to-mouth respiration and his wife, an anesthetist, gave heart massage.  I couldn't find any pulse.  When they got their instruments, the doctor couldn't hear any heartbeat and said that just by looking at the boy's eyes, he said that he was dead.  He used an instrument to look in his lungs and said that there wasn't any water in the lungs.  Apparently, the boy had eaten off and on during the afternoon, had stomach cramps, and disappeared without any signs of distress.  He had been under water for at least half an hour, the doctor thought.  After seeing this, Helen said we can sell our membership at the club as she doesn't want to go back. 

For some time, Rachel and Charles haven't wanted to go- they have friends playing here all the time.  It is too bad that they don't have public pools and we could pay whenever we could go.  The club fees have gone up to $10 per month and now gasoline is so expensive so we might as well sell our membership.

Since the children didn't have school on the day after Easter, we went to a city one hour from here to visit with the pastor's family there.  We will go as a family to get together with all of the pastor's families in our area, about nine of them, on May 1st which is a holiday.

You may have heard from Cynthia's letter that Joey was in bed for a week due to a swollen knee.  After a week, he hobbled around.  He thought he would need a cane, but an ace bandage helped.  Now he has been fine.  I told him that he should play mostly chess since he hurt his knee in a soccer game.

One of Rachel's English students gave her an egg (chocolate) that cost about $6.  I told her that maybe I should start teaching if I could get valuable gifts.  I spend time every day helping Helen with reading in English as she is weak due to not paying attention to phonetic sounds.  She is improving but is having a harder time than Rachel or Charles for they went all day to school in English until last August and had Portuguese on the side.  Now it is the opposite for Helen-  having little time of school in English.  Her main problem has been spelling but by studying, she is doing much better.  In Portuguese you spell as you pronounce a word.  Charles is too busy playing to do hardly any extra reading in English, but Rachel reads many books.  One of the books that I read I found interesting, "Ana and the King of Siam" for which the movie "The King and I" was made.  A television series about this is being shown.

We went to see the movie "The Day of the Jackal" about the plot to attempt to assassinate Charles De Gaulle.  It was interesting and full of suspense.

We have a shampoo that you might like, Marian.  It has vitamins in it and brings back the natural color.  Several of our pastor's wives have started using it. One who was much grayer than Joey has no more grey hair.  Joey refuses to try it as you would have to wash your hair two or three times a week and he goes for three weeks without washing as he feels that washing it makes it soft and it doesn't stay in place.  With all the talk about streaking, they said at our mission meeting that now with this shampoo, no pastor has to have streaks of grey hair.

Love,
Donna and Joey

Letter to Marian and Frank, February 4, 1974

 Helen on a ladder, a bit younger than in this letter.

Dear Marian, Frank, Lisa, Erik and Julianna,

Greetings from the huge city of Sao Paulo (largest in Brazil).  Wouldn't ever want to live here- the traffic is terrible and some days there is a lot of smoke due to factories but the medical care is the best in Brazil.

We were here for five days- January 14th through the 18th for X-rays, blood and urine tests.  I was with Helen the 2.5 to 3 hours it took to do the x-rays for they let me hold her hand.  I was impressed how thorough the 19 x-rays were done on the kidney and bladder.  While the dye was in the bladder, the x-rays from the right side and lying flat on the back showed everything normal, but on her left side of the bladder a cyst was found.  She had to urinate and several x-rays showing the bladder full and half full and empty showed that the cyst was larger when the bladder was empty and in the cyst a residual of the urine stayed.  This apparently was (the wetting) better when she took sulfa or antibiotics but only surgery was the solution.  The medical term is diverticulum.  I wish I had a Merck Manual to understand it better, although the doctor did a diagram for me.  He said that this is from birth, so apparently the x-rays at Fairview Southdale taken 2.5 years ago weren't thorough enough.  I'm glad we finally found out what was wrong.  the doctor says that there could be a complication from the surgery, in that the urine could try to go up the ureter to the kidney- he called this reflux and said that he tried to prevent this from happening by doing certain things in the operation.  This doctor was recommended to me by our dentist in Maringa.  He is a urologist for children.  Since I came here, I found out that he is consdiered to be one of the best in Brazil and is well known. 

After the exams, Helen and I went by night bus to Curitiba where we me Joey, Rachel and Charles and then drove for seven hours to a city where a pastor from our district was to be ordained at his home church.  This pastor is our age but did a short course offered due to the shortage of pastors.  He had correspondence lessons to do and Joey was his tutor the last year.  Before he became a pastor he worked with his family at a tile and brick factory in the country by his father's farm.  Here shingles aren't used on roofs, but tiles.  It was interesting to see the process of how the tiles were made.  We also visited an old folk's home for 75 residents where this pastor that was ordained had worked for four years before going to our own district.  The sermon was given in German since most in that area prefer that language-  we had a copy of the sermon in Portuguese.

On our way back home we were by the ocean so we spent two days at the home of a Dutch couple who live one block from a nice beach .  This couple had lived for 15 years in the U.S., five years in Canada and went back  to Brazil to be by their only son who had married a Brazilian when the parents left Holland 25 year ago and stayed here for 5 years.  Now they are about 68 years old and haven't tried to learn Portuguese which all their grandchildren can speak.  They lived in Maringa for a few months and we helped translate for them but they decided it was too hot there for them.  Joey wouldn't go in the water but we had fun jumping in the waves.  The sun was very hot one morning.  I made Helen and Charles wear shirts but Rachel took hers off and consequently got a burn so her back peeled.  We didn't get lotion under Charles nose, thus large water blisters formed which made him look funny.  While on the beach we saw a beautiful film made in Austria, "Sissi", spoken in French with Portuguese subtitles- only Helen couldn't read fast enough so I explained as it went along.  The movie was about a girl who was chosen to be the queen of Austria- Elizabeth was her real name. 

 

Rachel and Charles had their birthdays while Helen and I were here for exams.  Rachel made a cake and invited a few neighbors.  Rachel is now my height.  According to the Reader's digest, one can double the height for girls at 18 months and add an inch for good nutrition.  She and Helen should be 5' 9".

Today is the 8th day in the hospital and Helen will get out.  We will spend two days at a pastor's home here before we go back on a 12 hour ride by night bus.  She has had a catheter in for seven days.  When she got up a plastic bag was taped on to her leg so she could walk around.  For two days she has had a lot of gas.  They didn't give her an enema before surgery.  She didn't have a B.M. for five days and then it was very hard, finally they gave an enema but still she has gas pains quite often.  The doctor didn't leave any order for gas so they gave her medicine for pain in order to go to sleep for two nights.  Just about everywhere you go, there are couches in each room for a relative to sleep by the patient.  Nursing care is better here than in Maringa yet relatives are the ones who feed a patient when he needs help, gets them out of bed, helps them walk.  Nurses come in just when it is time to give the bath, take the temperature, or give medicine, unless we call them.  There is no T.V. in the hospital unless one has a portable one to bring.  We brought a tape recorder, coloring books, dolls, and many books.  Most days I read to her and when I read all of the books, I bought comic books.  Now that she is better she will play with her dolls, so I can write letters.  Helen had 11 stitches from the surgery.  American school starts on the 11th, so I will probably carry her up the steps so that she can go.  Brazilian school starts on March 1st.  That gives her plenty of time to recuperate.

We didn't hear from you , Cynthia, Louie of Stan's for Christmas.  Laurie sent Rachel a letter. Just think, Juliana is almost a year old!  Will she be walking soon?  Wish you could send us a picture of her when she has her first birthday.  How about printing us a letter, Lisa, or drawing us a picture?  Hugs and kisses to all,

Love, Donna and Joey

Thought Eric would be interested to hear that while we were in the hospital we saw helicopters going on top of a 22 story building about 8 to 10 blocks from here to save people from a fire.  It was tragic in that 200 people died.  Many jumped and there wasn't any netting so they had an instant death.  They had fire equipment such as hoses and extinguishers inside, but the 1000 people that worked there panicked and didn't remember to use them.  The whole city stopped working to see this tragedy and many of the duty nurses went back to work and hundreds of people went to give blood that was needed.  We heard ambulance sirens all day long.  Fire started when an air conditioner exploded due to over heating of the electrical wiring.  The fire department complained of what little equipment they had and what few firemen for this size of a city, and said many more could have been saved if building codes had been enforced- such as helicopter landing on top of the building- the only helicopter that could go up there had to land on skis.  One man held a wet curtain over his nose and mouth.  He waited calmly for three hours to be rescued while others became desperate and jumped.  He said he would have waited all day and encouraged others not to jump.

Thurs. am.  We got back home.  Everyone is fine.  Helen has to take antibiotics by mouth for a month and then have a urine exam before the doctor says everything is O.k.

Love, Donna and Joey

Rachel, Charles and Helen

Letter to the Beiwel's, December 27, 1974 (Friday)

 Rachel Biel, around 12 years old.

My Aunt Marian kept many of the letters my mother, Donna Biel, wrote to her.  This is one that I wrote to her family when I was 12 years old. She returned the letters in 2010.  Most are recorded here.  They were not entered in chronological order, so the best way to view them is by year, found in the index on the sidebar.

Dear Uncle Frank, Auntie Marian, Lisa, Eric, and Juliana,

Hope you had a Merry Christmas.  We had a pretty nice one though Christmas Eve was more excited.  We opened our presents that night and went out for supper.

Thanks for the stamps, Uncle Frank.  I sure appreciated them.  I didn't have hardly any of them.  I hope you like the "1 cruzeiro" that I enclosed.  Seven of them make 1 DOLLAR.

Sorry to hear you (Lisa) and Eric had chickenpox.  I hat it when I was 4 years old.  I'm also sorry to hear you both will be wearing glasses, but many people look prettier in them.

For Christmas, Helen got an Egipcian game called CARCARA.  We had it the last time we were in the States.  It sure is fun!  Mom and Dad are playing it right now- scoring:  Dad-1, Mom-0.  I got a dart board and nine darts, we sure have fun with it.  I gave Dad a little flashlight which you could adjust 4 types of screwdrivers on to it.  He sure was happy with it.

I'm happy to hear that more books are coming even though you shouldn't have gone to the bother and work of doing it all.  My little library is finally starting to grow.  It has some real nice romance books by Grace Livingston Hill.  Lately, I read an excellent book by Corrie Ten Boom.  It's called the "hiding Place".  She hides Jews in this little place in her house in Holland and than gets caught for it and goes to a concentration camp.  You really should read it.

Lisa, Helen really misses you.  All the time she talks about is "When we get to the States, Lisa, Polly and I will do this, this and this."  She really misses you.

I can hardly believe we're going to the States in one year and at Christmas!  I always wonder if it is fun to ice skate.  We still have our roller skates, but I wonder if it is the same.

Now I have 1350 stamps.  Most of them are from Brasil.  I've 200 Brazilian ones and 151 American ones. 

This last few weeks we went to two special films: Jesus Christ Superstar and Godspell.  Have you watched any of them?  I liked Godspell a lot better than Jesus C.S.S.  Mary fell in love with Jesus in J.C.S.S  In Godspell the disciples were dressed as clowns and Jesus had a huge blonde afro.  He also had on a Super Tea-shirt on and overalls.  Some things in it were just a riot.

Well, I guess I'd better end now.  With Great Love,

Rachel Biel

PS.  Oh, yeah, I forgot to tell you that I'll start school (Both B. and A.) on March 1st.
PPSS  Dad's planning to take us (Charlie and I) on a bike hike.  We each get to choose a few friends to go along.  We'll stay out about 3 or 4 days.  My bones are aching to go (and so am I). 

Tchau

See you, I mean.
Write you later, alligators.

In Memoriam: Otto Tollefson

Clifford Biel, Otto Tollefson, and Bob Roiko

It was with great sadness that I received the news of Otto Tollefson's passing.  Barbara, his wife, sent out the following email:

Dear family and friends –

I am Barbara, the wife of Otto Tollefson.  I am using Otto’s e-mail address and list of contacts to communicate the passing of Otto on Friday, December 24th, at 4:55 p.m., at Franciscan Hospice in Tacoma, Washington.

Otto died from colon cancer, just three weeks shy of his 80th birthday. All the children were with their father before his death.  He died peacefully, with family surrounding him until his final breath.

You are invited to participate in our celebration of Otto’s life and faithful service to our Lord.  There will be a memorial service on Sunday, January 2nd, at 2 p.m., at St. Mark’s Lutheran Church by the Narrows, 6730 North 17th Street; Tacoma, WA 98406.

Address: 11111 Aurora Avenue North, Seattle, WA 98133.

Here is a recent photo of the Tollefson family (minus Dean):

 Scott, Helen, Barbara, Otto, Adel and Joel Tollefson

For many years, Otto has been instrumental in keeping the Brazil families connected via email updates.  We all knew that if we had something to share, we could send our news to Otto and he would get it out to the rest.  Now, many of us have reconnected on facebook, which has been a great tool to have more regular tidbits, photos, and updates.

 Otto also edited a book in 1998 about our time in Brazil, "Seed Falling on Good Soil".  He requested contributions from the mission families, which together, give a wonderful snapshot of their ministry and of the people whose lives were transformed while they were in Brazil.  The text Otto chose for the tone of the book comes from Matthew 13:3,8,23:

"Once there was a man who went out to sow grain...  But some seeds fell in good soil, and the plants bore grain: some had one hundred grains, others sixty, and others thirty... 

And the seeds sown in the good soil stand for those who hear the message and understand it: they bear fruit, some as much as one hundred, others sixty, and others thirty."

The book is still available on Amazon.  Click on the photo for more info.

Otto had recently been working for St. Mark's Lutheran Church in Washington.  He described his service in his bio:

"The greatest gift I received on my 70th birthday was to officially begin as interim pastor at St. Mark’s Lutheran Church. But like “the man who came to dinner” I stayed on! What was expected to be a six month relationship has continued for almost three years. My part-time responsibilities now focus on visitation and teaching adult forums. 

The journey from my childhood home in Fergus Falls, Minnesota, began on D-day, June 6, 1944, when our family moved to Seattle. My education included the Seattle Lutheran Bible Institute (now Trinity College), Pacific Lutheran University, Tacoma, and Luther Seminary, St. Paul, MN. 

Upon ordination, my wife, Barbara, and I were privileged to be among the first group of missionary families that went to Brazil under the Evangelical Lutheran Church in 1958. Our ministry was first in church planting and school administration in a new wild west frontier area, and later in stewardship, evangelism and lay training in a large Lutheran parish in Joinville, Santa Catarina. 

On return to the US eighteen years later I served First Lutheran Church, Poulsbo, WA, and then as mission developer of Christ the Servant Lutheran Church, Lacey, WA. Barbara continued with her nursing, piano and church music careers. One of our greatest joys has been our joint ministry as clergy presenting couple with International Lutheran Marriage Encounter. 

We treasure our ties with people in Norway through our heritage, with Brazil through our ministry, and Scandinavian and Eastern European counties through LME and seminars we’ve given. We have five adult children and ten granddaughters. My ‘occupational therapy’ time is given to flower and vegetable gardening, reading John Grisham’s novels and Ann Rule’s true crime stories, and cheering on the Mariners."

My father was one of the tallest of the missionaries and Otto was one of the shortest, as seen in the first photo, taken in the early 1960's.  Of course, this was always a joke at missionary reunions.  But, the Tollefson family made its impression on my young mind for a much more important reason:  Barbara saved my life!

We were at a mission retreat in Camboriu, Santa Catarina, at the ocean front.  Most of the pastor's and wives were meeting in sessions up a hill, removed from the beach.  A couple of the wives were watching us kids as we played in the water and sand.  The day before we had been able to wade quite a distance out into the ocean, but there had been a storm during the night and the undercurrent was powerful and great rifts had been made in the sand, under the waves.  I was around 12 or 13 at the time (1974?) If I remember correctly, I was standing in the water with Kathy Fedde and Ruth Foehringer.  I felt a huge undercurrent start pulling us out, so I pushed Kathy to Ruthie, who pulled her out while I was sucked away.

Someone ran up to the meeting and everybody came rushing out.  My father doesn't swim (and hates the ocean) and he started throwing logs that were on the beach out into the water, hoping that I could grab on to one of them.  Pastor Charles Eidum swam out to me and grabbed me.  I had been pushed down repeatedly, with violence, by big waves that were crashing down on me.  I remember feeling a calm certainty that I would soon die.  Chuck Eidam pulled me in about half way, but then he started to succumb to the waves as well.  Barbara Tollefson had life saving experience and she charged in, storming through the waves and pulled both of us out.  There can be a lot of power wrapped up in those small packages!  (She is short, too...)

I sat on the beach, recovering my breath, everybody relieved that all of us were still alive.  My brother, Charles, sat down next to me, looked at how white I was from fear and said, "Boy, you sure have a lot of freckles!"  

The old guard is passing on and we are sorry to see them go.  Otto certainly planted his seeds on fertile soil.  His work and dedication will be remembered by many and will continue to produce fruit.  Those of us who have had the honor of knowing him and his family certainly will continue to carry a piece of him on with us in our journeys.

My heartfelt sympathies go to the Tollefson family.  
Que Deus esteja contigo!


Note:  Please feel free to leave comments about Otto or his family here.  Click on "Comments/Comentarios" below and a box will open up where you can write...