A crazy random story about when I served a mission to Tampa, Florida. One day me and my companion, Sister Hymas, went to the local mall and spent all of our money at the Clinque counter. We did this knowing full well that we had no food in our apartment. We had lipstick but no bread, powder but no milk, get the picture?
We left the mall and drove to the grocery store. We pooled our money, it looked very discouraging, we decided that the only thing we could do was pray, and pray we did.
We walked into the store and for some reason went straight to the bakery. We were staring through the glass at all the things we couldn't buy when we heard an older gentleman say, "I'll take that key lime pie." Sister Hymas, overhearing what this man had said quickly blurted out "I love key lime pie!"
The man walked our direction and asked, "You like key lime pie?"
Sister Hymas playfully responded, "I love key lime pie!"
He replied, "We'll split it then, you take half and I'll take half..."
Sister Hymas quickly said, "Oh that's okay, but I do love key lime pie!" (And, you need money to buy pie.)
Up to this point my story has been G rated, it will soon escalate to the PG rating.
I remember thinking, what a friendly man. Yes kids, he was a very "friendly" man. He walked over to me and my companion and said something in a quiet voice. We couldn't hear him and so he moved closer.
"I have an idea... why don't you, he said pointing at us, and I go to a hotel, have a little wine, a little running water (running water?)."
I thought to myself, oh my gosh! This old man wants us to sleep with him!!! GROSS!!
At that point I couldn't remember who spoke first me or Sister Hymas, "Sir, we're missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints."
He didn't really seem all that fazed.
"What?" he replied, he was obviously too preoccupied imagining us naked and rubbing his bald head than to listen to what we had just said.
"We are missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints," we repeated.
At that point he began to appear more conscious, and said "you're who?"
"Missionaries. We're misssionarrriesss, from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints."
He then began looking around, actually, he was looking at the double doors in the back of the store, we were wondering what the heck he was looking at when he blurted out "Am I on Candid Camera?! Is Peter Funt going to walk through those doors? Really! Am I on Candid Camera?!" He kept repeating this through a huge grin as he looked at those double doors. No shame in his voice, no fear that the wife who gave him that wedding ring would be watching Candid Camera, nothing. Nothing but true elation that someone had actually pulled a fast one on him. You got me!" He shouted.
What?!! We were stunned! I felt like saying, no sir, nobody was tipped off that you'd approach two nun like women in a grocery store and act like a perverted pig. Nobody knew that you would do that, so it would probably be a little unlikely that a camera crew and the host of a popular television show would be hanging out in the stock room of Publix just in case someone like us, Mormon missionaries, would be propositioned in a bakery by someone like you, a dirty old man. And another thing... isn't Candid Camera a family show? In my opinion the majority of the American public would (now hold onto your hat...) think you are a little SICK! I'm sure that many would write the producers of Candid Camera complaining that they had to explain to their children what a grandpa was going to do with two young girls in a hotel room with wine and running water. Sigh...
After we had flashed him our name plates and repeated that we were missionaries several more times, he began to settle down. He even uttered an apology. By this time the baker had finished cutting the key lime pie in half like the man had asked. The old man handed us one half and kept the other for himself. Can we be done here I thought?
We laughed a little and said our good-byes to the old man and me and Sister Hymas went to gather some necessities to survive on until we received our monthly allowance. Key lime pie was definitely not in the budget but we were too embarrassed to give it back. When we got to the check-out counter, our long lost friend was checking out in front of us. Clearly he had had some sort of spiritual awakening because he said "Sisters, let me buy your groceries, it's the least I can do."
It took a little convincing but finally we agreed to let him buy our groceries. We thanked him and once again said our good-byes hoping that we would never lay eyes on him again.
As we left the store and got in our car, we prayed and thanked our wonderful Heavenly Father for the groceries, prayed for the man's soul and then peeled out of the parking lot laughing our heads off.
When we got home that night, we tried on our lipstick, put on our pajamas and enjoyed our key lime pie.
