By Roving Reporter Marcia Mengel
Recently, I got to get to know Patty R., a member of our techie team. When I asked her how she found out about PB UMC, she told me, “About 6 years, Tony W., a member, invited me to lunch and she told me the she had walked by the PB UMC on XMAS eve one year and heard beautiful music. She started attending regularly. She suggested I do the same. I did and immediately loved the friendly people and the music.”
I asked her if she had a related technical background. “No. I was a PE teacher decades ago and then taught health education at the University of Nebraska while working on my doctorate. I then moved to San Diego with my spouse and I became a member of San Diego County Health Department.”
I was curious about what made her become a member of our techie team as she doesn’t have a techie background. She told me, “I wanted do something helpful to the church. One day after first service, Craig asked me if I’d like to join his team. This was something I could do because I was coming to church any way and it wouldn’t take up much time to do or prepare for. Craig taught me what to do. I am one of the projectionists and I am glad I decided to join the team because I really do enjoy doing it.”
When I asked if she had anything else to share with us, she told me her parents had been Presbyterian overseas missionaries and as a result she was born in China and raised in India “where my father worked with the Christian schools and my mother taught nutrition to village women. As a result, I developed an understanding of other religions and cultures.”
Turns out sports also become an important part of her life. “I came to the U.S. to attend college at Trinity University in San Antonio. My father knew I liked to run and therefore should go to a place where I could run even during the winter. I became the Trinity woman’s track team (athlete and coach). I took the Greyhound bus to meets and got to run in the Texas Relays. In graduate school, I took up volleyball and met my future spouse at the University of Illinois playing volleyball. I dislocated an ankle and we took up bicycling. We completed the 2006 Race Across America in 11 days and 19 hours. I did that race by myself in 2007, but only got as far as Kansas. Then we took up track racing at the Velodrome in Balboa Park. Two years ago our coach retired and we took up badminton. Anyone interested in joining us playing badminton, let me know. We can provide the rackets and the birds.”
Obviously Patty is a very interesting person to get to know. And she is an important member of our techie team. I hope you all find a way to get to know her, too.
