Orlando Florida Temple
The round-trip airfare from Washington, DC to Orlando was only $103. The round-trip cab fare from the Orlando airport to the temple was $120. Both were worth it!
What added to my joy was my girlfriend, Briar, came along as she took the milk route home to Denver through Orlando after visiting me for Fathers Day weekend.
The biggest lesson I learned from this temple experience had to do with Briar’s skirt. You see, she forgot to bring one with her. Consequently, she was wearing some new white shorts and a lavender golf shirt when we arrived at the temple. I called ahead and was told they “take anybody” at the temple, regardless of how they are dressed and she didn’t need to worry. But she did.
With an Orlando arrival time of 8:30 am (Frontier got us there 30 minutes early) and a departure time for Briar at 3 pm (mine was at 3:50) plus the 30-minute cab ride going back, and the fact that sessions in the temple start on the hour, I worried that if I didn’t make the 10 a.m. session I might not have time to get us back to the airport in time for her flight.
We arrived on the beautiful large temple grounds at around 9:35, but Briar didn’t feel like she was dressed well enough to go in. The fact that there were no stores close by to grab her a skirt didn’t help either. So she stood in the parking lot and just said I should go ahead and she would hang out at the visitors’ center.
They don’t have a visitors’ center. She told me she didn’t feel good about going in because “…women judge you.”
So therein lies the dilemma: what should I do?
Given that Briar had flown across the country (at her own expense) to spend the weekend with me, it didn’t seem right to leave her outside in the heat. And she wasn’t going into the temple dressed the way she was. So the temple clothing store came the rescue.
They opened at 10 am. I would pass on the endowment session and do initiatory instead. And Briar would come with me.
We bought her a white skirt for $30 and we were in! So the morale of the story is, “Work it out and go together. Don’t put your own agenda ahead of your joint agenda.”
I learned something new today too: you can go up and spend time in the celestial room without doing a session. They prefer you do an ordinance first, but you can still go up and spend time there. The celestial room is large and gorgeous. I loved the heather purple couches in that room. I’ll be framing this photo in a heather-colored frame.
Prior to going to this temple I didn’t know what heather purple was.
Afterwards we hit Chilis at the airport. It was great! I’m writing this as I’m on the plane going back to DC. I’ll be back within 12 hours of the time I left. Another temple visited! This is my ninth one this year