Home Visits in Action, by Rebecca Blanchard

In the late spring and early summer of 1975, I had been a Bahá’í for eighteen months, married for sixteen months, a young mother for six months, and all of twenty-two years old. I had just finished my education degree, but very much wanted to be an at-home Mom. We lived in an old farmhouse in Oasis, Iowa, where the other four nearby residents traveled the eleven miles to work in Iowa City every day. We had one car, which was needed to get my husband to his construction work site, and a land-line phone which cost long-distance fees to call anyone. My daily companions were our black lab, Lady, who loved rolling in the many wonderful smells of farm life and my beautiful, amazing, albeit colicky little son. There were many chores for me to do, most of them seemed never-ending: laundry, especially with cloth diapers, and no dryer; weeding, watering, and harvesting our 30 by 50 foot garden; caring for our infant; and cooking/cleaning for our family. I was blessed with an actively engaged husband and father who worked daylight hours every reasonable weather day. We, like many young couples, were living paycheck to paycheck. I was isolated, lonely, and knew only the basic principles of my new Faith. To my rescue came Carolyn Cavitt, a slightly older and definitely more deepened Bahá’í from Iowa City, and her brilliant, enchanting four-year-old daughter Camille. Once a week, they would show up at our house in the middle of the morning, and just be with us! We would pray, chat about Bahá’í community life and upcoming events, work together on whatever chores were on the list, snuggle Chaim and read stories to Camille, eat peanut butter sandwiches and the sherbet flavor Camille had picked for us. I had a ready and willing example of impressive mothering skills, a guide through my early time as a Bahá’í, and the love and laughter of true friendship. Carolyn and Camille’s weekly visits were literally a gift from God!