Week 13: learning balance

Following is Garrett's email from his 13th week of his mission. His email address is garrett.brothers@myldsmail.net. Please send packages c/o the mission home: 

 

Utah Salt Lake City East Mission
3487 S 1300 E
Salt Lake City, UT 84106

September 26th, 2016:

We had a free p-day again--some of the district wanted to go on a hike. I didn’t, so I’ve been practicing riding a bike. Growing up I never felt the need to ride a bike, and even though my dad tried to teach me several times, I never got into it. But now I’m riding ok. I'm still getting the hang of it, though. I only crashed once, by riding into a (parked) car.  I was trying to learn to not ride the brakes and so I only braked with one hand. It just slowed me down instead of stopping me, so I slowly ran into a parked car.

September 27th, 2016:

I did an exchange with Elder Wagley today!  We were better together than when we were in the MTC. The exchange was in my area and I was miles ahead of where I was at during my last exchange.  I've gotten a lot more confident and competent as a missionary.

Also, Elder Wagley gave me an "apartment treasure" he found in their car.  Apartment treasures are things left behind by missionaries when they are transferred, since they can take only so much. The treasure that Elder Wagley gave me is a cool ball you start spinning with your hand and rotate your wrist to make it keep spinning.  It gets faster and louder/higher pitches.  It's fun. It made me think of what I should leave behind.

September 28th, 2016:

I had exchanges with Elder Douglass today.  He's our zone leader. So it was back to back exchanges for Elder Matsuzaki and me.

September 29th, 2016:

Today was...interesting.  We were texted by one of our ward bishops; he asked us to visit a man recently called as an indexer as he needed the gospel.  As we walked in to Patrick's apartment, the sunlight passing through the blinds refracted through many empty bottles of Mountain Dew's "Dew Shine," a moonshine-inspired soda.  There was a confederate flag proudly displayed over a radio broadcasting studio setup. Patrick told us that he had received visits from Jesus & angels and had NDEs [Near Death Experiences] in which he visited heaven.  He blames the Yankees for the deterioration of the nation and confided his belief that extra celestial beings--humans from other worlds God created--would visit us. 

We got a text from a weird number.  It just asked us to call him.  After calling, we got this weird feeling so we hung up.  We then got another text so we thought it might be a member, but after calling again we got a third which had a URL and asked us to meet him.  The spirit really told us to be cautious.  But it was cool to be able to be tuned into the spirit so we didn’t do dumb things.

We also were asked to help cast out a "dark soul" that had been troubling a six-year old girl.  She has had some scary experiences, including a temporary possession.

It was one of our weirder days.

Also, Jose E's parents have been fighting, we learned from his younger brother.  I hope everything works out well--I can't get into much detail in my emails, however. But I know God can help all people.

September 30th, 2016:

5 hours of planning today! We went through weekly planning thoroughly, going over all the sentences.  We haven't finished. I'm brain dead. However I recognize it is important for me to learn.

Also there's a big spider crawling around in the bath tub so I'm going to get a container, capture it, and let it out instead of drowning it like I normally do (they can't crawl out of the bath).

Goodnight!

October 1st, 2016:

I was so drained today!  It was not fun.  Anyway I've ended up watching conference twice with Brody because no one else would and our plans fell through.  I just really need to sleep tonight.

October 2nd, 2016:

I'm better.  I had some frustrations with Elder Matsuzaki today--mainly how I'll sometimes fail to register "Let's leave a note" or similar things mean it's time to go. I’ve asked Elder Matsuzaki to be more direct. Anyway, I've gained a lot of respect for Elder Matsuzaki today.  I've also found I'm impatient with my own progress as I strive to be less prideful.  I never knew pride was so large a thing--I thought it only affected a few--so I never worked on it before.

Conference was great.  This morning we had a party with the Spanish branch and had lots of good Mexican food, which is always a good time :).  I took lots of notes for Conference & plan to review them during personal study.  I couldn't tell you my favorite talk yet.

Recent vignette:

Elder Matsuzaki: That was a bad idea

Elder Brothers: What? Coming out here?

M: No, ...

B: ...?...

M: I cannot fart in this long jacket.  It has no way to escape...

The photo below is of Elder Moe (my zone leader) with an egg that the sisters in our district made. They wrote a saga about the missionaries in our district who went on a hike a couple of P-days ago. went on a hike.  The sisters were inspired (?) to write a story in which we all die in various ways.  It was pretty funny.  Also they drew/painted our faces on eggs as part of the story.

Photobombing Elder Moe's egg