Monday, September 25, 2017
Alexandria, Virginia
Last Monday night we went to S*'s house, and she fed us meatloaf, and I made friends with her cats. She's still in the process of reactivating and invited us over to watch a session of General Conference with her this week! So, we will. She still has some concerns about repentance and about the after-life part of the the Plan of Salvation, but we're working on it. Then we went over to the Bishop's house, and it was great! We love going over there. The spirit in their home is so wonderful.
On Tuesday, we picked up the Elders from their apartment to take them to District Meeting and they returned our pillows and blankets to us. You see, they asked if they could borrow any extra that we had because of some weird emergency because they weren't sleeping in their apartment over the weekend, so we were like "Sure! We like service opportunities because we're missionaries and missionaries serve. Besides, what could possibly go wrong with it?" Let me tell you how wrong we were in sharing with them. Because after District Meeting, we had apartment inspections by the wonderful senior couple, the Lesueur's (who brought us a huge case of peaches to make us happy), and Sister Lesueur told us that the Elders had bed bugs. My reaction was simply: "...Are you serious?" And then I grabbed the pillows and blankets and threw what would fit in the dryer and everything else in garbage bags. Bed bugs?! Ew! My weak constitution! Then we texted and called the Elders because we were slightly irked that they hadn't told us and then exposed us to the monsters, but they weren't responding. They could probably sense the annoyance radiating off of us. But then we were happy because we had a lesson with C*! And we put him on date to be baptized!! I am so excited for him. And for me. Because I get to teach him. He doesn't have any background with God because he was raised Buddhist, but he has so many questions and a sincere desire to learn more. He said he knows that the peaceful feeling that he gets when going to church is the Holy Ghost. Ah! Yay! Then that night, we went to Brother C*'s house for dinner, and we brought S* with us. And he had his buddy, R*, over as well. I was his helper in the kitchen that night because S* and R* were in some sort of political debate and it was Sister Morin's birthday celebration. So, I got to help prepare and serve a six-course meal. Let me tell you, this food is so good! Brother C* made two chocolate cakes for dessert and then sent us home with both of them. Cute ol' Brother C*.
Wednesday: Zone Conference today! And flu shots! (Did my excitement come through over text?) Yes, 'tis the season. For the flu. And flu shots, apparently. We got there early and Sister Morin and I were the first ones to get the shots that day. Which was horrible. The needle-wielding fiend looked like he was enjoying all the power that he possessed. I just looked into his beady eyes and thought, "You sad little man." ...He was actually very nice and showed real concern for my life when the blood drained from my face. The mission nurse started to stroke my hair, and Sister Morin's fingers were clutched in my death grip while he viciously stabbed me with a sharp piece of metal and injected poison into my body. But I'm alive. After that, the nurse gave me a Snickers bar for being brave. Because I was being brave. Missionaries sometimes have to do scary things. Or so I'm told. But then we had Zone Conference, and it was just awesome. We focused on the Christlike attribute of obedience, and I feel very spiritually uplifted and ready to be obedient. Also, we got CTR rings. It was like Primary all over again.
We had to deliver a large-print Bible to a really creepy guy on Thursday, and we didn't feel safe going all by ourselves, so we called the Elders to come with us. The Elders were still dodging our phone calls apparently, so we called some of the Sisters in our district, and they were willing to come with us and make sure that 911 was called if we were kidnapped. ...That's all.
Okay, so, on Friday, I woke up and my neck was starting to itch, and I looked in the mirror and it was completely red. I didn't know what it was, so I put some cream on it, and we skedaddled on our way to have a lesson with A* early that morning. When we got back, we did our studies and started to plan for the week, when Sister Morin looked over at me and said, "Favorite companion in the whole world, what is on your face??" At first, I was like "Is it a bed bug??" but then I looked in the mirror and saw hives all over the place. And then I realized that I had been itching myself subconsciously throughout the morning and they had started to sprout over my entire body. There were hives in my throat, my ears, on my scalp, on my eyelids, on my neck and shoulders, my stomach, my back, and my thighs. And it was so incredibly itchy. Sister Morin started to freak out, so we called the mission nurse, and she said that she was going to start looking up ways to help while we went to CVS and talked to pharmacist about it. So, we get there, and the pharmacist just looks at me and says, "Yeah, you're having an allergic reaction, so you're going to want to put some cream on that. Also, Benadryl will help with the swelling." and sent me on my way. I was like "Pft! I'm dying over here! I'm probably reacting to the poison they injected into my body or the bed bugs finally decided to show themselves and I'm allergic to them! Either way, can you please fix this??" That didn't help. So, we bought the Benadryl and went back to the apartment to rest. The hives were almost completely gone that night. Which was good because I was about ready to rip someone's face off. Anyway, then we went to the G* family's for dinner (they take such good care of us) and got to work on our skirts a little bit. Then we coerced and pleaded until they showed us some of their swing dancing moves. It was a great night. And then we had a lesson with D*! We had dropped her previously, but we were able to make contact with her again, and she kept her return appointment with us! Yay!
There was the Women's General Conference session on Saturday night!! I was looking forward to it all week long, and it finally came! We got there early for a dessert bar, and I got some yummy frozen yogurt before the broadcast. There were a lot of non-member friends that were there and less-active members that we had the pleasure of acquainting ourselves with. I was so happy when it started. I needed it. One of my favorite things that was said by Sister Jones was: "You may do something bad that will make you unworthy, but your worth will never be lessened." (I'm obviously taking poetic license with that one. Do you have the actual quote?)
Sunday was a busy, busy day. We had C* at church, F* showed up out of the blue, and a less-active member, E*, with her three children showed up, and they didn't know anybody. So, we had our hands pretty full. I may have gotten my 10,000 steps just walking around the church so many times. But everything turned out okay. F* said he liked it enough (I'm still a little unsure about that). We had an amazing lesson with C* after church and taught him about the Plan of Salvation. E* and her kids are going to have us and Sister S* over on Wednesday for a lesson. I'm super pumped! When we got home, we treated ourselves to homemade ice cream and brownies topped with sweetened condensed milk....we indulged. After the indulgence in massive amounts of sugar, we went out to find some people. And while we were looking, we bumped into someone who looked vaguely familiar. While Sister Morin was talking to him, I just kind of stared him down, and then when it was my turn to speak, I quietly whispered, "...are you M*?" Turns out, he was! M* is someone we found a couple of weeks ago and passed to the Spanish-speaking Elders. But he said he wants to learn more from us, so we're going to meet with him instead. Which is fine by me!
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| Indulgence |
Anyway, I love you guys and I miss you guys like crazy.
Kisses from Alexandria.
Love,
Me
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