Dear Family,
I forgot to say in my last email, but Happy Anniversary to Mom and Dad! It's great to see so many years of happy marriage and to have such a great example for parents. As I've been here I have come to see many of the different circumstances that people come from. It has made me just that much more grateful for my parents and the chance I had to be raised in the Gospel.
Thanks for the package sent from Christian's house. The tie and the pillowcase are both really cool. The food is all really good, so I'm grateful for that. I managed to steal a whole lot of candy from the "Old Testament Table." (It's the ironing board where the departing missionaries leave or "sacrifice" anything that they don't want to take to the mission field. It's all up for grabs.) So, I basically have half my desk covered in Starburtsts, Jolly Ranchers, cookies and PopTarts and the like. I've been making an effort to pass it around to the other Elders in order to spare my health and also to just get rid of it all. I'm pretty sure that with just an hour a day back at the residence, there's no way I'm getting through those treats all by myself!
We're getting another new district on Wednesday, many of whom are going to the Spokane, Washington Mission! I'll only be their Zone Leader for about four days before I leave, but hopefully I'll make enough of a good impression that they'll remember me and say "Hi" to Rose-Ellen for me if they ever run into her. I should get released as ZL on Sunday and then be off on Monday. Oh, and also, just as a heads up for when I'll be calling: We leave for the airport at 5:30 -6:00 a.m. or so, and or flight is at 8:25 a.m. so I'll only have something less than an hour to call. It will probably be between 7:00 a.m. and 8:00 a.m. Provo time, Monday, September 6th. I can buy my own calling card thing, but that's around when I should be calling.
There's just one last story I'd like to tell from this week. On Thursday we went to the Referral Center (RC) here at the MTC. It's basically just a big calling center where you call people who have ordered things like Books of Mormon or Bibles from the Church. You make sure they got it and then see if they want to meet with the missionaries. I was a ward missionary in my BYU ward and we went there fairly often. When I found out we would be doing calls, I wasn't as nervous as a lot of the missionaries were. However, that all changed when he said that we would be doing the calls in Spanish! Upon arriving we found out that we could still make some of the calls in English, but we were challenged to do at least two Spanish calls. We were there for about an hour and a half and I got mostly answering machines, but a few people did pick up. The first was Janine. When I called her I was actually looking for her sister, but apparently she wasn't home so I just talked with Janine, instead. She was on her way out the door to work, so I didn't get to talk for too long, but I bore my testimony, offered her a Book of Mormon, and asked if she would like to meet with the missionaries. She said YES! I hope the missionaries who contact her will bring her to her Savior, Jesus Christ. It was a really neat experience just to find someone willing to hear the Gospel. I was so excited after that (it was in English) that I got up my confidence to start the Spanish calls. However, the Lord must have seen fit to humble me after that experience because the first Spanish speaker that picked up immediately began to chew me out. She was yelling and speaking so fast in Spanish that I was dumbstruck and couldn't think of anything to say or even understand what she was saying She had just been straight yelling at me for about 30 seconds when I picked up, "No me llamada mas!" or "Don't call me anymore!" and then she hung up. Needless to say, I was humbled, but I took it with a good attitude and just started laughing because I realized I had been chewed out for the first time in Spanish. This was one of my big fears for the field, but now that it's happened, I'm not afraid of it anymore. So overall, it was a great experience at the RC and I learned quite a lot that day.
Anyways, it's been a really good week here and the time has flown by. I feel like I walked in here yesterday. It is really true when they say, "The days feel like weeks and the weeks feel like days." I hope things are going well at home and that everyone is doing OK. My next letter home will probably be from the field so wish me luck! The Gospel is true and the Church is the true Church of Jesus Christ. I love you all. Have a good week!
Elder Wood
