Leaving the Frozen Tundra

Yep, I'm moving. Not really happy about it, I'm not going to lie. It stinks. But it was bound to happen at some point.

As will most likely be a theme with my mission, I get to leave just before a baptism can go through. Marissa, the girl we've been teaching, now has a baptismal date for the 9th. That's way exciting. But I won't be here for it. Figures. Not really sure where I'll end up, but McConnel will be training. That'll be good. He'll be a good trainer. He's been a great companion to have and it's hard to leave after one transfer of us rockin this place.

This past week's been a tough one, work wise. Christmas made it difficult to do much of anything, plus we had a legitimate blizzard, which blew in a lot of snow and blew out any chance of doing much work. When you're on the edge of town with no sidewalk because nobody had plowed it out and no car (either because it was grounded due to weather or because we had left it at a member's home due to the weather) we couldn't really go much of anywhere. Walking on the icy road was suicidal, and wading through waist deep snow through fields was a death sentence. We got out as much as we could but not much could be accomplished. Church was even cancelled. It ended up being twenty inches in a few days.

Our other investigator, being the stubborn man that he is, was committed to be baptized...but said it would only be after he finished the Book of Mormon. Not a date, nor the regular way of going about it, but it's a start. We read through an Isaiah chapter with him and helped him understand it. I learned a ton myself. Half the time I feel like even if the investigators don't learn anything from what I say I sure did.

So monday I'll email you, letting you know where I am! Hopefully it has snow.... Places like Des Moines only got rain. Those turds.

Elder Gates