Hello everyone,
Yep, that's right, we had a tornado just outside of our area (and Grandma was so excited that I was going stateside and not one of those "dangerous" foreign countries). It was actually Thursday night, Elder Shelman's first night in the field. We first got a call from a member letting us know about it, and then our Mission President called, asking how things were. I told him nothing looked bad where we were but that there was a tornado about forty miles away or so and he said that the news reports were saying it may turn south towards Mason City. So we canceled our plans to visit a member family that lives in a trailer park (for some reason "Trailer" and "Ternater" just didn't seem like a good combo) and just drove to a member family's home nearby that had a basement. Living on the third floor of an apartment building with no basement didn't seem too safe. So we stayed there until the news reports said it had moved down from tornado to storm watch.
The next day we bought a new bike for him. The day after that the chain broke about two miles from our house.
And this morning we tried to visit what we thought was a less-active member that wasn't on our roles. Yeah, no, he wasn't a member, but a man who is the son of a member who first ask for a Book of Mormon since he knew it was true and wanted to study it himself, but then continued on to talk about how he's had a spirit inside him and has a rock that Jesus once held and all sorts of stuff.... He talked, loudly, nonstop, for about 45 minutes and then tried to set up a time for us to come back. I hesitated, thinking "Look, guy, you seemed solid for the first five minutes but now I'm pretty sure you've fried your brain on too many drugs or else you have Bi-Polar/Schizophrenia or maybe you really were possessed by a spirit and it sure wasn't a good one by the story you just told or something and I'm pretty sure we could get nowhere with you," but instead all I said was "Uhhhhh...." I think what I said was more tactful than what I thought. He figured out that we'd either stop by at the foreordained time or else we wouldn't. I severely doubt we will. My poor companion, that's his second time in a "lesson" (I can't count it as a lesson, because there were no prayers and we said very little more than uh-huh and nope) with a nonmember in Iowa.
More about my trainee, his name's Elder Marcus Shelman from Pingree(?) Idaho, somewhere near Blackfoot. Thank goodness he's not from Utah. Tall kid, blonde, he's kinda like Tyler Mallory in the way he acts. Best way to describe him as far as I can tell. Great kid, he'll be a good missionary to train. I was pretty stressed out at first, and still kind of am, because I want his training process to go well and for me to set a good example, but there have been so many things going wrong outside of my control it's crazy. But at least they're outside of my control, so I can't beat myself up too much about the work not going well here. I was late to the training meeting though and so I missed out on some of the training for the trainers. So I was a tad more confused than most, I think. But things are going well. Not much else to update on, I don't think.
"But nevertheless, deep water is what I am wont to swim in." D&C 127:2
Elder Charlie Gates
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