Yeah, I'm pretty well fully and completely disoriented right now. Quincy Ward is HUGE, on the verge of splitting. As I told Elder Cooper, it's not so much a ward as a full on hospital. It's a good area, but it's currently sort of dead as not much has gone on here for awhile. We have one investigator, who is close to baptism, or so we thought/think/don't have a clue. It's all sorts of confusing. I still feel like I'm just on exchanges, as I've been in Quincy so much in the past. I also know some of the members already, too, from dinner appointments and that. Elder Cooper has also only been here three weeks, too, so he knows very little about the area, and the area book, our main source of information, has not really been updated at all since october or so, so it's all sorts of confusing. But yeah, I'm currently just getting my head on straight. I also rearranged things a little in the apartment. Besides that, Dena's father passed away the same day I was transferred. Dena is handling it like a champ. I'm going to the viewing and that tonight and tomorrow. We're going on exchanges so that way it's legitimate. It's so weird being so close to my last area! But it's nice to have permission from president to go back to Hannibal for when the baptism happens, whenever that is going to be. Our apartment is the upper half of an old house, so it's really cool and big and squeaky and creepy at night. I really have very little to update you on otherwise
"For business reasons I must preserve the outward signs of sanity." -Mark Twain
Love, Elder Charlie Gates
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Here I Come, Area #7
So, this email will be short and sweet. Ok, no real sweet, more of a salty, but everybody needs a little salt here and there.
Snow's come, finally. It's nice, sort of. It makes things fun. I have a good video of me rolling down a hill in the snow, you'd be so proud.
You're probably wondering why so short this week, and it's because Dena, who was scheduled for baptism today, probably won't make it today. We got a call this morning and Dena's dad is dying today. We went out and gave him a blessing and was with her for a bit before all the family came and it didn't seem like our place. I've never sat with a dying man before. Nor given one a blessing. So yeah, we just got back from that. I figure now's a good time to write my BYU stuff and forget about telling you about this week. It was all pretty much spent with Dena, helping her be prepped for today. But so much for that.
I'm being transferred. I don't know where this time. President called and informed me that I was being released as District Leader and explained that it is because the District Leader in the district where I am going has only been district leader one transfer and president wants to give him another transfer at least. But I was promised to be put back in at some point, because I did an exemplary job. Not like I care too much, position REALLY doesn't matter to me anymore after seeing the absolute worst of it. So I cheered after that phone call, but when the assistants called with my plans, I was thoroughly confused.
"Well, Elder Gates," Elder Whiting said after the obligatory greeting session one must always go through on phone calls, "On Thursday [transfer day] just leave your stuff in Hannibal and come to the transfer meeting. You're not going far enough away to need to do that."
"Wait, what?"
He then proceeded to answer my "what" as if I hadn't heard him. I had, clearly, but the "what" was more of a "What the heck are you talking about??" than a "WHAT? Sorry my hearing aid's going out."
After he was done with that pointless repetition, I asked, "Am I going to Quincy?" Quincy is the closest area, only half an hour away. Beyond that, it's over an hour to any place in one direction. He answered with some useless beat-around-the-bush, you-know-I-can't-tell-you response. "Shouldn't I at least take my stuff up to Quincy so the member taking me to my new area doesn't have to drive as far?"
Elder Whiting paused. "Is Quincy closer to Iowa City [the place where we all meet for a meeting before being shipped out to our new area by members]?" I responded in the affirmative, which caused another pause. "Um...one second." I heard him turn to the other assistant and say, "Can we just tell him where he's going?" After that I heard nothing but sounds of talking in the background. Now was the time for my "WHAT? Sorry my hearing aid's going out." style of "what," but I didn't bother. After a minute, Elder Whiting got back on and said, "Here's the new plan for you, Elder Gates," as if I had forgotten who I was. "Go up to Quincy on Thursday with your stuff, and stay there."
"Don't go up to the transfer meeting?"
"Don't go up to the transfer meeting." Repetition, again.
So I figure I'm going to Quincy. None of us have heard of being transfered inside of a district, but we guess it's possible. We'll see.
I know by now that wherever I'm going is where I need to go. With as many transfers as I've gone through, I know that. It's sad to go, but it's probably time.
Well, that's the gist of it. I should get one and write my other stuff.
--
"For business reasons I must preserve the outward signs of sanity." -Mark Twain
Love, Elder Charlie Gates
PS The Hannibal public library has these banners with different famous writers' names on them, and Shakespeare is spelled Shakspere. Baha
Snow's come, finally. It's nice, sort of. It makes things fun. I have a good video of me rolling down a hill in the snow, you'd be so proud.
You're probably wondering why so short this week, and it's because Dena, who was scheduled for baptism today, probably won't make it today. We got a call this morning and Dena's dad is dying today. We went out and gave him a blessing and was with her for a bit before all the family came and it didn't seem like our place. I've never sat with a dying man before. Nor given one a blessing. So yeah, we just got back from that. I figure now's a good time to write my BYU stuff and forget about telling you about this week. It was all pretty much spent with Dena, helping her be prepped for today. But so much for that.
I'm being transferred. I don't know where this time. President called and informed me that I was being released as District Leader and explained that it is because the District Leader in the district where I am going has only been district leader one transfer and president wants to give him another transfer at least. But I was promised to be put back in at some point, because I did an exemplary job. Not like I care too much, position REALLY doesn't matter to me anymore after seeing the absolute worst of it. So I cheered after that phone call, but when the assistants called with my plans, I was thoroughly confused.
"Well, Elder Gates," Elder Whiting said after the obligatory greeting session one must always go through on phone calls, "On Thursday [transfer day] just leave your stuff in Hannibal and come to the transfer meeting. You're not going far enough away to need to do that."
"Wait, what?"
He then proceeded to answer my "what" as if I hadn't heard him. I had, clearly, but the "what" was more of a "What the heck are you talking about??" than a "WHAT? Sorry my hearing aid's going out."
After he was done with that pointless repetition, I asked, "Am I going to Quincy?" Quincy is the closest area, only half an hour away. Beyond that, it's over an hour to any place in one direction. He answered with some useless beat-around-the-bush, you-know-I-can't-tell-you response. "Shouldn't I at least take my stuff up to Quincy so the member taking me to my new area doesn't have to drive as far?"
Elder Whiting paused. "Is Quincy closer to Iowa City [the place where we all meet for a meeting before being shipped out to our new area by members]?" I responded in the affirmative, which caused another pause. "Um...one second." I heard him turn to the other assistant and say, "Can we just tell him where he's going?" After that I heard nothing but sounds of talking in the background. Now was the time for my "WHAT? Sorry my hearing aid's going out." style of "what," but I didn't bother. After a minute, Elder Whiting got back on and said, "Here's the new plan for you, Elder Gates," as if I had forgotten who I was. "Go up to Quincy on Thursday with your stuff, and stay there."
"Don't go up to the transfer meeting?"
"Don't go up to the transfer meeting." Repetition, again.
So I figure I'm going to Quincy. None of us have heard of being transfered inside of a district, but we guess it's possible. We'll see.
I know by now that wherever I'm going is where I need to go. With as many transfers as I've gone through, I know that. It's sad to go, but it's probably time.
Well, that's the gist of it. I should get one and write my other stuff.
--
"For business reasons I must preserve the outward signs of sanity." -Mark Twain
Love, Elder Charlie Gates
PS The Hannibal public library has these banners with different famous writers' names on them, and Shakespeare is spelled Shakspere. Baha
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
21 Years of God Saying: "Here Charlie, I Have Some Leftover Craziness, Have At It."
I know my subject is doctrinally incorrect, but oh well.
I loved my birthday package! I have to say it was kind of odd finding so many dog references in there, and the hilarious toys, but whatever, I loved it!
So the baptism still has not gone through, she still has not quit smoking. Casey has moved down to Texas now to start a new job, and hopefully Dena and the kids will be following behind in the next month as he gets the money for it. We're happy he's found a job to support his family. So now we'll need to make sure that we have men with us at all the lessons. But our game plan now is to wait on setting a date till she is quit altogether. It's sad to think I might not be here to baptize her, but I'm trying my best to stay. I know that where I go and who I'm with is where the Lord wants me to go and who the Lord wants me to be with, so I'm down with whatever happens. But I would like to stay. We'll find out Saturday what the turnout is for sure.
So for my birthday I used the money mom sent out for it and took the district out to lunch and got myself a cheesecake. I have to sign out so I'll talk to you next week! Hope you like my new signature, I think it fits me.
--
"For business reasons I must preserve the outward signs of sanity." -Mark Twain
Love, Elder Charlie Gates
I loved my birthday package! I have to say it was kind of odd finding so many dog references in there, and the hilarious toys, but whatever, I loved it!
So the baptism still has not gone through, she still has not quit smoking. Casey has moved down to Texas now to start a new job, and hopefully Dena and the kids will be following behind in the next month as he gets the money for it. We're happy he's found a job to support his family. So now we'll need to make sure that we have men with us at all the lessons. But our game plan now is to wait on setting a date till she is quit altogether. It's sad to think I might not be here to baptize her, but I'm trying my best to stay. I know that where I go and who I'm with is where the Lord wants me to go and who the Lord wants me to be with, so I'm down with whatever happens. But I would like to stay. We'll find out Saturday what the turnout is for sure.
So for my birthday I used the money mom sent out for it and took the district out to lunch and got myself a cheesecake. I have to sign out so I'll talk to you next week! Hope you like my new signature, I think it fits me.
--
"For business reasons I must preserve the outward signs of sanity." -Mark Twain
Love, Elder Charlie Gates
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
2011: The Prequel to 2012
Hello everybody! It's me, Elder Gates. I'm still here and ok and all that. Anybody who would care to explain why I felt like starting my email that way, please mail your explanations to me. Speaking of mail, sorry for all of you that have sent stuff and I still have not responded. It's been crazy here and hard to get caught up on much of anything. The trio ended on Tuesday, with us driving to Iowa City for Elder Wilson's new comp, Elder Cooper, which took all day. Then I got violently sick that night. Since we believe that extremely violent entertainment is not appropriate, I do not see why I could not have simply explained this to the virus and have it leave me alone. And I can't even sue the FCC for it or nothing. What a dispicable time we live in. Some may argue that the flu is not entertainment, but if SAW can be listed as such, why can't my virus? While I've never watched Saw, I'm sure it would have the same results. I apparently even puked so hard into the toilet that the toilet not only fought back by splashing in my face, my eye decided to burst a blood vessel. How my eye was even connected to this fight between me and the toilet is beyond me, but I still argue it was an odd way for my eye to try to get its point across. Even now, a week later, my eye still is bloody looking. My branch president, who's a doctor, explained the plethora of colors it will change over time. I turned to one of the Quincy elders and told him how straight that sounded. My Branch President laughed and told me that as long as I didn't go marching in any parades with my rainbow eye I'd be fine. I told him that I came out here to escape those parades in the first place. Anyway, speaking of Quincy ElderS, we lost Elder Wilson on Tuesday last week to a sad but not entirely unexpected case of New Comp Syndrome. The saddest part of the whole endeavor was needing to rush him to Iowa City to acquire this New Comp Syndrome. Luckily, he got a pretty good case of it, or so it seems, so that's a relief. When Christmas Eve came, we were finally able to step out into the light for District Meeting and a WEDDING!!! The wedding was great and simple and short and perfect. There was barely anybody there which is cool. I wore the pink tie I would have worn to Cari's wedding. But they're MARRIED! I was sick for all of the dress shopping and all of that jazz so I missed out on that...darn.... Christmas Day was great with breakfast with our Branch Mission Leader's family. It was so much fun to sit around a tree with a family and open presents. It felt like home. Just without the orange rolls. We then called home, and it was great being able to see my parents on Skype. It was also good to see that mom still hangs my photos on the wall across from the computer desk. But it was weird, yet necessary, to talk to them about going home plans. And while it would be fun to have a Gates Christmas Vacation in Hawaii next year if I'm there, we'll see if i even choose that for school. Not sure yet. I'm with yall, I'll probably end up at Provo. Then it was time for lunch at an investigator's and then dinner at the Branch Mission Leader's house again. We also went and said hi to Dena's dad that night. The baptism for Dena should be on for saturday, but we haven't been able to get ahold of them for a few days, which is kind of scaring us a tad. She'll be baptized, I know, but I don't know when. All in all, though, we're just happy to be free to do work again, with no more drama nor meetings nor sickness.
--
"As for myself, I am an optimist. It doesn't seem very much use being anything else." -Winston Churchill
Elder Charlie Gates
--
"As for myself, I am an optimist. It doesn't seem very much use being anything else." -Winston Churchill
Elder Charlie Gates
Monday, December 20, 2010
Holy Night, Batman! Santa Brought Me Another Comp!
So, yeah, favorite quote of the week. An investigator was shooting his daughter with a nerf gun while we were visiting. As we left, she said "Hurry, shoot the Mormons before they leave!" Apparently not much has changed in the last two hundred years here in Missourah.So, here's the dillio, yo. One of the people in the companionship in Quincy needed to take off due to health reasons.So, currently, we are in a trio with Elder Wilson. We cover both Quincy and Hannibal, have two apartments, two cars, and two phones. We'll find out today at some point whether or not this is permanent. We, personally, hope it will be, for a few reasons. One, it's nearly Christmas, and it's a terrible time for a missionary to be pulled out just before he can do all of the Christmas plans he has been looking forward to. Two, the missionary who left will, in my opinion, need to be in a trio to make dealing with his health problems easier. Three, we're selfish like that and want to stick together. The three of us get along great and it's hilarious. While this will be the most insane planning I would have ever had to do in my life, I know we can do it and keep ourselves on track with everything.
Dena is still on for baptism. She wants me to baptize her, and is excited for it! We're still helping to make sure she is done with cigarettes for good. They're now on for getting married on christmas eve, which will be interesting getting arranged but we'll do it. All three of us missionaries, if it is three, will wear pink ties for it (mine from Cari's wedding). We also started teaching the children of our other major investigators. Well, actually, we started, and then our investigator took over, which is what we wanted anyway. That's pretty much all we really had in the way of missionary work, due to all the switching up and zone conference.
Zone conference was really good, but getting there was tricky. In the thirty minute drive just to Quincy, we saw three different accidents due to the freezing rain. Elder England was fine enough on the roads, he just went really slow. When we got out to help a person out of a ditch, we had to skate across a sheet of ice, commonly referred to as the road. It took us over an hour to reach Quincy, and then we had the joy of driving all the way up to Mount Pleasant that night going really slow, and then off to Iowa City the next morning. Conference was really good, including a talent show (our zone did the twelve days of christmas, changing up the words. Elder England and I decided that "on the sixth day of christmas our mission gave to us 6 more weeks with him....") and a cookie decorating contest. I, of course, lost that one. I thought I ingeniously turned a bell-shaped cookie into an angel.
But that's about it. MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYBODY!!! Remember who it is all about!
--
"As for myself, I am an optimist. It doesn't seem very much use being anything else." -Winston Churchill
Elder Charlie Gates
Dena is still on for baptism. She wants me to baptize her, and is excited for it! We're still helping to make sure she is done with cigarettes for good. They're now on for getting married on christmas eve, which will be interesting getting arranged but we'll do it. All three of us missionaries, if it is three, will wear pink ties for it (mine from Cari's wedding). We also started teaching the children of our other major investigators. Well, actually, we started, and then our investigator took over, which is what we wanted anyway. That's pretty much all we really had in the way of missionary work, due to all the switching up and zone conference.
Zone conference was really good, but getting there was tricky. In the thirty minute drive just to Quincy, we saw three different accidents due to the freezing rain. Elder England was fine enough on the roads, he just went really slow. When we got out to help a person out of a ditch, we had to skate across a sheet of ice, commonly referred to as the road. It took us over an hour to reach Quincy, and then we had the joy of driving all the way up to Mount Pleasant that night going really slow, and then off to Iowa City the next morning. Conference was really good, including a talent show (our zone did the twelve days of christmas, changing up the words. Elder England and I decided that "on the sixth day of christmas our mission gave to us 6 more weeks with him....") and a cookie decorating contest. I, of course, lost that one. I thought I ingeniously turned a bell-shaped cookie into an angel.
But that's about it. MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYBODY!!! Remember who it is all about!
--
"As for myself, I am an optimist. It doesn't seem very much use being anything else." -Winston Churchill
Elder Charlie Gates
Monday, December 6, 2010
16 MONTHS?? I LOST COUNT AND THOUGHT IT WAS 15!! Dang it....
Still no snow. Drat. Keep waiting for those Christmas cards, everyone, because they're not happening till there's snow.
Christmas goodies! I want wagonwheels, some divinity (not too much, I love them and all, but too much sugar and me is no bueno), frosted cookies, and whatever other amazing cookies we make that I can't think of. No bakes, while not particularly christmasy, are a must. As for SKYPE, I'll have to check to make certain. We're having breakfast and dinner (not the lunch dinner, but the supper dinner) with our branch mission leader and his family on Christmas, which is great because we love our branch mission leader and his wife reminds me of mom. I'll need to ask them about SKYPE, which will be tomorrow. I'm happy to know it will probably work on your end so I'll make sure it's good on this one. I hope it works!!
Dena and Casey are doing GREAT!! Casey even bore his testimony on Sunday and was participating class more than most of the actives and having awesome comments. I'm so proud of them!! Dena, as I put it in coordination, is, come hell or high water, getting married on the 26th. I'm still uncertain whether that was an appropriate use of the word hell, but it came out and I regret nothing. Either way, she's determined to get married and thus baptized on New Years Day. They're incredible, and are just bound to get more incredible. She wants to go dress shopping and wants some opinions, and since she's dropped a lot of her former friends due to their bad influence, she wants us to be there. Yep. Me. Dress shopping.... We also had to help her understand some things that apparently has been glossed over in the past. It's awkward coming in after somebody has been taught, supposedly, all the lessons at least once, and not knowing all they might have covered or not due to bad records. She accepts most things so well and easily, she's great.
I don't know if I remembered to mention it last week but Dena's dad is in the hospital, and she has had us come and visit him a few times now. And while she wasn't sure how much he'd like us, he, in fact, loves us and enjoys our visits of us sitting there quietly and being sarcastic. He actually corrected his girlfriend when she referred to us as Dena's friends and let her know we were friends of the family. Which, if the rest of the family agrees with him, opens up doors to about a quarter (hyperbole, but a lot) of Hannibal and the surrounding areas. Which is AMAZING.
Well, that's about it. Sorry for no hilarious stories, we've mostly just been working with Dena and Casey and trying to visit less-actives and our few other investigators this week. Christmas is coming! If you want to celebrate christmas right, invite the missionaries over. If somebody has offered them dinner already, that still leaves lunch and breakfast open!!
--
"As for myself, I am an optimist. It doesn't seem very much use being anything else." -Winston Churchill
Elder Charlie Gates
Christmas goodies! I want wagonwheels, some divinity (not too much, I love them and all, but too much sugar and me is no bueno), frosted cookies, and whatever other amazing cookies we make that I can't think of. No bakes, while not particularly christmasy, are a must. As for SKYPE, I'll have to check to make certain. We're having breakfast and dinner (not the lunch dinner, but the supper dinner) with our branch mission leader and his family on Christmas, which is great because we love our branch mission leader and his wife reminds me of mom. I'll need to ask them about SKYPE, which will be tomorrow. I'm happy to know it will probably work on your end so I'll make sure it's good on this one. I hope it works!!
Dena and Casey are doing GREAT!! Casey even bore his testimony on Sunday and was participating class more than most of the actives and having awesome comments. I'm so proud of them!! Dena, as I put it in coordination, is, come hell or high water, getting married on the 26th. I'm still uncertain whether that was an appropriate use of the word hell, but it came out and I regret nothing. Either way, she's determined to get married and thus baptized on New Years Day. They're incredible, and are just bound to get more incredible. She wants to go dress shopping and wants some opinions, and since she's dropped a lot of her former friends due to their bad influence, she wants us to be there. Yep. Me. Dress shopping.... We also had to help her understand some things that apparently has been glossed over in the past. It's awkward coming in after somebody has been taught, supposedly, all the lessons at least once, and not knowing all they might have covered or not due to bad records. She accepts most things so well and easily, she's great.
I don't know if I remembered to mention it last week but Dena's dad is in the hospital, and she has had us come and visit him a few times now. And while she wasn't sure how much he'd like us, he, in fact, loves us and enjoys our visits of us sitting there quietly and being sarcastic. He actually corrected his girlfriend when she referred to us as Dena's friends and let her know we were friends of the family. Which, if the rest of the family agrees with him, opens up doors to about a quarter (hyperbole, but a lot) of Hannibal and the surrounding areas. Which is AMAZING.
Well, that's about it. Sorry for no hilarious stories, we've mostly just been working with Dena and Casey and trying to visit less-actives and our few other investigators this week. Christmas is coming! If you want to celebrate christmas right, invite the missionaries over. If somebody has offered them dinner already, that still leaves lunch and breakfast open!!
--
"As for myself, I am an optimist. It doesn't seem very much use being anything else." -Winston Churchill
Elder Charlie Gates
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
The Levels of ADD: ADD, ADHD, ADBlu-Ray, AD3D and- SQUIRREL!
This was a realization from one of my AD3D conversations with Elder England this week.
I couldn't help but laugh at Mom's subject line for this week's email, hoping I'm still "All Right." I was just joking about that with my last subject title because I got my left foot ran over, so I was literally "All Right." So no, I'm not still all right in that sense! My foot's fully healed, and i know it's a blessing. But in the other sense, I'm even better.
Mom seemed to really want to hear about my investigators, which works out since that's what I want to talk about anyway. WE SET A BAPTISMAL DATE! All yall in other areas probably would get excited about this, too, but it's especially exciting for me. I hadn't had an investigator at church for the entire time I was in Mason City, and all of the baptismal dates I set there fell through pretty quickly with less-dedicated investigators. And when I came here we ended up with investigators with all sorts of things to overcome first, like custody battles and marriage and smoking and blah blah blah SO when Dena, one of our investigators, decided that she wanted to get married to her live-in boyfriend, Casey, a member, Christmas weekend so her mother would be around for it, we jumped on the chance! And for as solid as she was before, she's WAY solid now! I LOVE what baptismal dates do for people who really, really are willing! She is now trying to talk to us about planning a wedding and making sure she has a modest dress and all the stuff we'd tell her to do anyway! I do NOT know ANYTHING about planning weddings, though. Helping someone find a dress and all sorts of junk is WAY beyond me. While many missionaries have had to marry people on their missions, I've never had to do it before, so this is exciting but sort of scary, too. But Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown, I'm getting to see my investigator married and...Happy Birthday! A Baptism two days before the anniversary of the day I entered the world. So, yeah, be excited. This should ring a bell with my previous emails and my belief it's a principle of the gospel that bad things and good things tend to go near each other. It took a long time of sickness and pain but now the Lord's sending blessings. Ok, I shouldn't get so excited, in case it falls through, but I have faith it won't and I'm praying hard for them!
Oh! Whoops! I completely forgot to mention this part, but you can probably guess already: transfers are this week, but neither of us are going anywhere. Thank goodness.
Oh, Thanksgiving! Well, this week was pretty lame in most ways of missionary work, but some cool things happened. We had both a Lunch and Dinner appointment on thanksgiving. I hate stuffing myself like a turkey but it was all just so good. Lunch was at the house of a couple of our investigators, where we also got to meet his parents, and the dinner was at a member's home.
Anyway, I gotta go! One last thing: I may be able to SKYPE home for christmas! I don't know how feasable this will be for you or even for us to get a member that can do it but i'm gonna try. Just so ya know!
"As for myself, I am an optimist. It doesn't seem very much use being anything else." -Winston Churchill
Elder Charlie Gates
I couldn't help but laugh at Mom's subject line for this week's email, hoping I'm still "All Right." I was just joking about that with my last subject title because I got my left foot ran over, so I was literally "All Right." So no, I'm not still all right in that sense! My foot's fully healed, and i know it's a blessing. But in the other sense, I'm even better.
Mom seemed to really want to hear about my investigators, which works out since that's what I want to talk about anyway. WE SET A BAPTISMAL DATE! All yall in other areas probably would get excited about this, too, but it's especially exciting for me. I hadn't had an investigator at church for the entire time I was in Mason City, and all of the baptismal dates I set there fell through pretty quickly with less-dedicated investigators. And when I came here we ended up with investigators with all sorts of things to overcome first, like custody battles and marriage and smoking and blah blah blah SO when Dena, one of our investigators, decided that she wanted to get married to her live-in boyfriend, Casey, a member, Christmas weekend so her mother would be around for it, we jumped on the chance! And for as solid as she was before, she's WAY solid now! I LOVE what baptismal dates do for people who really, really are willing! She is now trying to talk to us about planning a wedding and making sure she has a modest dress and all the stuff we'd tell her to do anyway! I do NOT know ANYTHING about planning weddings, though. Helping someone find a dress and all sorts of junk is WAY beyond me. While many missionaries have had to marry people on their missions, I've never had to do it before, so this is exciting but sort of scary, too. But Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown, I'm getting to see my investigator married and...Happy Birthday! A Baptism two days before the anniversary of the day I entered the world. So, yeah, be excited. This should ring a bell with my previous emails and my belief it's a principle of the gospel that bad things and good things tend to go near each other. It took a long time of sickness and pain but now the Lord's sending blessings. Ok, I shouldn't get so excited, in case it falls through, but I have faith it won't and I'm praying hard for them!
Oh! Whoops! I completely forgot to mention this part, but you can probably guess already: transfers are this week, but neither of us are going anywhere. Thank goodness.
Oh, Thanksgiving! Well, this week was pretty lame in most ways of missionary work, but some cool things happened. We had both a Lunch and Dinner appointment on thanksgiving. I hate stuffing myself like a turkey but it was all just so good. Lunch was at the house of a couple of our investigators, where we also got to meet his parents, and the dinner was at a member's home.
Anyway, I gotta go! One last thing: I may be able to SKYPE home for christmas! I don't know how feasable this will be for you or even for us to get a member that can do it but i'm gonna try. Just so ya know!
"As for myself, I am an optimist. It doesn't seem very much use being anything else." -Winston Churchill
Elder Charlie Gates
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