Filled with sunshine everywhere;
May the year bring joy and gladness
And the love of friends who care!" (an underappreciated primary song, although the Christmas version is better)2
President C. moved P-day to today because people would be out yesterday and we could talk to them. The white handbook and President think that weekends and holidays are the best times to find people. I think they're the worst because even if people are home they don't want to talk to us. But this week it means I get to email you when I wouldn't have been able to yesterday.3
It was six months ago today that everyone came over and I was set apart to be a missionary, and tomorrow is six months since I entered the MTC. Wow! It doesn't seem terribly long but my mission is already a fourth of the way over.
I wish I could have been at Fillmore yesterday. I didn't even know they kept going with the Narnia movies.4 There's a lot of movies that have come out that I don't know about. That reminds me--in the Chipmunks movie, I guess there's a scene in an office and on the wall is a poster of a kid on a skateboard with a guitar. That is a member of our ward when he was a kid. He produced the documentary on the Church up here that I sent home. He got money for them using the poster in the movie.
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| Thanks to the internet for helping me find this! |
Our Memorial Day wasn't as fun. We helped a new ward member unload boxes from a moving truck.5 Then we went to the ward Memorial Day picnic. We had three investigators show up, ones who can't usually make it to church, so that was good. We played capture-the-flag (Elder C. brought extra clothes, but I didn't) and I got green pollen all over my black shoes. It looked pretty cool, actually. He played ultimate frisbee while I flew my ladybug kite I bought last week (he bought a dragon). Then we wandered through the local cemetery. I was surprised at the amount of "Together Forever" stones.6
We rounded up a bunch of converts for a lesson tonight to help one of our investigators. I hope that goes well.
Elder C. calls a news service every morning7 and one thing they provide is a horoscope, which can be pretty funny as a missionary. Apparently when we were on exchanges on Wednesday it said not to do things alone, to bring a companion. Yesterday it told us to study ancient texts. One Sunday it told us not to run errands.
If you want some funny scriptures, read Jeremiah 5:8 and 8:17.8 The "bite you" in the latter verse makes me think of something Preston would say.9 I finished getting through Isaiah this week (just a basic overview) and this week I hope to get through Jeremiah. If I were to read one book a week, no matter how short or how long, I should finish the Old Testament in September. However, once I get past Ezekiel, it should go a lot faster.
Again, I can't think of anything else to say but I will once I leave. Transfers are next week and it's a good possibility I'll be shipped off. Hopefully I can email Monday--which will be June! On Saturday we're attending a wedding so that our investigator can get baptized.
Love
Elder Melville
1My dad’s birthday is May 27.
2“Have a Very Happy Birthday!” and “Have a Very Merry Christmas!” from the Children’s Songbook..
3This drove me nuts my entire mission. They always told us Saturdays and holidays were best days for finding people at home. You might think that intuitively, but in my personal experience, that was almost never the case.
4My family told me they had seen the Prince Caspian movie. I still haven’t seen it.
5I think these members had been in the ward previously, and everyone was excited they moved back, because they were a solid addition. But I was transferred, so I don’t know. I think some of the members felt bad making us do service on P-day; but since it wasn’t P-day, we were more than happy to help out. I think missionaries should do more service than they actually do, because tracting certainly isn’t very worthwhile.
6We saw the tombstone of the son of the members we lived with. I wanted to take a picture, but my companion forbade it.
7This was technically against the rules, but he wasn’t very obedient, and this was a relatively harmless service. I sometimes thought it would have been helpful for missionaries to know more about current events than we did, since we weren’t supposed to read or watch news.
8“They were as fed horses in the morning: every one neighed after his neighbour’s wife.” “For, behold, I will send serpents, cockatrices, among you, which will not be charmed, and they shall bite you, saith the Lord.”
9Preston was my three-year-old nephew. When I visited him before I left, he would go around saying “Die!”
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