At the beginning of the week, I went on exchanges in the J1
with Elder Crook. At night, I was talking to a guy that plays the saxophone on
the corner of 25th street. I started to talking to him, and he was in the used
car business and knows Jay Brasher and Jeff Brasher for years...his name is Dane...he
has really long hair and plays the saxophone a lot.
So after that later on in the week, I went on some other
exchanges with Elder Kelley in Weber Heights. Normally we just go on exchanges
with district leaders, but they requested to go with us so that was ok, and it
was good for them, too. We taught one lesson that night to a lady that wanted
to postpone her baptism, and we couldn’t really figure out why. After a little
bit, we figured out it’s because she wants to buy this white dress, and she
can't afford it for a few more months. So we talked to her about what baptism
is and what's important and a bunch of other stuff, and so now she is getting
baptized on July 6. They didn't tell her this, but she lives in a wealthy ward,
and they are going to try to get them to donate her the dress as a surprise for
her baptism. The next morning Elder Kelley and I went running. I had woken up
that morning with a sore throat; so that was a horrible idea. It ended up
making me sick for the last three or four days with a fever/other flu symptoms
so I guess it's my own fault.
I have always heard part of being sick is mental and if you
can just tell yourself you're not sick than you won't be...yeah, it turns out
that is FALSE. I tried to smile a little more and walk a little faster when I
was sick, and I think I just made it worse for myself. Sunday I was pretty much
out of commission all day. We went to our early morning meeting, and I was
about ready to pass out so I went home and stayed with Elder Torres who was
also sick. We slept until our meeting at four o’clock. Even though I was sick,
that meeting was awesome. Those videos always make me feel like I need to
repent for not having been a good enough missionary before the mission. It
always makes us happy to see though. It'll be cool to have all the iPads in use
by next year.
We also had mission conference this last week. I almost
forgot, it's hard to keep track of what week I am in. So the first part of the
day, we had some training by President. He threw down about the "casual
sense of disobedience" in the mission and announced we can now drive on p-day;
we just need to be smart about it. He talked a lot about how we need to use p-day
as a preparation day and not a play day like Mom would always say to me. We
have been trying to get our zone to do that for weeks, so that was pretty great
(actually doing p-day studies, wearing pros. clothes, still acting like
missionaries, staying with companions). So it's always good to have President
back-up what we have been saying especially when he doesn't normally come out
and remind us about those things.
Then we went as zones to do service. Our zone went to a
retirement home. We sang songs to a bunch of the people staying there. We had
Elder MacPherson, too, so he went crazy on the piano which is awesome. He is
the best piano player I have ever met in my life. Then we went back, and they
split us into groups outside and had us play some games. I guess that's where
we are supposed to be bonding or something. I don't know. I would just rather
get trained more..all the games just made me realize there are two things I
hate in this world 1-elders that flirt 2-sisters that flirt...that's all I have
to say about that. (Forest Gump reference anyone?)
So then we had the awesome part where we came back inside
and Elder Callister came and talked about the fall and the atonement. He went
into a lot of detail and explained it to us so we understand and can therefore
teach it better. It was really helpful. Unfortunately, most people's reaction
was to go out and buy both his books and start reading them, but hey what do
you do? A lot of missionaries still need some help on the whole "mission
library" thing. We pick our battles, like I said right now, we are working
on more obedient p-days.
So we found a few new people this week which is crazy. That
hasn't happened in a while. We are still going along with Liz and Vanessa.
Well, mainly Vanessa. Liz has been avoiding and lying to us and when we do
confront her she is mostly honest and she just knows she doesn't want to
change. She is still with that boyfriend and still goes dancing and has been
drinking coffee at work even though we got her to take it out of the house. She
promised to go to church then didn't show up. So we talked to Vanessa yesterday,
and she knows she just needs to set the example for her mom and do what she
thinks is the best. It worries me to do that, but I just pray that Liz will
follow closely behind. It's tough to be patient with her when she acts so
careless, no matter how brutally honest we are with her about what it was
already done to her family. Her son is probably already going to go back to
jail, and she still can't get it. She crashed her van last week and got it
taken, because she doesn’t have insurance. Now they don't have a ride to
church, oh boy. I guess this will help us to get more fellowshipping involved.
Recently I have wanted to give-up motivating the members and
just do everything on my own because that is easier and more effective short
term, but the meeting on Sunday kind of reminded me that I need to keep working
with them and worry about their long term benefit, just learning more and more
patience. Today we were going to go golfing, Elder Plowman golfs, not me, but I
am still sick so he is being a good companion. We are staying home so I can
rest. I feel bad not letting him go, but he is stuck with me. I'm lucky to have
an awesome companion.
So the Weaver’s showed up at my house this morning with some
cinnamon rolls! It was good to see them again. They said Dad did an
awesome job in Antelope! Brother Weaver said, "He even changed my way of
thinking on a few things…great instruction." We have no idea how he
got into the building to knock on our door without a radio card. There is a key
pad and Aaron said he just pushed a bunch of buttons until he heard a beep and
the door opened. Pretty crazy.
Well I think that's all for now!
Love you all tons, take care
Elder Bassett
PS Can I ask a big favor? Only if you can find one…some type
of Spanish urban dictionary. It would be so useful, and I figured they have everything
online…just if you see something on amazon or something. I have seen them
before from missionaries in the MTC. It’s like a dictionary with a less common
word, and it tells you what it means in different countries and gives a
connotative and denotative definition of the word…just if you see something; it
would be pretty cool/useful to have.
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