March 14, 2016

Hey Mom!

This week:

Teaching in the rain, approach of solutions, of intelligent conversations and practical realizations, custom guitars, stake conference, and other shenanigans!

Hmm. Well, glad to hear that you didn't burn the field or the cabin down. It's bad enough whenever a wildfire starts, but I can't imagine living it down if it were known that it was we who did it. Still, glad to hear that Dad saved the day! Be careful of Murphy, his law is the definition of dastardly. 

Fortunately, Washington hasn't caught on fire like it did last Summer. If you recall, I was serving in Henderson when it happened, but Beatty told me that the smoke was bricks thick when it was happening. Thankfully, the rain and the snow that's happened so far has definitely helped.

Speaking of rain, it down-poured, thrice this week. And consequently, some sections of the road were covered with worm jerky. Or...at least they were jerky when we got walking in the day. Anyway, during one of these downpours at night we got a text message from a former investigator informing us that her grandfather just died. Came to find out later that we had been to her grand-dad's home to teach her uncle, who had been helping him. Anyway, she was really sad about the tragedy, so we met with her the next night at her grand dad's placed with a member. Since there seems to be a lot of tension between her and uncle, we more or less helped her move some stuff from downstairs to a car out back. After that we shared a comforting message about life after death with her while the rain (which hadn't stopped from the previous night) completely drenched us. I had taken the water-proof layer to my coat earlier, but my Newsie hat got soaked. Still, it felt really good to help her out. 

On a more positive note, we were sitting in our car Thursday after a good 45 mins of fruitless tracting. We decided that there was something more productive to do. Gave it some thought, and we figured we could try by this one gal who was a solid potential who we never had much luck meeting before. We prayed to know if it was the right thing to do, and I felt immediately good about it. Drove out there, and what do you know? We get to meet with her! And schedule an appointment to come back as well. Her name is Emily, and she seemed very happy to meet with us. 

We also had dinner with an older couple in the ward named the Nielsons. When I first met them, I had a hard time connecting with them. But when we were in their home, I noticed a series of Issac Asimov books on their book case. I got talking to Bro. Nielson about Foundation, one of the books I read Senior Year. After discussing Asimov novels a little bit, and a little of Dune as well, I decided to try and sound intelligent and gave him my thesis that it Foundation was all about the effects of post-war cultural assimilation. He responded "Well, that's one way to look at it. More or less it was about what we do with technology and how we use it too." That one hit me like a brick wall. I remember very distinctly failing an essay from Ms. Lewis about Foundation's lesson, and it was at that moment I realized why. The most generic lesson in Sci-fi literature, and I over thought it so much that it landed me a 23/45ish or something like that.

Yeah, I never told you guys I failed that one. Surprise!

We also had dinner with a wonderful older couple named the Soritos. Sis. Sorito reminded me so much of you, Mom. She even had a son named Michael coming home from his mission in 9 weeks! She also loved horses too.

Also ran into a super cool guy named David who showed us back to his work shop. Guy makes custom guitars for hobby! The people we meet out here right?

Stake conference also occurred, and there were a lot of talks on family preparation, family history and temple work, and also strengthening the youth as well. Speaking of youth, I sat for the very first time in my life the other day at the "adult" dinner table. I'm not going to lie, I really miss the youth table. 

Anyway, thanks for the email!  I'll probably celebrate my 19th birthday by going for a bowl of won-ton soup at the local oriental restaurant, Mommy Yum-Yum's. It's actually pretty good! I love it here in Ephrata, but it will still take some time to get over the love I had for Yakima, but time rolls onward and the Gospel goes forward. And therefore we strive to become more divine each day of our lives!

Love you dear Mother!

 Elder Michael Camit