Dear Mom and ________,
Well, it's been another week! It
seemed like it went by especially fast this time because we had a Zone
Conference and we saw our mission president and his sweet wife, and then we
went to the temple on Saturday with someone my companion had taught
in a previous area who was baptized. It was really cool to see that someone was
taking that next step and continuing to progress, because many people get stuck
between baptism and going to the temple. We drove down there with one of the
members of our ward, and she is the sweetest thing! Zone Conference was really
enlightening too and I am so grateful for the leadership of a wonderful mission
president who truly was called by God to be here.
Other than that, Willits is still
Willits and life goes on. We are teaching the most wonderful family and I
always feel much better about life after visiting with them and talking about
the Gospel in their home. They are a young couple with two young children (who
I have already adopted as my honorary nephews, I think I'm up to about 20+
neices/nephews by this point), and it is so wonderful to see them embrace the
Gospel and truly desire to have it in their homes. Working in this ward can
sometimes be very challenging because there are about 500 members on the
record, but only about 30-40 who are actually active, and even many of those
are only active on the outside because their hearts aren't really in it. Even
though that is a serious struggle, I am grateful for our little family we are
teaching and to see the difference that it makes in their lives and to see how
much they love it and actually want it.
"Cultural" sidenote of the
week: I was just informed last week that I am living in the region known as the
"Emerald Triangle," known for having the best and strongest marijuana
in the United States. It is literally everywhere, and so are its horrendous
effects. My companion and I went to visit a church member (one of the 500 who
nobody knows about) and his house had a huge, wooden fence all around it so you
couldn't see into the yard. It had a latch though, so we just lifted it up and
went in. The pathway to the house was bordered on one side by a wire fence, and
the other side had these gigantic bushes that overflowed onto the path so you
wouldn't be able to walk on it. Not to be deterred, my companion and I squeezed
through the bushes and made it up to the front door, to the surprise of the
owners who promptly asked us how we got there. When we explained that we came
through the bushes, they asked if we were from Utah because we couldn't tell
what kind of bushes they were. Turns out, we had just waded through thousands
of dollars worth of straight up marijuana. They weren't interested in anything
we had to say, so we left and went promptly home to change our clothes because
we reeked of weed, and so did the truck after we got in it. Thankfully it had
aired out before the car inspections at Zone Conference, or that might have
been another interesting story. Good times. Welcome to Willits!
Well, thanks for everything and I hope
you are all having a good week! Lots of love!
Hermana Burton
Another exchange with Sister Fiji!
I found this great picture of your Dad. I can't wait to meet him someday!
(:
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