Hellooo!
So
it's been a while since my last real chance to email. Lot's has happened. I
really loved the MTC and all that happened there! I learned so much about
doctrine and teaching and studying and just everything! I saw Josh and his
Swedish friends, I'm not sure if I already said that or not.
Getting
up at 2:45 am to fly wasn't fun. I sat next to other missionaries on our first
flight to Atlanta so I slept the whole time. There were a total of 50-ish
Elders and Sisters on our flight going to WV, Atlanta, Tennessee, and
Baltimore. Then our flight from Atlanta to Charleston was delayed 1.5 hours, so
that was lovely. We got to the airport and met the Mission President and the
APs, and they are all super cool! The President and his wife are super nice and
the mission home is giant! Transfers are on Thursday here so we got a day of
training and touring with the Mission President on Wednesday. Thursday was
transfers. They had all of the new missionaries line up at the front of the
chapel and called us out one by one and announced where we were going and then
our trainer would run up and greet us! It was pretty cool, although I went
last, which was terrifying haha.
My
first area was announced as Covington, but that was all I heard. After we got
there is when I realized Covington WV isn't a place. I am serving in Covington
VA, outside of Lexington, right on the border of our mission! It is a tiny town
that is pretty much all centered around a huge smelly paper mill. But it is
super awesome here, I love it. My trainer is Elder Rasmussen and he is really
cool. He's kinda quiet but we are a lot alike other than that :) He has been
out for 10 months, and has been in Covington for the last 4.5 months I believe.
He's from Utah and loves Les Mis, so we're pretty much best friends. He did
theater and musical choir stuff in high school before.
Even
though we have a car, we still walk a lot, even though there aren't sidewalks
half of the time! Our house is two stories, our living room and kitchen are
downstairs and the bedroom, bathroom and study room is upstairs.
The
first person I met here is named Jodie. She is a long time (almost 12 months)
investigator. She is large, loud, has a son Logan, a lot of animals, and even
more problems then she has pets. She follows all commitments of the
missionaries except smoking and coffee. She recently hurt her back and need
surgery and a shot to fix it. Because she is in so much pain from her back, she
feels too bad to smoke, which is kind of a blessing, but she has told us that
if we say it's good she feels too sick to smoke, she'll knock our teeth down
our throats. She likes to say stuff like that a lot, loves to joke around. The
first time I was over, I said the prayer before we left, and she started
screaming Amen and Praise Jesus during the prayer, but I just kept going like
it was nothing. Afterwards she started dying of laughter because she was trying
to freak me out. Other than going and just talking with her, we do have a ton
of other people here.
There
are 2 girls who have similar situations that have been taught though. They both
have heard all of the lessons and want to be baptized, but are both living with
their boyfriends. That kinda stinks, but hopefully soon they'll get married.
One of them is dating a member of our branch anyways. Speaking of the branch,
I'm in a branch. It's decently close to becoming a ward, but it's a branch
nonetheless. It's smaller than the Roseville YSA. We had meeting before church,
mission meeting and branch council. They are all really nice people. I got up
in testimony meeting to introduce myself so that was fun.
I
met the missionaries in the area over, Clifton Forge, and we actually share the
branch. One of the missionaries is legit a 50/50 mix of Brady Holmes and me.
It's terrifying, but he is the best. We then drove to Hot Springs, an even
smaller town outside of Covington, to take a man the Sacrament and it was the
prettiest drive of my life, holy cow. People were right about it being pretty
here, especially with all of the hills, trees and fog/low clouds. It's pretty
much been cloudy and drizzling everyday here so far. I had to buy a rain jacket
from the Wal-mart. It is way colder and rainier than expected.
We
try to meet people here a lot, just stopping by different houses and stuff, but
people are rarely home. We haven't taught a lesson yet, but we have 2 actual
discussion lessons so far this week and possibly 1 other tonight. I'm excited;
I can't wait to actually teach! We tried teaching this guy named Tony about
where he was reading in the Book of Mormon, but then he was going on about how
Alma's book is huge and hilarious (?). He also said how it was confusing when
Alma was saying the Lamanites were wicked because, according to him, the
Lamanites were never mentioned in the Book of Mormon before Alma....What?!?! He
also told us about how Joseph Smith was the best/smartest farmer Idaho had ever
seen. He was interesting...Anyways, that's about it not too much has happened
here so far, but I really do love it. Thanks for all your emails and such!
Sincerely
to everyone,
Elder
Goold
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| Elder Goold with President and Sister Salisbury |
