Feeling much better

August 4, 2014

So you know that lovely illustration of Sister Webb and I? This week has been way better.

All thanks to President Van Cott.

So not to freak you out or anything, but these past weeks have been rough mentally, physically, and everything - ly for Sister Webb and I. Woke up feeling the same on Tuesday, and we both decided we should stop ignoring our feelings to contact our mission president. So we shot off a text to President just letting him know how we were feeling. A little bit later we got a text asking if we could be at his office at 4:30. So then we start freaking out. Comes time to walk into his office, and he says "So...two overachievers have stressed themselves out." yeah. It actually turned out to be a really good (and long) meeting, where he just shared a bunch of scriptures with us, and actually kind of validated some of our feelings. He didn't even address my issues a lot, namely because I didn't really know what my issues were, but I walked out of there feeling so much better. Both of us did. So as much as it hurt our pride - we never wanted to be those sisters - we're glad we did it. Turns out, I need to take more breaks and eat ice cream. Should have known.

Afterwards we got to have dinner with two foreign exchange students from China and one from Germany who are staying with some members in the ward. The girls from China were pretty excited to hear I had been to Bejing. After dinner we shared the Restoration, and one of the girls from China filmed it apparently. Spreading the gospel in China? Sweet.

Wednesday, Sister Webb got to experience life in the desert on an exchange. 114 degrees. This week is my week, as I'll go out to Palm Springs. Exciting. So the day of that exchange happened to be the birthday of the sister I was with. We went and got her birthday donuts, and then throughout the day we ended up getting both birthday ice cream, and birthday cake as well. Not a bad birthday.

And then I went on an exchange to Banning. Forget Atlanta. Forget Ukraine. My craziest day on the mission may have been in Banning, California.

Let me begin with pulling off the freeway to a dirt road and pulling up to a tattered little trailer. We begin teaching this investigator they have. At one point a naked man walks by. Yes - it took me this long to see my first naked man on the mission. Definitely thought that would have happened in Atlanta or Ukraine. Then this investigator goes "Shoot. The man who threatened to kill me just walked up. I guess I'll have to leave today." I thought we were all going to die right then and there. I was strangely calm. Turns out he was walking up to his own house, which happens to be across the street. You see, people like to make meth around that area, and she calls the cops, hence the death threats. Then, at the end of the lesson, we talk about baptism, and then she's all "I've already been baptized! I've been baptized Mormon!" So if we can find the records, the Banning sisters' investigator just became a less active. Then on the drive home a torrential rain storm hits and we begin hydroplaning on the freeway. This is the beginning of two days of blessed but definitely out of the norm rain for the Redlands area.

Later on that exchange we also meet the renter of a less active, who was very not interested but managed to talk to us for 30 minutes straight before we got a word in. I watched a slug cross the entirety of her front porch during that exchange. Did you know that her brother-in-law invented the mobile home? Some more craziness happened, and then literally 10 minutes before we were going to exchange we heard a car crash. Witnessed the end of it, really. The sister I'm on an exchange with runs over, along with the member we were with, and before you know it, we're right there. No one was really hurt, thankfully, but we did console a lady who was involved before all the cops and ambulances and fire trucks showed up. What a way to end the exchange! So that was Banning. It was nice to return to quiet little Yucaipa.

Sunday was quiet, if not good. We met with the D family, and the mom and dad are moving forward with their baptism on the 16th of August. It's exciting!

Well, I think that's it for this week. Love ya!

Sister Tanner