Long letter....lots to read today!
The other day after a really tough day my companion stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and just started crying. As I tried to pat her back and help her calm down I looked
at the fence where we had stopped. The streetlight where we were was shining on a bush and illuminated a shadow of a musical staff. Each leaf on the branches fell perfectly on the staff showing individually painted notes that varied from all kinds of intervals. I didn´t have time to jot it down, but I am sure that if I had sat down at a piano the notes that fell on the staff would have made a lovely melody. It was then that I realized that my companion and I needed to take advantage of the musical gifts the Lord had blessed us with. She has an angelic soprano voice and I can hold my own with the alto harmony. I told her that I felt that we needed to sing hymns in more of the lessons to invite the Spirit more powerfully. Of all the companions hips in the mission, I know that the Lord put us together to help others see and feel the Spirit. We decided to sing more and really try to invite the Spirit to each lesson. So far, it has helped us begin each lesson with more focus and we know the Spirit is with us.Nata – an alfajor is the yummy treat I sent you… see the picture mom said she put on the blog last week. Way to go with FHE – you will be blessed.
Mom – the picture of Haedo (from last week’s post) is in my area… I have walked by that sign about 3500 times in the last 5 months. We live at 1406 ------ about 6 blocks from that sign you posted and about 4 blocks before the freeway. Good luck finding it on Google.
About phrases that I say throughout the day … when things blow up and go wrong I say “how much can one heart take?” – it is a lyric from a song about Emma Smith. Then I realize that I really don´t have it THAT hard. I also say “you´re gonna miss this” – a lot.
Ready for the best news I have received to date in the mission? Last Monday I got a letter from Sister Wilcox – one of my companions in LA – that I already knew from BYU… She said that after Orion Newell moved to Alaska to study – they forwarded the reference and her friends from her home ward invited him to dinner and apparently he kept receiving the Elders and was baptized in Alaska! It made me so happy I almost cried. Remember me writing about him? We found him tracting in Hollywood Hills my 3rd week in the mission. He was 20 – agnostic, but read the entire Book of Mormon in the month we taught him. He was my favorite of our investigators… and now he is one of my favorite converts--which means I need your help. I want to write him and congratulate him. The address I have is ----- that is all I know. His cell number back then was -----. Could you call him and say that you are Sister Jensen´s mom and that she wants to write you? Tell him Sister Wilcox wrote me and told me he was baptized. Then could you give me his complete address? I can´t wait to tell him how happy I am for him. Thanks – I simply could not wait 6 months to look him up myself.
Random story: people burn grass here. So there is quite often a smell of burning cut grass. It is interesting and always makes me stop and think, “what is that smell?”
Mom – the Relief Society here wants to know about the canning/sealing machine we use and what different food items we can. I was telling them about how efficiently we do food storage in the states and told them that you can get large cans of flour and other things. They want to know specifically if there is flour because it is the hardest to keep here the way they do it. Will you send me the low down about canning and how much it all is? Thanks on behalf of the Relief Society here in Haedo!
Challenge of the week: I feel that it is very, very important to write a personal history. For this purpose I challenge you all to write 2 pages every week explaining something monumental from your life (how you met your spouse, how you chose your career, the birth of you children, big injuries, sicknesses, successes, failures, trips… anything that would be interesting and would shed light on who you are. 2 pages a week about one specific thing… at the end of the year you will have an awesome personal history and your posterity will thank you for it. I cannot wait to start my own after the mission. I am going to write one story every week for the rest of my life – or at least until I run out of important things to tell about!
We stopped by and could only leave an English Book of Mormon with Santiago – instead of sitting down and really teaching him. It was late and he had to go to bed early for soccer practice in the morning. That morning I had written my testimony in the front of it in the most powerful way that my soul could muster. It is amazing, and a little bit sad, that I want soooo badly for him to accept this and let it guide his life. I always feel like that more for young people because I want them to have the gospel all their lives. But if I had such desire to preach to everybody like I have for the little Australian boy Santiago… I would be a much better missionary. I try to pray to have that desire for everybody.
We had a tough time getting ------ to church yesterday. We arrived at his house and really had to work to get him to go. He was saying that he wasn't going to go--but that he knew he needed to go. He eventually did decide to go with us and really liked it. Later he was mad at my companion because she was trying to cut to the chase of his 30 minute story and he felt offended. He called us that night crying and begging forgiveness. I think all this has to do with trying to quit drinking. Surely his body is going through serious withdrawal and he is suffering emotionally and a little bit psychologically. But he needs the gospel, and he needed to hear what we told him. He thanked us for pushing him. Sometimes you have to be a little bossy. Trust me-- we felt strongly that we knew what we were doing.
We have 2 others with baptismal dates, but before I can get too happy about it… it´s just that they were too easy and that almost always means that they won´t make it. When people just accept everything like this… it´s usually not the miracle you think it is. One is -------- who needs to quit smoking, but came to church on his own on Sunday. And the other is -------- who wasn´t there when we tried to pick him up for Church, but has 7 days sober of drinking and not smoking. He will be baptized next transfer (just after I leave) if things keep going this well. The other is a young girl named ------- who is just waiting for permission from her Dad – he said he´d let her when she turned 18 which is just after I leave… we´ll see if he signs the papers, but that would make 2 baptisms right after I leave. I know they still count and all, but it is still heartbreaking to not be there for them. It's like you need to see with your own eyes the proof that your labors are paying off. And you just want to be in the picture so bad. Laugh all you want, but it is true and it is real.
Question: is there any way to keep dirt from getting under your nails. The more I use a file to clean them, the more the dirt gets under there. I see no solution and my nails are just barely starting to grow again after 3 months of rebellion from my stress...… any ideas?
FYI: Here in Buenos Aires in the morning there is this fog that fills the air and it makes you feel like you live on the inside of one of those glass balls with the snow inside. Or it makes you feel like you live in a place with those fogged windows. It is cool. I took pictures this morning.
Why do they do that? Here in Argentina every Fall they literally cut all the branches off the trees. I´m not talking about simple pruning, I´m talking about massacring the poor tree and leaving it a stump and a bunch of fingers that reach to the sky but look terrible. I took pictures. Everybody destroys their trees right before Winter. They claim it makes them grow better and stronger in the spring but they don´t realize that they literally defame the beauty of the tree. Back home we are more concerned about the beauty of the landscape to half-kill our trees every Fall. This place now looks like a slaughtering yard for trees. It makes me sad.
It was so cold in our apartment and our heater was broken-- that I started heating our feet with my hairdryer in the morning as we studied. It was truly pathetic, but the Lord blessed us with a miracle the next day. A surprise apartment inspection, and when the Smith couple came they offered to DRIVE US to the store to buy a heater and bring us back. We accepted and we were able to buy 2 little heaters and I have slept great and studied better ever since. What a tender mercy… how cool is it to have a car to drive and buy the thing you need right when you need it? You have no idea. We were so cold. So cold.
Sorry you didn´t get the “estandarte” mailed to you – you won´t be getting it next transfer either… I´m not that good with the numbers anymore so you won't get the success papers but just know I am working hard every single day.
I have senioritis of this area. I´m screaming to get me out of here, but sad that I´ll barely miss the baptisms. I walk around way too comfortable… I need to go somewhere new and be confused again. It´s good for me to be lost and not know anything… you work differently when you know nobody and nothing.
We tried to wash the dishes of an investigator the other day and she yelled at us. The truth is that she was mad that her 19 and 15 year old daughters didn´t do them and she doesn´t want the guests who came for lunch to do their own dishes. It was really awkward and weird to be so seriously yelled at for simply trying to serve. Imagine that! So if for some reason I hesitate to wash the dishes after the mission you will know why… for 18 months we were literally forbidden to help out in the homes of the members and investigators… nobody lets us serve them… not even the members.
Mom – brace yourself… don’t take this wrong, but I have learned how to make an omelet even better than the omelets you make. It´s ok, I´ll teach you how it´s done. It is so amazing that you can learn something after cooking for so long and it´s like, “hey, why didn´t I ever try that?” You are going to love it!
Daddy – I´m glad you had a lovely 50th birthday spent quietly at home, but rest assured you will have a 50 yard line cake when I get back! I hope that the job scene is better when I get back and start searching… I never thought that I might be one of those people with a college degree that struggle to find a job. Let´s hope that doesn´t happen.
Jason – I bet you are already winning on the personal history thing. Way to go!
Wow how the hour goes by...
Love you tons, love the mission, love the cold, love the cough drops that I brought, love wearing ankle socks under my nylons, love my long warm coat,
Hermana Jensen!
p.s.
Thanks for the picture of daddy and the kangaroo... I was going to ask you to send it to me. You were inspired! I will print it and show it to Santiago today!
Wubba
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