Crazy time in the Maritime

Doesn't look like he is lovin the rain...
 

What a week, what a week. Things just keep getting more and more crazy here in the Maritime. 

 

Where do I even start for the week? There are so many things happening here that would be totally worthless to tell you because there are just details about peoples personal lives, and nobody wants to hear those. I'll do my best to just stick to the highlights today. 

Monday- Monday was pretty quiet. It was our P-day, so we had a little time to relax, and prepare for the week. Some of the Senior Missionaries were leaving, so there was a big BBQ at the mission office. It worries me that other missionaries don't freak me out anymore. When I first got out here, I would think to myself, "dude, these missionaries are insane!", and now I just go along with it... I'm becoming one of them..... 

Tuesday- Tuesday was the most insane day of life ever. Because we are extremely insightful missionaries, and have the incredible gift of foresight, we accidentally double booked ourselves for the night. We spent all day running around like crazy trying to find splits, and making plans to be in two places at one time, and nobody wanted to cooperate with us. Finally we got everything all worked out, and at the very last second, all of our plans got cancelled, and we had to re-plan everything again. But that meant I got to go and sing at the seniors home, so that's always fun! (Oh yeah, that's something our area does. The missionaries here are super talented, so we go and sing at a seniors home every other Tuesday, it's pretty great!)

Wednesday- Wednesday was the day of eternal less-actives. We spent so much time working with less-actives... Our less-active pool currently has 14 people in it, and that's just for the Elders, that's not even counting the people that the sisters are working with. It is so hard keeping us with everyone! Other than that, Wednesday was pretty quiet. We made a lot of phone calls, and tried to set up appointments with some former investigators and potentials (nobody actually wanted to talk to us, haha)

Thursday- Thursday was one of those days where we were going going going, and running everywhere, and at the end of the day, we didn't actually accomplish much... Blum was sick most of the morning, so I spent a lot of time working on the Area Book, and making phone calls. Then we went out to Fall River for doctors appointment. While were were out there we tried to contact some former investigators, and nobody was home. We spent a whole day out there and didn't even get to contact anyone. Then we came home and taught our family history class with our whole 1 person who showed up.... and he was already a family history master and came to help people out... It was a quiet night...

Friday- Friday we had a little bit of a humbling experience. We had just finished our weekly planning, and were getting ready to move on to other things, when we got a text from our leaders telling us that our goals weren't realistic for what we had been actually accomplishing recently. We really had to suck up our pride and reevaluate where we are at right now, and then completely redo our planning for the week. It stung a little bit, but It was good to be given a call to reality... The rest of the day went pretty normal, correlation meetings, plans being canceled, the whole nine yards

Saturday- Saturday we bused down to Bedford to do some street singing with the Sisters, and the very first person that we talked to was a basher and kept us occupied for the whole time we were supposed to be there. The sisters left and did other things, but Elder Blum and I had to stay and talk to him. We were really nice and didn't bash back, but he just would not relent. It was actually really sad to see.  On our was home, we got a call from our favorite investigator (he really is my favorite, shhh don't tell the others) and he had us come over that evening to meet with him. This man has been an investigator for over 7 years, and he says he is really ready to get going. He has been keeping his commitments now, and I'm really excited for him. (Fun side note that I forgot in my last email, he fell asleep during our last lesson. He is old, and hadn't slept that night. We asked him a question, and he put his head down like he was thinking about it, and suddenly he was sleeping.... So funny!!!!)

Sunday- Sunday was fantastic! We had an investigator come to church with us, and she loved it! She used to be a catholic, and she hates church, so the fact that she came was amazing. She told us she was just going to stay for sacrament meeting, and then after every meeting she would say "Well, I'm going to stay for the next one, just to see", and she ended up staying for the whole service! I'm so happy for her! She is also starting to ask us questions about her getting baptized, and that was a big no-no a few weeks ago, so I think this is going to be a great thing for her :D :D :D 

Well, that is the whole week. I feel like it doesn't seem as crazy once you write it down, but trust me is was so crazy, I promise! 

I hope everyone is have a great week, and thank you all so much for the birthday wishes, you are all fantastic! Happy birthday shout outs to Cara Otten, Taylor and Sarah Castro, and Jacob Siolo! 

Mission work isn't easy but at the end of the day, you feel like you have done something worth while (Most of the time). I know this is where I'm supposed to be, and I know this is what I need to be doing at this time. 

Have an amazing week, don't do drugs, stay in school, crack is whack, only you can prevent forest fires!

Hockey hockey, moose moose, maple leaf, sorry about that, eh?

Elder Jeffry Nielsen

PS. Get prepared for next weeks blog. I have decided that because Canada has such massive and disgusting looking spiders (yes, i'm being real here, there are terrifying spiders here) and they are everywhere, next week is going to be the spider blog. I'm going to take pictures of every spider I see, just for you all back home :D Love ya