Arizona, Here He Comes!

Ryan is flying to Arizona this...in just a few minutes, actually. I'm sure he'll spend more time in the airport than in the airplane. Hm. He's never flown before; I wonder what he'll think of that (if anything). He hasn't liked the MTC much (to put it mildly), and he wants to be in the "real world with real people," but I expect the change will be a second shock. Hopefully it wears off fast.

Anyway, here's what he wrote yesterday:

me with my favorite mural and Elder Hemenway behind me

Early Emails

Because I am leaving tomorrow, I am allowed to email you guys today while I wait for my laundry to finish. So here I am.

So I think I am doing a lot better. I've gotten into the pattern of things a little better, so I'm doing ok. Although I had this weird rash break out over the backs of my hands, I think it's stress induced? Because it's very uniform, and I haven't felt like it was too dry, and I've been drinking more water here than in any other time in my life. So whatever. *1

A few fun things have happened this last week. I have taken to keeping a list of things I want to tell you all throughout the week. We're not allowed to draft letters, so I just do bullet points of what I want to talk about. It's fine. Probably.

"A picture of elder Anderson with a bag on his head, cause why not." *2 

So first thing. On Wednesday last week we got to host new missionaries. Which just means we spend ten minutes getting their badges, taking them to their residence, then guiding them to their classroom.

After tearing them from their weeping family of course. 

It honestly was kinda fun, pretty refreshing to be on the other end.  *3  Now I am the 'senior MTC' missionary. I hosted three elders around. It really was just a fun refreshing experience. We were told to try not to tell them too many things because they were already too overwhelmed. So yeah, that was a thing.

Another interesting thing, is there is almost a sort of MTC seniority, like I mentioned earlier. On your first day as a missionary you walk around with an orange dot on your tag, and every single missionary tells you 'welcome to the MTC'. You hear it all day and it gets annoying fast. But no one is really 'old' in the MTC except foreign language missionaries, or those waiting on their visa, because everyone else is just three weeks. We're all newbie, green missionaries. Just a random thought I had a little while ago.

There was a little thing someone said that I thought was hilarious. He described MTC as 'Spirit Prison'. Which I thought was a hilarious play on words and almost too true.

some "epic" views of "spirit prison"

One of the weirdest/most annoying things this week was we got moved to a new classroom, because we got so many new missionaries. So our district of twelve got smashed into a smaller room with the remains of a district who were left behind due to visas or whatever. It's terrible. Especially since the classroom is yellow. I hate yellow, it is literally the worst color. So that was annoying.

 "a mural and associated Scripture, just because they are cool" *4

Let's see, what other random facts are there?

I am really tired of drinking water. I have never been so sick of the stuff. It's not like anyone tells me to, but Ijust keep a water bottle with me all the time, so I drink from it, and it gets tiring, especially since the water isn't all so great. I probably need to wash out my bottle.

"The blue drink is the same flavor that you liked, Michael. It tasted strongly of Vernal, Maeser to me." *5

I bought two new pairs of shoes for my mission. I've got one broken in, but the other was a little tight, I tried to start getting them broken in, but after walking around with them for one day, the next three days were awful. My hips and legs were dying and I think I strained my left foot. It's awful. I think I'll still try to finish breaking them in, but I don't know how well that will work out.

I may have told a few of you individually that I have been seeing a therapist here. Only three times, once a week, but it was super helpful, I think I'll remember his advice for the rest of my mission. But at the beginning of the my first meeting with the good therapist I met with (the first guy I met with was even less helpful then the  therapists in situational comedies), he told me that they do a sort of 'blood pressure' thing with mental health. Measuring stress to see if someone is in a healthy stage, since stress-- like blood pressure-- can affect a lot of other mental things. The healthy scale was somewhere between 20 and 40, if I remember correctly. He told me that last week I measured at 80. And this last time I measured at 76. Soooooo yeah. Honestly I feel slightly less stressed, but apparently not? Although I bet that the test isn't 100% correct Still though. I think I can get that down too, with some of the things he told me, but I thought that was kinda funny. About as funny as the Spirit Prison thing. *6

K, next little thing. One of my teachers, Brother Eaton, told me that when he was working with an investigator, another investigator came with them, and the second investigator committed the first investigator to baptism without him or his companion doing anything. Which was kinda funny.

Someone else told us (don't remember who, I think it was President Jensen or one of the other members of the branch presidency) that an Elder actually had to gain 10 lbs before he was allowed to leave the MTC. Pretty sure Pres. Jensen told us that. I thought that was kinda funny, but also sad for the poor elder.

So I did get the package that was sent to me. I haven't finished eating the fudge, it's just so much, I am worried I may have to throw it away. But its super tasty, thanks Lindsey. I like having the photos too. Anywho, you know all the bubble wrap that was in there? The attached video shows what happened to that. Feat. Elder Anderson, Elder Steel, and Elder Peterson before bed.

I have also taken to sketching during meetings, because otherwise I just fall asleep. So I was wondering if you guys could buy me one or something? Along with a small plastic container to keep it in, and some H level pencils (like a 4H, or something like unto it). I had my own sketching stuff that I'm letting Rachel use, but I want a harder pencil, and I suppose you could send me that eraser too, but I do want something to keep it in that isn't a plastic baggie or anything like that. that would be awesome. I will have to send pictures of my sketches sometime too, although it's just the skeletal anatomy of a dragon. Not sure how interested you are in that, but I think I'll send it sometime anyway. And yeah, I could use some bare minimum sketching stuff. It would be nice. It is a little difficult to balance sketching and paying attention though. I f I don't sketch, I fall asleep, if I sketch too much I don't pay attention. Honestly the whole mission is a huge balancing act. But it's fine. I'll figure it out.

I've had a couple of interesting thoughts about the mission too, For instance, you all know about De-ja-vu, right? I've gotten it before, and it's always interesting, but I have never Gotten De-ja-vu so bad as I have here on my mission. I just think that's interesting, so much here is so familiar.... Makes me wonder if I'll get more of that on the mission. Just another testament that I'm doing the right thing, right?

I also had an interesting thought about teaching as a missionary, so I don't know how applicable this is to any of you. But as we were talking about how to really teach the gospel to people, it clicked. In writing, when describing a scene or a person, you should try to show someone the scene, instead of just spew details at them until they can envision it. It's difficult to explain, but it's critical in having a well written book. I realized it's the same thing with the gospel. You can spew facts and stories about the gospel at someone All. day. And they will never get it, you have to show them the gospel, you have to show them how they can use it in their lives, they have to choose to figure it out and experience it for themselves, and that's the only way they can actually get it. And that is going to be the single hardest thing to do on my mission I think.

Now one last fun fact, then I'll talk about what I learned yesterday and I'll be done.

Yesterday, Elder Steele pointed out another elder who looks Exactly. Like Benedict Cumberbatch. It was awesome. I am not even joking, he looks exactly like him, except with brown hair. I wish I had a picture of him, it was great. I don't know his name, but I recognize him as Elder Cumberbatch now. It was hilarious. Makes me wonder how often he is told that because he is the spitting image. 

So there are three talks given at the MTC that they ONLY show in the MTC, two by Elder Bednar who apparently is super missionary man. And one by Elder Holland. There is Character of Christ by elder Bednar, Missions are Forever, by Elder Holland, And Recognizing the Spirit, by elder Bednar. I saw the first two the last two sundays, and the last one yesterday. All three totally shook my world and changed my view on things. None of them were really things I hadn't known before, but suddenly they clicked, and it all made sense. My favorite thing about Recognizing the Spirit, which I watched yesterday, was Elder Bednar literally said 'Stop worrying about whether you are recognizing the spirit or not. In order to follow the spirit there are three steps (almost his exact words here):

1. Be a good boy/girl
2. Honor your covenants and keep the commandments.
3. ACT. Press Forward with a steadfastness, and just do it. As long as you keep the first two, any thought that comes to your head, any urge or prompting you ever get should be acted on, because they are most likely from the spirit, so long as it isn't obviously bad, and even then, remember Nephi and Laban?

Elder Bednar's promise to us as missionaries if we followed these three things was:
 My steps will be guided, my utterances will be inspired. And I Can Not go amiss.
It was powerful. The most interesting thing he talked about were three instances when he followed the spirit, and didn't realize it for decades. If you find the talk, The Twenty Marks (or something) by Elder Packer, the missionary mentioned in there is actually Elder Bednar. I highly recommend it, if you can find it, it probably tells the full story. Elder Bednar mentioned that at the time he gave Elder Packer the twenty (German) marks, he had no idea why he did it, in the slightest. He didn't even recall that until He met Elder packer 20 years later and the story was retold to him, elder Packer told him that those twenty marks saved him and his wife when crossing to East Germany. I wish you guys could hear the talk. But you can't unless you go to the MTC.

So that's my general feelings on the MTC, really. There is no other place on earth so far that I hate more. And yet, there is no other place on Earth where I think I could have learned the same things, in such powerful ways. *7

So yeah, I think that's about it. As far as your individual emails go, I'm glad I am getting them, but I would like it if some of you would give me thoughts over events. I like hearing what's happening with you, but thoughts are so much more meaningful. So if you want to tell me sometime during the week what happened and when it happened, go ahead, I don't mind. But I'd like it if your weekly emails were more just your thoughts. Thoughts can say so much more than anything else.

Yeah.

The cat is Sister Mittens. She hangs around hoarding attention and occasionally asking for food. She's cute. *8

So that's my thoughts for this week. I'll send a few individual emails now, but I don't have a ton of time, so I don't think I'll be able to get to all of you.

Love you guys,
-Ryan



Mom's Notes:

1. Ryan has definitely been stressed out about being in the MTC—from being away from home, I suspect. And he has been known to get stress rashes. Poor guy!

2. Yeah, why not? Missionaries are silly.

3. It was kinda fun...to tear new missionaries away from their weeping families?

4. I wonder if this mural, with its associated scripture and thought, in the yellow (literally the worst color) wing of the MTC.

5. This does not look like something you should drink. Also this is the kind of weird picture missionaries send their moms all the time. Fortunately Ryan must have heard me gripe enough about this (and recently, too) since, so far, he has sent pics of himself too.

6. Funny? I wonder how much of that scale is stress that Ryan carries around all the time anyway; he is an intense kid. But I think he will grow into this missionary role, at least. He seems to be doing lots better already.

7. What a dichotomy! Although many learning experiences really are no fun.

8. I learned about Sister Mittens on a missionary-mom facebook page, and asked Ryan if he'd seen her. He's actually smiling in this picture!

I was going to post more that he'd written me in another email, but this is a super-long post already. Maybe I'll make it a second post later in the week. Maybe. But the main reason I wanted to include it at all is because I read it and could see how much he has grown in just these past three weeks at his least happy place on earth. Ryan is starting to sound like a missionary. And he is awesome!

Eulogy

Today's story was emailed to me today by my favorite person. So Bruce is today's guest writer (something I've never done before.
I don't think.).






Goodbye, Old Gloves

In the original Star Wars movie, A New Hope, Luke suddenly realizes that the Stormtroopers must have gone to his house. He races home, too late, to the sight of destruction and smoke streaming from the charred body of his uncle.

My gloves met the same fate.

Fortunately, just like Luke, I was not present for the attack. I only suffered the horror of returning to the same sight of desolation, the same smoky marker of sudden, senseless loss.

I got the gloves in October, my first week working in Colorado at the Adler truck yard. Until we could get new coveralls, we were to dig through a pile of old castaways and pick something usable. I found something large enough, and discovered hidden treasures in the pocket: a small notepad and a pair of used gloves. The gloves were oil-stained but in good repair, and when I slipped one on, I found it clean and perfectly broken in, even comfortable. I liked them right away, and kept them for myself.

Everyone was given a brand new pair that same day, but I decided to save the new ones for later and use the old ones as we began hauling heavy pressure hoses and operating cam locks and hammer fittings. I thought the other green hat newbies looked awkward in their ill-fitting clothes and too-new protective gear, but I worked comfortably and felt like a pro in my work-stained leather gloves.

I used my old gloves every day. I hooked up lines, too cold (or too hot) to touch with bare skin. I handled grease, oil, lube, coolant, and water. I shoveled dirt, scraped ice, and climbed metal rungs. I was careful to always have them available to wear; I conscientiously placed them with my other gear in my apartment, ready to go to work for the next shift.

As I learned my new job, I discovered right away that I could hold my gloved hands in front of the fire box, heated by the blue light of the blasting propane inferno inside, as snow melted on my shoulders. The hot, oiled leather would hold the heat, keeping my hands pleasantly warm as I worked. It was too hard to write with them on, so sometimes I would lay them in front of the fire box door to warm up, ready to comfort my hands from the bitter night cold.

A week ago I was issued a new pair of winter leather work gloves--a very nice pair, nut-brown, with the manufacturer's Canadian maple leaf emblem on the wrist. They seemed too beautiful to work in, but they were warmer and sturdier without restricting movement. I started carrying my new gloves in my pockets, but I kept my old ones for the really dirty jobs.

This morning I got to the job site, checked my pockets for my new gloves, and pulled my old standbys from my backpack. Shivering in the stiff breeze, I set my old friends in front of the burn box door, with no warning that this would be the last time I would see them whole, or touch them with the skin of my hand. I walked away, ran numbers and started the day's paperwork. Today, the burners needed to run much hotter than usual, and when I returned, my gloves were on fire, smoldering and smoking into oblivion.

I quickly donned my new gloves and brushed the carcasses into the dirt, then I shoveled more dirt on them to put them out and cool them off. I cleaned up the burn box doorway, then recovered my old friends from their grave.

They were lost. Charred, deformed, ugly. On one, I could still read my name on the unblackened wrist, written in my own hand. What had I done?

I had just gone from the panic of the emergency to the decisive moment of action, and as the calm tried to extinguish my remaining adrenaline, I wasn't sure if I was going to laugh or cry.

I chose to laugh.

I showed the twin corpses to my coworker, who laughed with me. I set them down, took a picture of them, and then tossed them in a plastic trash bag, leaving them lying in state on empty plastic water bottles and old food wrappers. Later, I saw them in the top of the bag, alone and forgotten in death.

Their loss hurts, for some reason--maybe even more so, now that I've written this eulogy. They served me well, and I appreciate their service. I'm even grateful I had them. Perhaps, the more joy I got from using them, the greater the pain at their loss. I have much better gloves now. I don't carry quite as many things to and from work as before, and I'll be more careful with that burn box.

Can a pair of old, abandoned gloves make a better life for a man?

Yes.

A New Christmas Tradition

Every year, for several years, our family has made a gingerbread house for Christmas. 

our 2018 creation

When the kids were little I would tell them not to eat these houses (silly me!) because it was so much work to make them! However I did know that it was an irresistible temptation for them, and expected the candies to be gone within a week, and it was all good fun.

Rachel is probably 18 months old in this picture. That means we've been doing the gingerbread house thing for about fourteen years!

Well, within the last four to five years the kids stopped picking all the candies off of the houses and eating them, and I realized that a lot of the fun of the gingerbread house had gone away. We still made them, and they looked nice and made our house smell great, but after Christmas we'd smash the house up and throw it away. Bummer.

So this year I came up with a new idea to put the fun back into it. What if we made our house and then gave it to a family with little kids who would really appreciate all the candies, frosting, and giant cookies? When I proposed this to my kids they were very enthusiastic. So the house-building began:

Last Sunday I drew up a pattern and we baked all the pieces.

The kids decorated the windows and we poured in the hard candy "glass" on Sunday night, too. 

Kaylie is decorating the front wall before we begin construction.

making the pillars for the front porch
The peppermint sticks weren't tall enough, so we molded white chocolate mixed with crushed peppermint to make the bottoms of the pillars. When we started building we realized they still wouldn't be tall enough, so we made more chocolates to cap the pillars. Still too short. The starlight mints just did the trick.

It seems like we have an accident every year, and this year was no exception. This wall fell down and broke, and the window popped out. It was Michael's idea to use graham cracker pieces to brace it on the inside.

A string of 20 Christmas lights is built right into the house. This year I (rather cleverly, if I do say so) drilled some holes into roof pieces to make a porch light, and to light the...can't think of the name... the room that pops out of the roof which, otherwise, wouldn't have gotten any light.

decorating...

...more decorating
(Look at that mess on the table! It covers our entire eight-foot-long table while we build and decorate.)

And here is the finished house:

front (not plugged in)

sides

and back

We finished it up late Tuesday night.

Now, the entire time we were planning the house, I was trying to think of who we should give it to. There are so many families with little kids; how could I choose? But on Sunday, while we were filling in the windows, Jessica told me a story: She had taught the five and six-year-old primary class that morning, and one little girl told Jessica that she was asking Santa for a gingerbread house this year. !! So when the house was finished I contacted her mom and asked if her family could use a gingerbread house. (I didn't want to take it there if Mom already had one, or had big plans to make one.) Mom said, "Yes!!!" 

Yay!

So the real fun was on Wednesday afternoon, when the kids and I went to deliver the gingerbread house to our neighbors.

Two little girls admiring their new house. (The little one on the left is the girl who was asking Santa for a gingerbread house.)

They were very excited when Michael plugged in the lights; they were delighted with the "Santa" in the chimney and the snowmen in the yard. It was fun to see them all "ooh" and "ahh" over it. As we got ready to leave, little E— asked, "How did you know I wanted a gingerbread house?" And I said an elf told us. Mom said, "They must have an elf in their house!"

That started a whole new, excited conversation. "We have an elf in our house!" And they showed us their Elf on the Shelf, and  the naughty and nice list she had made. I noticed that all of the family names were nice, but the Lego men were naughty, so I asked about that. Apparently there had been a big battle overnight and the Lego men had taped the Elf to the wall; we got to hear about that in pretty great detail. :-)  (I imagine the family freed the Elf, which helped them on the nice list.) It was lots of fun to see how excited the kids were—and Mom, too!

The next day Mom posted some pics on facebook, with this caption: Look what we got on our doorstep from the North Pole!! My girls absolutely love this! We're grateful for the Christmas magic...It was just what E—had on her Christmas wish list. Thank you!

Hooray!

I see that a gingerbread lady has been added. And some chocolate chips on the ground. (reindeer droppings?)  :-)

I had asked Mom not to mention our names, but I am delighted that she used "the North Pole," since that is what our card would have said if we'd delivered it anonymously.

And here are a couple of pictures she posted of her girls doing just what kids should do with a gingerbread house:

So we had a lot of fun, and I believe this is a Christmas tradition that we'll keep for a long, long time!

Merry Christmas!

Missionary News

Ryan has been in the MTC for two weeks now; one more to go. He is anxious to get out of the training center and into the field. He actually writes a lot more than any of his brothers did, which is nice for me. Today I'm just posting the letter he sent with pics attached. 

Pictures

I have a few interesting ones this time. Sorta.

*1

The Burt's Bees honey chapstick is an interesting thing. That chapstick cost me $3.99. But I really needed it. Another interesting thing about that stuff is that the honey flavor/scent smells almost exactly like the field next to the church down the street from the house. The first time I opened it I got a straight shot of homesickness, since I walked by that field every time I went to Techris. *2  It smells mostly sweet like honey, and warm, but it has a bit of rosemary scent in it which gives it a nice herby smell. It's actually kind of comforting, so I'll pull it out and just smell it sometimes.

We sang the First Nowell for the devotional last Tuesday, the arrangement by the MoTab choir director.  It was really cool, but it also made me homesick. *3   There's  a picture of myself and Elder Anderson right before we went to sing it for the Ecclesiastical leaders.

The next one is of the absolutely retarded haircut they gave me last Wednesday. It was worse than the [hair place] in vernal. I hate it. They cut all of my hair stupid short except my bangs. It only looks ok if I constantly brush them up to the side. *4

The next is Elder Anderson, he went under the bed to retrieve a ball so Elder Peterson trapped him under there, and we lifted up the mattress to see this. It was amusing. Elder Peterson has a level of humor similar to mine, but way more sarcastic and... I'm not sure I can adequately describe it.

The guy on the moped is one of our MTC teachers, Brother Eaton. He was gone last saturday so Brother Simons subbed, and shared that picture with us. So we all made that our phone backgrounds for Bro. Eatons class monday afternoon. It took him 20 minutes to realize what we had done, it was also amusing.

The last picture is another of our district. I guess I'll name them this time. *5


Love you guys!


Mom's Notes:

1.This is not a particularly interesting picture, although the story that goes with it is.

2. Ryan worked at Techris, about three blocks from our house, to earn mission money over the summer.

3. In another email this week Ryan mentioned that it's hard for him to sing bass in church because it reminds him of sitting next to Bruce singing bass, and it makes him miss us. Aww. (Also, the director of the Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square is Mack Wilberg.)

4. That is a pretty bad haircut. But Ryan hasn't had much luck with haircuts since we moved to Vernal. Hopefully the next one (in six months, from the looks of it) will be better.

5. Ryan did tell us the names of everyone, but I omitted them from the blog.

Ryan is having a rough time in the MTC; he's homesick and a little stressed out, but he's looking forward to moving on to Gilbert. I'm sure he'd love to hear from you. If it will arrive on or before Dec. 17 you can send him a letter at this address:

Elder Ryan Alexander North
12-18 AZ-GIL
2005 N 900 E Unit #159
Provo, UT 84602

Or you can email him any time at: ryan.north@myldsmail.net

Do it, do it, do it!