Good morning everyone,
Hope everyone is having a good day. I certainly am. Every day is good day in the mission field as long as you make it that way.
So this week we were able to accomplish a lot. We're almost done moving. We've done all the deep cleaning in the trailer. Now all we need to do is get a few more things out and hand over the keys...after the inspection of course. I just want to be done with it haha. The place gives me anxiety. The new apartment is soooooooo much better. It's clean, spacious, spiritually inviting, and our new neighbor is awesome. His name is Tim and he's a retired G.I. He's really friendly and always offers us beer just to be funny. We gave him some cookies(not my idea but I guess it works) so now we're friends. Hopefully we have an influence on him. He likes what we do. He always tells us "beware of morons. They're everywhere" hahaha.
So Monday we had dinner with the M's. They're always fun. They're kind of struggling right now so we're doing our best to spiritually revive them. We also went fishing. I'll send some pictures. We saw a lot of bass but nothing was biting.
Tuesday we did some biking around Southern Pines which is right around where we live now. We didn't find much success, but we were able to meet with a less active woman and the little Mexican that lives with her. His name is R and he's crazy. He just doesn't get life. All he wants to do is drugs, snowboard, and some other things. He started to ask us questions so we answered some of them. So we offered to come back another day and just have a question session. So we went back on Friday and he just plagued us with questions. He asked us a bunch of junk and the Spirit didn't want to be there. He then went on about how we were missing out on life because we don't drink or do other stuff. He then offered to take us fishing, but told us that he would ruin us. So needless to say, we're not gonna do that haha. We told him to read the Book of Mormon and left. Weird lesson.
Wednesday we had district conference. Something my district leader came up with. The Zone Leaders were there so he wrote on the board "FIRST ANNUAL DISTRICT CONFERENCE." It was super funny haha. Elder Lowham and I got to teach about leaving our commitments with a purpose so that went well. We then went biking and tracting and didn't accomplish anything. Sometimes that happens. Actually, most of the time that happens. The hardest part of missionary work so far for me has been finding people to teach. Especially cause we're in Pinehurst which is just a retirement gold community full of white people. But we do find our Hispanics.
Thursday we did some weekly planning. Nothing to report there. Then we spent two hours or so cleaning the trailer. Getting there. We then went to dinner with the Bickford family at Brixx. It's a pizza place kind of like Mellow Mushroom but a little fancier. Brother Gross owns the restaurant so he pays for us to go a lot. He's the Ward Mission Leader so we go sometimes after coordination meeting each week.
Friday we went up to Robbins with Brother Scribner to post some flyers
Saturday all we did was move people. We went and helped a family in the ward move for a few minutes, but literally half the ward was there so we left. We then got to help move a non member family. The Clewis family. They're all chiropractors. It was us four Elders, a priest, and then like 5 other men. It took 6 hours. Something I learned is that McDonald's is just terribly unhealthy. The lady we were helping bought us each two quarter pounders and I knew I wasn't gonna be able to do it. But I did! And I regretted it....I felt like I had just eaten 1200 calories. Oh wait, that's because I did. Those things are ridiculous! Nutrition facts: 520 calories, 420mg of sodium, 19g of fat, and 30g of protein. I definitely don't believe the protein part. That just doesn't seem realistic for McDonald's. But enough of the McDonald's. We helped these people move a few miles away and it was a lot of work. The heat just kills. It makes you feel like you haven't slept in days. Later that night we ate dinner with the Barbours. They're my favorite! Just little old southern folks who love to cook southern food. We had two roasts. A rump and a round. They were both delicious. There was a man at dinner named Bashir. He's friends with the Barbours and he's from Afghanistan. He does confidential stuff with the government and speaks five languages. He's Muslim so it was interesting to hear his views during the lesson.
Sunday I gave a talk! I spoke about building your faith and then showing it. I feel like I did okay. Not my best talk haha. But everyone told me afterward that I have great speaking voice and that I should think about going into announcing or something. We'll see haha. If you want a copy of the talk just ask me. I'll send it to you. Later we had another lesson with A. We addressed a lot of concerns of his about baptism and the Plan of Salvation. and other things. He just wants to make sure that he's made everything right with God before he gets baptized. I can work with that! So then we went and ate dinner with the W's. They have a massive house,ten kids who are all home schooled, and an old dog that looks like the black one from Harry Potter 3. We taught our lesson and then Brother W wanted a blessing. So we gave him and his wife one, as well as Brother N who was with us. He's their home teacher. It was interesting. Later that night, I had the impression that we should go to Pinebluff. So we went there and visited Willy Barry, the lady whose house we pressure washed. She was happy to see us. She's going in for surgery today for Carpal tunnel. I'll definitely need that when I'm older. Then we went and knocked an apartment that we've been trying to contact for months. They answered! I told them that we're missionaries and they let us right in. They're names are Alberto and Max and they're both from Vera Cruz like every other Mexican in Pinehurst. We presented the Book of Mormon and they were so excited to read it! Max just kept looking at it and saying "this book is amazing." Then he told us that he wouldn't have much time to read, but would read an hour each night. An hour? That's fantastic! They told us the last church they went to was not very welcoming. They said no one said hi but that everyone just stared at them. So I told them that that would not happen at our church and invited them to come next Sunday. They're excited to come! So we're gonna show up before church at their house next Sunday and help them get to the church. I'm so glad we found them!
So that was the week. All is well in Pinehurst. We just need to step up our game a little bit so we can baptize!
Have a good week.
-Elder Landon Carroll
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