Saturday, November 29, 2014

Sopapilla Week


November 19, 2014
         Today was so great!  We went to the plaza to buy stuff and I got a new trompo!  My miracle was when I was throwing it in the plaza:
Miracle #58: I threw the new harder trompo in front of the Chilean shopkeeper and nailed it! I even did an awesome trick and it was funny because they were blown away that a gringo could do it.
         We had a great lesson with the family V.  especially with the mother of the family.  She is so ready for her baptism and the change that we have seen take place in the family really makes me happy.




November 20, 2014
         Today was great!  We did service at 8:00 A.M. with our investigator family V.  We helped them work on their house.  We had to pick another elder up to help us and because we had meetings with the mission president afterwards, we decided to drop our clothes off at his house because it was closer to the president. Complicated, and would have been a good idea if I would have remembered my dress shoes.  Instead I had to wear my tennis shoes to my interview…smooth.  I only got chewed out a little bit.  The worst part was that our interviews were 2 hours delayed. We sacrificed our study time and just worked the whole rest of the day.  We had an awesome/creepy experience of watching a man run down the street carrying a large bag of cocaine. We also had an annoying experience of having to teach a lesson where the neighbor was smoking weed so we got to smell that for an hour. My miracle for the day was little Josephina, the youngest of the family V. 
Miracle #59: My two-year-old investigator remembers my name and can clearly say it!  She likes to get my attention and it is adorable. 

November 21, 2014
         Today we had divisions again!  I stayed in my sector, but the bummer was that every single cita fell through.  EVERY. Single. One.  We walked and knocked doors for 4 1.2 hours in the blazing sun.  I wanted to melt and die, but I didn’t. The best part was in the end of the day when we bought sopapillas.
Miracle #60: A man at the street vendors who I made a contact with, bought both me and my companion, Elder Fernelius, another sopapilla.  That was awesome.
         The funny moment of the day was when we were studying and I crashed…hard!  I was out cold for 25 minutes and Elder Soulier couldn’t wake me up.  He yelled and nudged and finally sprayed me in the face.  It was a nice nap.
November 22, 2014
         Today had some ups and downs.  We didn’t really do much til after lunch, when the party began.  The very first contact we had was my miracle and it was with a couple of guys who had obviously been drinking.  They called us over and one of them wanted to show us his champion kickboxing moves. 
Miracle #61:  I took everything out of my pockets and started using my years of taekwondo to follow everything that he did.  He was super impressed and the miracle was that it turned into a fantastic contact.  Who woulda thunk it? I used my martial arts to make a contact.
         On the down side of things, we got dropped by one of our investigators.  It was a really weird meeting with him because one day we were fine and today he didn’t want to have anything to do with us.  Sadly, it didn’t really bother me. I honestly couldn’t understand much of what he said, and I never really could understand him so as a result, I never formed a strong bond with him.  I think that as time goes on and I improve my ability to communicate, then I will care more when we get dropped.
         On a funny note, we were studying and Elder S. went to the bathroom.  After about 30 minutes I realized that he was still in the bathroom and we had to leave.  I yelled to him and he gasped and woke up. Yeah, he fell asleep ON THE TOILET!  I laughed so hard.
November 23, 2013
         This was a rough day for me.  One of the families on our ward is really hard to get along with.  Today I had an encounter with the mother and it was not cool.  So, the mother is a seminary teacher and there is a youth in her class who missed class for a week and also missed mutual.  Instead of reaching out to him with love and concern, she was chewing this kid out in public.  He put up with it for an impressive length of time, but when he started to give her his excuse for not coming, she went crazy on him and started almost yelling.  I was thinking, “This is really awkward and inappropriate and hope it ends soon.”  But, it got worse, the young man tried to just walk away, which I thought was a good response to the circumstances.  The teacher wouldn’t have any of it, and she grabbed him and dragged him into the classroom and cornered him.  Then she started tearing into him again.  I asked Elder Bickle (one of the 5 missionaries in our ward) if we should step in. He  
didn’t respond so after about another 20 seconds of screaming, I just walked into the room and said, “What are you doing?”  The Hermana responded, “We are just playing.”  I responded, “It doesn’t look like playing to me.”  She told me to leave so I went and stood in the doorway.  Then, believe it or not, she continued her rant for a few more minutes, and she blamed the kid for how he made her look in front of the missionaries.  At this point, Elder Bickle ran away, and left slightly fluent me to deal with the angry Hermana.  She turned to me and started questioning me.  I said, “It looks like you are chewing him out.”  Little did I know that I had not seen the she-bear fully awakened until this point. I took the brunt of the attack and it wasn’t pretty.  Finally, I was rescued by Elder Soulier who came in and said that we had a meeting.  He dragged me down the hall as this sister shouted to him that he needed to tell me to be more humble and much more.  I agree with her that I need to be more humble, but that does not mean that I was wrong to step in.  (Mom side note: Elder Colvin has a weakness for sticking up for the underdog ever since he was a little boy, no matter what grief or pain it caused him.  Why would he change now?)  Elder Ocarez said that he thought that I did the right thing.  I think that I did the right thing too, but not in the best way.  I compared my experience today with power-washing the horse stalls.  This particular family is like a power washer in the barn, just spewing high-pressure crap and hurting everything in their path.  What I did was essentially shoving my hand in front of the spray.  Maybe I deflected the spray for a little bit, and prevented a little damage to a young boy, but it stung and ultimately it didn’t do much good.
         Miracle for the day lasted 2 long hours:
Miracle #62: We had our first ward council in more than 6 months!
         Other than that, the only thing worth note is that we had a service activity at 9:30 at night moving someone’s furniture a block to their new house.  I carried an oven/stovetop all alone for a block and almost died.  I liked it though because it was an excuse to get a little exercise in on Sunday. We negated any benefit though by eating more sopapillas.
November 24, 2014
         Ugghhh!  Today was a day!  We had only had 2 out of 6 planned lessons work out.  We spent 2 long hours on list work to no avail (contacting less active members).  Nothing happened, well, one thing happened that was a miracle-ish.
Miracle-ish # 63:  A man was working on fixing his car so I started talking to him about his car and it turned out that he is a less active member and is a relative of someone in our ward. This is the second contact this week that I have made because of my own personal hobbies or interests.
         The funny/creepy point of the day was when we were doing door contacts and this girl (of indistinguishable age – you just can’t tell down here because the girls mature really early) was creeping out on me.  She was climbing up the fence and shoving her mom out of the way so that she could stare at me.  So NOT cool.
November 25, 2014
         We had a good morning!  One appointment, one meeting, and one PACKAGE!!!!  I got my Christmas wish from my parents, the Insanity Workout.  That program is made to kill you and I almost threw up doing one of the workouts.  It is going to be good fun for me and it will help me with my excess pent up energy.  The miracle of the day was one that only my dad would appreciate.
Miracle #64: We taught someone who just moved back to Chile after 10 years in Germany.  He gave us German chocolates!! Mmmmmm  Sister Brim is so lucky! (Friend of Elder Colvin’s who is serving in Berlin.)
         I saw at least 10 drug deals go down right next door to one of our strongest members….really depressing. 

Monday, November 24, 2014

Divisions, Explosions, and Gangsters.... OH MY


November 12, 2014
         Our miracle happened the very first thing out of the house while getting on our first bus. 
Miracle #51: We met a woman who really wanted to hear our message and asked us to come to her house…too bad she lives out of our area, but we will pass her information on to the Elders who are in her area.
         Other than that we went to a couple of museums today for p-day.  P-days here are fun, but it is sometimes hard to go to work after having fun.  However, I was in an especially good mood today and talked with just about everyone I met. 

November 13, 2014
         Today I had division with Elder Faber and it was pretty interesting.  Every missionary is so different and it is refreshing to change things up a bit and learn from other teaching styles. I have been very fortunate to be able to go on so many splits early on in my mission. I think that it is helping me to learn a lot more quickly than if I weren’t able to do splits.  Our miracle happened once again with the familia V.
Miracle #52: The whole family participated in the lesson today and asked us to come back on Saturday for the 4th visit this week.
         The weird/creepy thing for the day happened when we ran into a man who thought he was Jesus and he was going around casting out devils.
I am pretty sure that Mom will hate this picture!
November 14, 2014
         Today was one of those blah days.  I have a huge blister on the bottom of my foot and it feels like I am walking on legos all day long. It was a way hard day because I was just kind of out of it, but we had a little miracle happen.
Miracle #53: A less active member’s daughter participated in a lesson of ours. 
November 14, 2014
         Today was a good day.  This morning Elder S. stumped some Bible bashers with a scripture.  We had our miracle in the lesson with the family V again. 
Miracle #54: Hermana F (la madre) accepted a date for her baptism and actually wants to move it up if possible.  We were so happy for her!
         The other fun part of the day was seeing a gunshot across the street from where we were teaching.  We saw the gun barrel and the muzzle flash and everything.  Elder S. go so freaked out.  I just laughed because now I have had another rare life experience that I lived through!
November 16, 2014
         Today was a decent Sunday.  We had a good day with a powerful miracle. 
Miracle #55: We got an Elder’s quorum President called today! This will really help the missionary efforts here in the ward.
         I am pretty sure that parents here in Chile are raising a generation of diabetics.  Kids here start drinking coke/any soda, when they are less than 2 years old. They actually put it in their baby bottles. 
November 17, 2013
         I had divisions today and I worked with a Latin Elder.  It was GREAT!  I love speaking only Spanish! It is so fun. We pretty much just knocked on doors for a couple of hours and visited people to see if we could teach them.  I had a good time with Elder Cascante and was surprised with how well I understood him until about 9:30 at night when the Spanish part of my brain just completely shut off.  It is super lame.  The other elder’s house is really big and fairly nice, but they don’t take care of it so it is pretty ghetto.  The miracle of the day was during contacting:
Miracle #56: We were invited in by an inactive member that we have never met and we were able to teach him a good lesson.
         We found out later that he really doesn’t ever do anything that he says he will, but still we were able to teach someone something!
         I stayed in the other Elder’s house for the night and met a lot of missionaries that I really liked and got along with. It was a good time, and I learned a lot on this division.
November 18, 2014
         This morning I almost died.  So don’t freak out Mom, I’m going to tell you this story and if you freak out, I won’t tell you any more good stories. To explain a little, in order to heat the water here they use gas and something called a califont.  It has to be lit before you shower, but in this house it is really old and spews a lot of gas.  When I went to light it, I guess that I turned up the gas too much and when I struck the match into the califont to light it, I created a huge fireball and lost the hair on my arm in the process.  It was kindof funny, but also scary!
Miracle #57: I did not get seriously hurt in a fireball today. AND
We were safe while walking down the street past some serious gangsters brandishing assault rifles.  Chilling!


Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Another week



November 5, 2014
            Yep, another P-day.  It was fun and I did some stupid climbing and it was totally worth it.  My knees ache a little because I had to make a long drop.  We went to a store that was just like Walmart.  It is so cool to see American stuff here, but they had just ran out of something that I really wanted …so that was irritating. My miracle was once again with the family V.
Miracle #44: We watched half of the restoration video and had a very spiritual discussion about pray and answers to pray.  M. said that he has never felt an answer to his questions to know the truth.  We listened to his concerns and then prayed with him to help him find the answers to his questions. After the prayer he was emotional so I thnk that he must of received at least part of his answer.
November 6, 2014
            Today was a roller coaster.  Normal morning of walking a long ways to find out that our appointment fell through.  Then I once again died after lunch.  I cannot stay awake for the life of me.  Later in the day, I woke up which is a good thing because I had my very first snake.  Snakes are just flirty young women between the ages of 15-25.  Anyway I had a super snake attack and it was uncomfortable, but I survived.
Miracle #45: I told a funny joke today in Spanish and everyone laughed. 
 
Where's the hazmat suit?




November 7, 2014
            Today felt like a p-day except is wasn’t.  We did contacts in the morning and as usual got nothing.  After that, we went to do morning study with I. and, as usual, he fed us a great meal.  We can never leave his house without eating amazing food, which I don’t mind at all. Then the rest of the afternoon we went back to finish cleaning up the hoarder house.  The evening was completely filled with appointments.  My miracle was going to be having 0 citas fall through, but unfortunately the last one fell.  After our last appointment, we found our miracle.
Miracle #46: We met a person who was just moving in and they turned out to be less active.  She was very receptive to our message and she said that she wants to come back to church.
November 8, 2014
            Today was insane!  It went from listening to a prophet of the Lord, Elder Nelson, to getting stopped on the street by a drunk suicidal old prostitute.  We also met a very obnoxious atheist sociologist who tried to convince us that God was a fabrication of men.  I was glad for two things, one that I have taken sociology so I understand that lingo, and two that I have a very good friend who is an atheist so that I know that they are not all jerks like this guy was. We had the funniest lesson with H. today when we asked him if he could move something with only his faith (thus leading to a discussion of the necessity of works).  He scrunched up his face and did what resembled using the Force.  I almost lost it.   We were fasting today and when we stopped by 2 families and told them we couldn’t eat with them because we were fasting, they gave us a delicious feast to eat later!  That was one of the many miracles today.  But my favorite miracle was when we stopped to have a conversation with a dude washing his car.
Miracle #47:  Car washing dude turned out to be an inactive returned missionary, and also happens to be married to a lady we met while door contacting yesterday.
November 9, 2014
            Sundays, for some reason, are the days that I am able to understand the most Spanish.  I really felt for the first time that I might be fluent today.  To be fair, I was humbled when I accidently said a really bad word today.  Fortunately it was just in front of the missionaries.  It was bound to happen sometime. 
My miracle of the day happened with little Max in church.  I play the piano for the music in church and during the sacrament I just sit at the piano bench.  When I sat down with my companion and Max after the sacrament, Max was so excited to tell me something. 
Miracle #48: Max told me he had received his answer, the one he has been praying for.  He said he felt so happy and that made me really happy for him!
My mother keeps asking me about the “pilot plan” here in our mission.  Basically we are the guinea pig mission for this new type of missionary focus.  Instead of the emphasis being 100% on baptism, the new pilot program has an emphasis of 30% baptism, 30% reactivation, 20% retention, 20% member work/teaching.  So those are the only numbers that we report and there is really not a lot of emphasis in our mission on numbers.  Meaning that the percentages are more of goals that help us divide our time rather than requirements. I love this plan as do most missionaries and it is working in our mission!  So that is the pilot plan and that is why Elder Nelson came to our mission to check up on how it was working for us.
November 10, 2014
            We had a really good teaching day, not very eventful, but just some good lessons.  The miracle of the day happened with our planned family home evening.  Max wanted to go, but he is too young to accompany us on his own.  His mom wasn’t able to come, but then his previously unreceptive father agreed to come with us.
Miracle #49: Max’s dad came to family home evening and listened to a really good lesson about the atonement.
November 11, 2014
            Today Elder Kimball had to get his ingrown toenail taken out….which he got by playing soccer so Mom, you are right about soccer.  I was doing divisions with his new companion, and my new housemate, Elder Ocarez.  El es Capo (he’s a boss!)  I could learn so much from him and I hope to in the future.  We really only had 3 lessons today, but Elder O. taught me how far I have to go as a teacher.  He set a baptismal date with one of our investigators and he teaches with so much power!  I can’t believe how much I have to learn.  I feel inadequate, but I know that I am supposed to be here right now.  My miracle was with H. today.
Miracle #50: For the first time in a month of lessons, H. actually understood 100% of what we taught (probably having a native speaker helps!)

Ups and downs


Climbing whatever
October 29, 2014

         I am so glad that I only had 2 nights of ingrown toenail incarceration.  I got to go and play soccer with the zone today (sorry mom – I promised her I wouldn’t take the chance of dislocating my knee again.)  That was fun other than the fact that I might as well be a midget running around with giants.  I seriously cannot run worth squat on my little fat-kid legs.  They just don’t move fast or far.  Elder Kimball (my temporary companion) LOVES running so we ran nearly 2 miles back to the house and that absolutely sucked, but I did it!  I also managed to not scream like a little girl while taking and ice cold shower…instead I screamed like a man.  Just kidding, I was having a hard time breathing let alone screaming!

Miracle #37: I didn’t get injured while playing soccer.

October 20, 2014

         Today was a good day for learning.  I was on divisions with Davis (who has his mission call but is waiting to leave.)  I was suppose to give a lesson in Spanish all by myself. I must admit to being distracted by the gunfire that erupted outside of the house where I was teaching.  While the little kids all ducked down under the furniture, I just calmly moved away from the window and just kept on teaching.

Miracle #38: I actually gave an entire lesson by myself and was understood!

          We also had a great service project cleaning out the hoarder house of the devil.  Yeah, I kid you not, the house number was 666 and that place just shouldn’t exist. 



October 31, 2014

         We had the coolest day every today.  After our studies, we went to start finding old investigators from lists and that’s when we found 3 strong contacts. 

Miracle #39:  We met a man named M. who said that he was busy but he let us in anyway and we taught a lesson.  He was actually quite interested and he said that he felt that he would like to be baptized.  He was baptized as a baby, but he
never felt that was the right thing to do.  He wants to be baptized when it is his choice.
         Later we taught the law of chastity lesson to H.  He understood us and even felt a little sorry for us teaching this difficult subject. W ran into our favorite little investigator M. on the streets.  His parents were in the house so we were able to go in and teach him the 10 commandments.  That was a great surprise lesson.  But, the best lesson was with I. who is the coolest guy.  He knows that out message is true, but he wants to learn more doctrine before he commits to baptism.

November 1, 2014

         It is a well known fact that I am going to struggle with getting along with companions 24/7. My parents and siblings all predicted that this would be my greatest trial and so far they are correct.  Anyway, my miracle today came in the form of overcoming my natural tendencies to become irritated by my companion. This is a big deal for me because it tells me that there is hope for change.

Miracle #40:  I started to share a brief scripture and wanted to follow-up with a tiny thought when my companion interrupted me and took over the lesson entirely.  Miraculously, I did not loose my very hot temper.

         This weekend is Stake Conference and I get to play a musical number.  It is my favorite one, the one that I played at my brother and sister’s farewell, the one that I closed with in my senior recital, and the one that I played in the CTM; the Josh Wright “How Great Thou Art medley.” 

November 2, 2014

         Not much to note today other than my musical number went well and I had a teaching miracle.  About 2 weeks ago we talked to a man with a mental disability at a bus stop.  We lost his correct address and I was bummed out until…

Miracle #41: While we were trying to locate another potential investigator, the first door that we knocked on was this disabled man’s door!  We were shocked!

         We had a lesson with him and during it he got a call from his mother.  He told her that he had some friends over and that they were teaching him about Jesus.  She wanted to talk to us and I was a little scared she would be upset with us.  Instead, she thanked us for helping her son and asked us to continue to teach him.  WOW! 

         On a side note, I am talking in Spanish all the time now and it is a great feeling to feel my fluency level rise.

Sorting through the fardo ties.
November 3, 2014

         Today was a boring morning of meetings because my companion is district leader.  I got pulled aside by my mission president and told that he did not like my choice for my musical number in stake conference because he thought is was too showy.  I must admit that it hurt my feelings. I have played that number lots of times before (including in front of mission presidencies and stake presidencies) and I have never been told that before. Oh well, life goes on, and I have learned that I will only play piano solos if someone provides me with mission president approved music.

          My miracle for the day didn’t happen until after a family home evening lesson where we were accompanied by M. and H. (two of our other investigators) to another family’s home.  I talked with the wife of the family for a long time and she told me something that blew my mind about when we first met them. When we first met them, we weren’t looking for them.  Someone told us to ask at their house and they let us in.  Turns out that they had been taught by many elders before, but there was no record of it in our area book.  Due to this lack of records, we knew nothing about them and thus we had sincere and genuine interest in getting to know them. 

Miracle #42: Our investigator noticed our sincere desire to know and understand her and her family and was touched.  They could feel our love for them and the Lord’s love for them and it softened their hearts to our message.  

November 4, 2014

         We had another meeting today for Elder S.  I learned that there are new missionaries coming in which moves me out of the greenie spot to a regular junior companion spot.  We had a good lesson with I. today, but otherwise is was pretty boring…not even a miracle unless you count:

Miracle #43: I am no longer the newest missionary in the field.


Saturday, November 1, 2014

Finally a PHONE!



October 22, 2014
         Today was great! We started p-day early to get a 40 kg sack of ties called a Fardo.  It cost about 11 dollars per person and there are some treasures in it!  After going through the mountain of ties for an hour, we got some super ass…(Ass is a type of food here and it is a missionary joke.)  I earned some super Ass after single-handedly carrying that fardo for literally more than a mile.  It was VERY hard.  We only had 2 citas today and both of them fell through.  One of them was a 3.5 mile walk during which our miracle happened.  We had our young investigator with us and I felt so bad for him having to walk all that way without anything to show for it.
Miracle #30: About .75 kilometers from our destination, we asked a gut how far we were from Santa Rosa and he gave us a ride in his truck!!
After this nightmare, we found out that the person lived WAY out of our sector.  We were finally able to drop M. off at the futbol workshop at the capilla. We went and did our shopping but were unable to finish.  On the way back we ran into a crying and distraught man who came from a cancelled workshop.  We walked with him and comforted him, finally making it back to our house.  All in all we walked 10.76 miles by the rough estimate of the awesome step counter I got in my package.                            October 23, 2014
         Today was another day.  We had our last meeting with the president which was fun actually.  I personally think he is the best president possible.
Miracle # 31: We got our phone back!!!
         Other than that, the only real noteworthy part of the day was when we/I told D. that now that he has his mission call, he will feel Satan working harder than ever to tempt and discourage him.  He went all quiet and after a moment, he said that he already felt it.
October 24, 2014
         Today was full of literally miracle after miracle. 
Miracle # 32: Not a single cita fell through and we have 3 new potential investigators.        
        The first real thing we did was go to the bishop’s storehouse with one of our investigators.  Elder S. got to learn all of her backstory.  I say Elder S. because I sort of zoned out once I realized how similar her story was to my oldest sister’s problems.  She has a very tough life.  After the storehouse, we had a lesson with an 11 year old kid who can’t read.  He is this little tiny kid and I don’t think that he gets much to eat or any help with his school. After that lesson, we took our young investigator M. to meet with Humberto. We had a great lesson and then we went to another appointment and taught a family home evening lesson that was mas o menos.  Finally, the last appointment of the day was with I.  We were really looking forward to teaching him because he is always very prepared. Unfortunately we dread his forbidden-fruit Jennifer Lopez look-alike daughter.  Wow! 
         I feel like many of our successes and miracles are directly related to the more meaningful and specific prayers that we decided to start offering yesterday.
October 25, 2014         
Miracle #33: While teaching a lesson to a drunk man, he said that he sincerely wished all of the blessings that he has ever received to be ours….  God loves everyone.       
        The worst/best part of the day was when our drunk investigator hugged us goodbye and he KISSED my neck.  No me gusto.
October 26, 2014
         Today was ….a Sunday. Really our day started out at 5 am when we went to a Capilla Abierta at another sector and we were doing street contacts. 
Miracle #34: We met a man who we had contacted weeks ago and found out that because of our reference, he is taking lessons and reading the Book of Mormon!           
        We had two other lessons and one was the object lesson that I used to do with the missionaries in Washington with the push-ups and candy.  If I do enough pushups, then the other person gets to have a piece of candy.  It shows that no matter if we accept Christ or not, he still will do whatever it takes to pay for our sins.  We can chose to accept his sacrifice or not, but whether or not we choose to use the atonement, He will pay the price.  I did the pushups and the person in the lesson got to choose whether they wanted the candy or not.  I ended up doing the pushups and busted out 215.  It was a good lesson.
 Our other lesson was with a less-active woman who is trying to come back to church.  She is insanely attractive and it is hard for me to remember Spanish.  Seriously, I kind of don’t look forward to sitting through lessons and not being able to make eye contact because she is so unfairly gorgeous. I have decided that apart from PMS, women are God’s greatest creation by far.
October 27. 2014
         Today, in a word, was LONG.  Elder S. has a crazy bad ingrowntoenail so we had to take a 3 hour trip to visit a doctor who said we needed ot come back tomorrow.  My miracle happened en route:
Miracle #35: I held a full conversation by myself with a Chilena in the metro.      
        We are going to go on divisions with other missionaries tomorrow because for the next 2 days, Elder S. won’t be allowed to walk and we have some solid citas.  That means we can’t do anything on p-day, which is actually fine by me.  I would like a day to be able to sleep. 
October 28, 2014
         Today was really boring.  Elder C. is pretty lazy so we didn’t do any contacts at all and we spent so much time in the house.  My miracle was this:
Miracle #36: I went the entire afternoon without a lick of English and I didn’t die at all.        
        By the definition of missionary fluency, I am fluent, so my companion says.  He claims that if I can understand 80% of the language and speak my mind (which I am eternally blessed that I can), then I am fluent.  So the rest of the day was extremely boring.  I can’t do anything and I have already studied for 4-5 hours. I hope that Elder S.’s toe heals quickly for more than one reason.  As much as missionary work is exhausting and frustrating, it is at least work...and work is good.