Shovels, Spasms, and "Sand"wiches

It's always great to hear that our favorite daughter is happy and doing well!  I'm sure you'll enjoy the following email as much as we all did!

Greetings!

I am a happy, happy lady. I have had a wonderful week and it's now Christmastime and my heart is jiggling around so much I keep checking for Bill Cosby. (<--- NOT funny, I'm sorry. When will I learn?)

Where do I even start? Well, first of all, there was a cute miracle that occured last Monday. Right after I finished e-mailing we went home to drop something off before heading to our dinner appointment. I checked the mail and there was a letter from C* (a recent convert from Boston). When I opened up the envelope, approximately 800 cat pictures/stickers/calendar cut outs fell out. She knew that I love cats and included a bunch of cat memorabilia for me. So cute of her. So that was just so nice and perfect timing because I was still a little (<--pronounced, "a lot") weepy about learning that my sweet Zorro had died. Then we went to our dinner appointment and they have 6 cats so I was a happy girl. It was nice of God to let things work out that way for me.

Here's some exciting news: P* is officially the newest member of the Boston 1st ward!!! Isn't that amazing? He was baptized at 12:30 yesterday, EST (in case anyone wants to thoroughly document that in their memoir). I was invited to come up and even got permission from President and the APs (which is remarkable because we couldn't find a member to drive us up and we definitely didn't have the miles to drive ourselves without going over our limit) to drive up to Boston and we had everything arranged and I was SO excited. But then I remembered that the ward had asked us to do sharing time this week because it's all about how they can prepare now to be missionaries. So that was a bit of a bummer, but the Church is just as true and the ordinance just as official, even without me having been there. So I'm really happy that that happened!

On Wednesday we went to a dinner appointment and I got to meet our kind of investigator, J*. He's the husband of one of the ladies in the ward. He's really, really nice and really, really not interested in learning more about our church. But he's cordial and just a great guy. He's SO funny (not in a stand-up comedian kind of way, he's just a funny guy, you know?)

Do you remember how I had a regular feature in my e-mails while I was companions with Sister Edwards called, "Sister Edwards says the darndest things"? Well, I have enough material to start that up again for Sister Vicente. Only now it's even funnier in some ways because English is not her first language and she has an adorable accent (Sister V if you ever read this, I'm sorry. (She hates it when people say her accent is cute!)). The other night we were looking through a Walmart catalogue that they stuck in our bag (did you know Walmart started their black Friday sale on THURSDAY? Come on, people!!) and there was a stupid-looking boy with even stupider hair. I said, (with a bit of attitude), "Why does that kid have such ugly hair??" and without missing a beat she looked at me and said, "His mom!" hahaha. I will have to be sure to write the quotes down more, 'cause she's full of them.

Thanksgiving Day was just wonderful. We headed over for the big meal around noon and it was great! Amazing food, and so fun to be around the kids (<--- who AM I???) After we ate we played some games (Sorry, Apples to Apples, and Candyland) we headed over to see C* and W* (our recent convert and investigator, respectively). They were both doing well — it was their first Thanksgiving in the States (since they're both from Ecuador) but they seemed to have caught on just fine since they offered us apple pie when we walked in. haha. Then we headed to another family in our ward for a dessert party. Surprisingly, I was able to escape all three of these houses while only consuming a total of 1.5 pieces of pie. Isn't that impressive? Don't worry, our neighbors gave us some pie last night and I've subsequently negated all my hard work on the actual holiday :)

J*, our wonderful friend and kind of investigator that I told you about last week, had an amazing Thanksgiving as well! She texted us Tuesday and told us that since her two kids were going to be away for the holiday (her husband passed away a few years ago) she was going to drive up to Sharon, Vermont and spend Thanksgiving at Joseph Smith's birthplace, being thankful for the Restoration of the true Church. Isn't that incredible? She is one of the most golden people I've ever met (in every sense of the word).

On Friday we had our first District Meeting with our new district leader, Elder Ramos. He was with me in Boston for one transfer, then he got transferred down here to NH, and then I followed him the next transfer! So fun. He is a wonderful missionary and it's nice to see that he really takes his calling seriously. He gave me the most specific training assignment I've ever heard of. It was so funny when he called me and said, "I want you to give a training on Doctrine and Covenants Section 20, verse 17 up through the first comma. Use verses 8-16 as support." haha. But I did as requested, and, as usual, I learned a whole bunch! I love teaching. I love preparing to teach. I feel like I need to be a teacher when I grow up.

Saturday we got to spend the whole day doing Mormon Helping Hands again! Do you remember a couple weeks ago when I talked about shoveling sand for 2 hours? Well, I more than TRIPLED that! Woohoo. We shoveled (and hauled sledfuls and wheelbarrow-fuls to the beach) for 7 1/2 hours (with a 25 minute break for lunch). It was inTENSE. I spent a couple hours in a crawlspace (alternating between being on my hands and knees and sitting) using a number 10 can to dig up sand (GREAT for my obliques!) and plop it into a sled. My goodness. It was hard, hard work but it was so good! The individual tendons and ligaments (I honestly don't know whether they're tendons or ligaments or something else all together) in my palm are strained and bruised. Good battle wounds. I don't say this to complain, because I really would do it all again. And, in fact, we DID do it all again YESTERDAY. Since we didn't finish the project on Saturday we headed back down with the elders and shoveled for 3 more hours. Have you ever heard the phrase, "I feel like I got hit by a truck"? Well, I got to teach that to Sister Vicente this morning as she struggled to find the words to describe how she felt. haha.

Once again, some wonderful citizens dropped off food for us volunteers! It was windy and FREEZING (right on the water!) and everything I ate was nice and gritty. I even ate some sandy donut holes right off the ground. That's how much the labor worked up my appetite! :)

The more I deal with sand, the more I am amazed by Abraham 3:14. Do you KNOW how much sand there is? I was just working at one house in one neighborhood on one beach in one city in one state in one country on one continent! HOLY COW. If that's not at least a googolplex, I don't know WHAT the heck is. One Elder kept muttering under his breath with every increasingly belabored shovelful, "STUPID Abraham's SEED!!" And Dad, you're exactly right. It was so great, Sister Vicente started singing, "The wise man built his house upon the rock" on Saturday and it has never seemed more appropriate.

Sunday was a good day, even though it was hard to move much less get out of bed, pray, shower, get ready, and leave by 7:30 to make it to Ward Council at 8:00! We had a really good Sacrament Meeting (and we had 5 less-actives there! A personal record for me. Woot woot!) and I had a good epiphany. I remembered (and I think I told you about this) that one week in the Oxford ward, someone said something to the effect of, "You find what you're looking for" and mentioned specifically that if you are looking for things that are good, you'll see them, but if you're looking for/expecting things that will annoy you or other faults, you'll be able to find them. I think missionaries too often focus on the faults of their wards. Thinking things like Ugh, I wish the leaders would involve us more or why doesn't the bishop get that we're here to help? For me, it's been mostly why are people so apathetic? Care about something, people! And also complaints about how loud our Sacrament Meeting is because apparently no one in this ward believes in taking their screaming children OUT of the room. BUT I realized that there is so much good to be found! I looked at the screaming fighting children sitting in front of me and I realized that they are probably just having a bad day, and at least they are growing up in a home with the gospel and with parents who love them unconditionally. In the people who fall asleep during Sacrament Meeting I saw an effort to at least show up and do the best they can, rather than being frustrated that they weren't taking things seriously. It was a nice moment to realize that there is good to be found in every situation, and, at least for me (but I feel fairly confident in calling this a universal principle) it is easier to be happy when we focus on and actively look for those good things.

Like I mentioned earlier, we got to do sharing time in both Junior and Senior Primary. I was reminded of my lack of patience. All the leaders were laughing to themselves as I would raise my eyebrows and say (in a somewhat-grumpy tone) things like, "I'm going to need you to give me the answer in a non-yelling way." and "Okay, how about we DON'T be annoying, and we listen to me because I'm actually the one in charge right now." I think the kids appreciated it though. I tried to be not only disapproving, but also fun. Come to think of it, that's probably a very lucrative business idea! "Melissa's Nannying Service: Not only disapproving, but also fun!"

Well, I hope that all things are well back at the ranch. Andrew gave me some good words of wisdom after I asked him for help in keeping my mind focused. He said that it's not bad to be excited to come home. It's not even bad to think about home! It only gets bad when that gets in the way of work. So I've been making an extra effort to be mentally disciplined this week and I have had miraculous results - I am really being blessed because mental discipline is probably one of my biggest weaknesses! I am Ether 12:27ing to the max.

I love you! Thanks for writing, thanks for the Christmas package. Thanks for your prayers and your love and your thoughtfulness. I am happy, healthy, and growing/improving in innumerable (just like the seed of Abraham! ha!) ways.

Love,

Sister "I can't wait for December 1st so I can start my advent calendar!" Broekhuijsen

P.S. Here's a happy birthday shout out to my dear mother! Everyone, please wish her a good day on Sunday!