More Thermals Please!

Hello all!

I've decided my emails need a bit of spicing up. I fear they're getting a little same-y and that would be unfortunately boring. Because boring the life of a missionary isn't! So today I'll give you a bit of the Good, the Bad, and the Strange of Oscoda, MI.

The Good: Three new investigators! This past Thursday, Elder Valentine and I taught the three sisters of a recent convert the message of the restoration. It was my first time really doing that, so I was really excited. We met them at a member family's home for dinner at 5:30. The food was delicious and the conversation, though not exceptionally lively, was fun. Our lesson, however, went oh so well! I felt very comfortable as we were teaching, the girls asked questions and participated, the member family was extremely helpful, and the Spirit was incredibly strong. I felt like leaping for joy I felt so good! The three sisters all seemed very excited to read from the Book of Mormon for themselves and agreed to pray about it. We'll be seeing them again this next Thursday; I'm extremely optimistic.

The Bad: It's cold in the winter and we've been doing a lot of walking. Really. A! Lot! Of! Walking! We're only allowed to use 1250 miles/month on our car and we've already used over 900, notwithstanding we have at least one more 120-mile round trip to make for district meeting this Wednesday. We can't be blamed for using up our miles, though; we lost over 300 of them the first day we had the car because it had to be driven from Grand Rapids to Mt. Pleasant and then to Oscoda. Plus, we have to go to West Branch (60 miles away) for district meeting once a week and we have significant amounts of work to do in Tawas (15 miles away) and Hale (30 miles away), where we teach our three new investigators. So, we've been spending every day in Oscoda we can. Walking. We walked 30 minutes to church yesterday, an hour to do our home teaching, 45 minutes to visit a less-active sister and this all in dress shoes! I suppose I should quit my whining. It hasn't snowed and stuck yet. And at least I have legs; it would be harder without them!

The Strange: We stopped by the home of a contact we have. He wasn't home but some teenage boy was. We asked him to tell our contact that the missionaries had stopped by. As we were walking away, he popped back out of the house: "Wait. Like, the missionaries that kill people?"
I was totally confused. Luckily, Elder Valentine recognized his mistake. "Oh, uh, no, I think those are mercenaries."
"Oh. Right. Well, seeya!"
Those crazy Michiganders ...

Anyway, all is well in Oscoda. I think I'm slowly but surely improving as I strive to work harder, be more obedient, and do more to leave my comfort zone. Being a missionary is pretty much basically a good thing. For sure!

Love you all,
Elder Cloward