It's a Small World

July 4, 2010
Dear Mom and Dad,
I don't know exactly where to begin with this last week. I left you with a promising feeling of the work here recently but this last week it seemed to take a couple hard turns. It happens all the time in missionary work though so nothing too shocking. Selerihna was not able to get baptized yet. She had a little setback but the plan was set again for this upcoming Friday. That may or may not happen though. I'll explain in a minute. Selerihna is doing well though. She picked herself back up really well I am impressed and also happy that she learned the lesson she did about picking herself back up and pushing forward. She will be a lot stronger for what she has learned now.
We had a crazy experience the other night while finding people. We came up to a house and outside was an older looking couple. After talking to them a few minutes we found out they came from the states about three weeks before. They have a lot of children and other family there that they visited. They were gone for 7 years and would stay with someone for a while then move on to the next. They would also get jobs while all of that was going on. They lived in Hawaii, North and South Carolina, California, Utah, and....RENO! They lived in Reno for a year in Sparks it sounded like. They didn't know for sure but she did say that she worked at Fitzgerald's casino and after it went bankrupt went to Club Calneva. They got baptized in the church while living in Hawaii and were members for the rest of their time. They told me all about the Bishops of Reno and Utah they met. It is such a small world. They are living with some family here though that we taught and there is a man there who is possibly the most prepared person I have ever met on my mission. He has great questions and feels like the Lord has put everything together for us seeing him. It is my belief that he will be baptized in the near future. Probably within about 2 months. We have cycled through a lot of other investigators lately. We met those people when we were getting a little down emotionally about everything. Almost all of our appointments from Monday to Friday seemed to just fall through and nobody was home for us to meet with us. It was rough. Things may be getting better though.
Last night we got some news that is not the greatest. We were going to go to Guam on Saturday for zone leader council so we made appointments on other days and had Selerihna's baptism planned but while calling Guam to give them our numbers we found out that we will be leaving on Thursday instead. The plane on Saturday was full so now we have to leave Thursday and will come back the next Monday. That takes a big chunk out of our schedule and may disrupt Selerihna's baptism. We are going to tell her tonight and see if she will be fine with the branch just taking care of everything. I hope so. If not we will have to push it back until next week. Keep your fingers crossed.
Tomorrow President Dowdle will fly in for zone conference. Tomorrow all the other missionaries will have their interviews and we will have a little time to talk with President. Then on Wednesday we will have our zone conference. I am nervous about having to give a training. We are training on chapter 4 in Preach My Gospel which is all about the Spirit. We have some good stuff planned that will be a lot of fun but it really depends on how much of a discussion the zone will turn it into. Discussion is what helps make zone conference great.
My exchange with Elder Standage was a lot of fun. I really don't have too much to say about it. We had fun and taught some people. Just typical missionary stuff. haha.
Oh I sent off my eye exam papers for the driver's license last week. Let me know if you got that. I may need a license here soon. Everything should be ready on it.
It sounds like your trip in Utah has been fun. You make with jealous with all the golfing going on. It sounds like Dad may need to put the driver in the bag though. haha jk. Just wait until I come home then I'll give you the perfect example of how not to hit a driver.
I'm sorry to hear that everything with Uncle Roland is going rough. I still keep him in my prayers.
Well, I guess that covers my week. I hope that the rest of your trip in Utah is fun. Thank you for everything that you do for me.
Love Always,
Elder Kevin South

p.s. Tell everyone else I say hi and give them all my love.