03/31/07

Eh Yo,
Yet another week down and back to another letter. Crazy how time flies. This week went really fast. Probably because I’ve been so busy at work this week. I finally moved offices. I’m out of the Printing building and now I have two offices in the Bindery building. I still need to get my stuff out of my working office over there and into the new office over there. I have half of my stuff in my new office now because I moved it from Printing and honestly, I don’t know how I’m going to fit my bindery office in there now too. I’m out of room already. We’ll see. So with the move and all of my regular work, I’ve been super busy, but that’s not even the half of what my week consisted of at work. I jumped right into my interrogations that I learned in Vegas. Holy COW!! This stuff is crazy Mike! You would not believe what it can do. I am amazed at every interrogation that I’ve done so far. I have done 8 of them now and not a single one has slipped something past me. I mean, it’s such a long story that I don’t know how much detail I can go into, but my first one, I was a little nervous because there is so much to remember and do and look for that I wasn’t sure I would be able to do it all, but I went through it with as much confidence as I could muster since confidence is one of the most important things you have to maintain in these. And the guy I was going to interrogate is a very controlling, strong willed, know it all type that would try to control the interview and that is something else that is essential to maintain is control of the interview. You have to cut the subject off as soon as they start into any kind of controlling dialogue and never let them control even 1 second of the interview. This was going to be a tough task with this guy too, since he’s a manager and everything. But as I went through my script I laid out the night before, it was so weird how everything played out exactly as they said it would. Honestly, if I said one thing, he would say almost word for word what they said he would say. I noticed the queues he was giving me subconsciously and I started narrowing in my scope based on my suspicions and what he was telling me through is actions and body language. I knew exactly when he was lying to me and when he was being truthful. I continued to tighten the noose as I noticed certain things based on my questions and suspicions until finally I told him after his 3rd denial and him trying to rush me through my questions that the investigation was very clear at this point. By this time in the interview I had still not used the word YOU or done any kind of accusation of him at all. This is the non-accusatory method I was using. There is an accusatory method too that is much more confrontational and intense, but the non-accusatory is much harder to get a confession because you never even accuse them, but instead, use implied accusations and test for submission through other questions that imply you know everything. This is the method you use when you have no evidence, which we didn’t at this point. I noticed him going into submission (as they call it) in about 12 minutes into this interrogation. I picked up where you go from this sign and moved in for the full confession and had it at 15 minutes in. They say if you are good, it will take an average of 22 minutes for a full confession. I was stoked. I couldn’t believe I nailed it so well on my first one. I got a little bit braggadocios about the whole thing and was pretty pleased with all the attention I was getting from the management team, until the next day when we fired him and I saw the pain in his face and realized just how much this affected him. It sunk in pretty deep when I realized my involvement in this whole thing and had a big time humbling moment. Not that I felt bad for outing him, because I knew it was his decision to make, but for some reason, I couldn’t remove the personal level out of this where I’ve always been able to do that with ever termination. I felt personally responsible for this one for some weird reason. I actually had a weird melt down the following day after his termination when I was debriefing my boss, the VP of HR. I don’t really know why, but I just got emotional and confused as to why. But it was good, he kind of worked me through it since his back ground is in psychology anyway. So I got a free therapy session out of it. Since then I have done 7 more, all this week which led to 2 more terminations and several probations. Only 3 out of 14 were not involved. I was shocked. I may still do a few more next week, but we’ll see. I have felt fine about the others, it’s just the first one, it was really weird. My boss refers to me like I’m his secret weapon that he can use if people won’t talk. Actually at the end of the week, there were two pressmen who came forward to him and asked if they could tell him everything because they didn’t want to talk to Travis. Ha ha. So the word is getting out that you can’t lie to Travis and he’ll extract information from you that you never thought anyone could. It’s such a mind bender. I sort of can’t wait till boys start rolling around here when Brinlee and Aynslee are teenagers. They are in trouble!
Well, I just watched the first session of conference and then went out and changed the oil in both the C-RV and my Truck. I need to go take a shower and get ready for the 2:00 to start. I only have ten minutes before it does. I really liked Jeffrey R. Holland’s talk the best from the first session so far. Good stuff on relationships! I’ll check back in after that.
Well, now the Sunday morning session is over. I really liked Pres. Faust’s talk on the healing power of forgiveness. Pretty powerful. Speaking of powerful, how awesome was the closing hymn in last night’s Priesthood’s session? That was my favorite thing of the whole session. The talks were good, but that closing hymn had chills running throughout my body from start to finish. Good stuff.
Let’s get to your letters now. I’m way excited to hear about Janet. How golden and prepared was she? Great job on her. It’s so awesome to take an investigator from finding them, to teaching the, resolving their concerns, committing them and baptizing them. You have such a bond with them when you go from beginning to end with them. Way to go! Sounds like she has a good support system in place with that ward already too. That’s way awesome! Did a bunch of her family show up for the baptism? Anything come from that? Are you going to be teaching or referring any of them for missionaries elsewhere? Your pictures are only taking up like 1 Gig. All the others I have on CDs for you, so it’s no big. When I hit 4 Gig on your new pics, I’ll dump them all to a DVD. That’s what the problem has been is that your pics are taking too many CDs to fit in a standard CD wallet. So I’m going to put the rest on DVDs now before I take them off my computer. Then when you get home, you can put them all on your computer or on your own external hard drive or something. I think you are wise taking on Jesus the Christ later on in your mission. I needed the base from the scriptures myself to get the understanding from Jesus the Christ that I got almost at the end of my mission. As a result, it went from one of the most confusing and hard books to read at the beginning of my mission to probably my favorite book ever when I read it at the end of my mission. But let me know when you get into it and what your thoughts are.
Well, I finished watching the last session of conference. I have to say I liked L. Tom Perry’s testimony. It was about as bold and powerful as I have seen him lay it down. It was sweet. I also liked Henry B. Eyring’s talk about “are we doing all that we can do”. I was starting to sort of tune out and fall asleep about that point, but I don’t know what caught my attention, but I perked up, listened a little more intently and got a ton out of that. In fact, since I’m coming up on my month for teaching in EQ next month, I think I might use that when I get called to teach. The EQ presidency has to teach once or twice during their month they are basically on call. So I think I’m going to prepare something from that talk. I was jazzed about it. After conference, it was time to head over to ma’s and pa’s to visit with your ward missionary guy form Rock Hill. We waited for about an hour and it was time to get going on some food. So we grubbed, watched some funniest home videos and finally decided to call him cuz I had to go. Dad left a message, then we watched a little more TV, then called Don who’s having some kind of surgery up in his Colon or something. Then he called and said that he wasn’t coming because he got hung up at another dinner appointment he was at. So I bailed, Stosh bailed and Grandpa was right on my heels too, so we all split. Oh well. That would have been cool to talk about that in this letter. I guess he might come over tomorrow, but I don’t think any of us can make it. I have to get into my homework that I’m WAY, WAY behind on right now. So I’m going to throw in my quote of the week and get going.
Quote this week is based on my impressions of the way you found Janet:

“The Missionary’s morning prayer: ‘Father lead me this day to a family, that I can fulfill my purpose – I will testify unto them by thy power without hesitancy or fear – and will lead them by the power of the Spirit to baptism into they kingdom.”
-Alvin R. Dyer
I am glad to see your humility saying how the Lord “flopped” someone right in your lap, but then you have to fulfill your purpose, which requires you both to be living righteously and being receptive enough to recognize those opportunities too. Then testifying to them boldly that this is the Lord’s church, just like L. Tom Perry did today. Move their spirits to feeling where they cannot deny feeling the truthfulness of your bold testimony. And then lead them by the power of the spirit as you teach them enough to accept and commit to live the commandments and come into the Lord’s kingdom through baptism.
I’m so proud of you Mike for that baptism and the fact that you are training a new missionary right now. This will be such a growth period for you, to be a trainer. You will learn more about yourself and even from yourself as you teach all that you know to this new missionary. You will work harder than you have worked before, because you have so much more to prove, being a senior missionary, a trainer who has been trusted to groom a new missionary with good habits that will last his whole two years. You are being groomed for other things too. Prove your merit through this first real test. This is the most influential leadership calling you will receive. As much as missionaries look up to their DL’s, ZL’s or AP’s, you never have as much influence over another missionary as you have when training them. Teach him everything you know and continue to learn together. This really will be a huge growth and learning time for you. Continue to keep that humble attitude you had in your letter to Mom and Dad. You will learn a ton from this new guy too. I remember when I was training my first greenie Schweitzer. I got a little bit proud with him and thought I had achieved veteran status at my ripe old age of 6 months out. But I had a whole lot more to learn. Sure, I worked the crap out of him, but I was not very teachable. We had the Sylvia Benson experience together. That lady who was possessed and started talking in different evil voices. He knew from the moment we were in there that we should leave. He told me several times that we should leave. I kept telling him to calm down, everything was under control. I didn’t feel very easy in there, but he was feeling the spirit and taking the cues that I should have been way earlier than I finally got the hint. I should have listened to him in that instance. After having him a month, I finally figured out that I was really learning a lot from him too, as hard as it was to believe that. The next month with him was super educational for both of us and we had a lot of great success together. The Lord sends trainers a greenie as a 50/50 growth experience. You have a responsibility to teach him, but you also have a 50% responsibility to learn from him too. You are being thrown a real learning experience here, so keep up that attitude you had. You are always impressing me with the way you learn these lessons so much earlier than I did. Every week I’m more proud of you and I can’t wait to hear what’s next.
I love you and miss you every day. I sometimes wish you were back already, especially now that it’s warm and spring like and I want to play some tennis, but I’d rather have you out there soaking up knowledge like a sponge and growing even closer to the Savior and Heavenly Father than you ever will be able to again. What a thing, missions. I get trunky for mine every so often. I’m feeling it now that conference is just over and I think about your ward mission leader being out here and writing you a letter and that you just got called to train. What awesome memories. Keep up on your journal. Stay obedient. Love your Greeny as you teach him every good habit and bit of knowledge you have. Enjoy this stage of your mission and your life.

Love,

Trav

Mike called as a Trainer

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03/25/07

Yo Boyo,
This letter won’t be as long as usual. I have been super busy with that class I took down in Vegas. That was Wednesday through late Friday night. I got home around 3:30 AM Saturday morning. My flight was delayed about an hour because the airport there was so busy and backed up. It was OK though, because I made good friends with these two old ladies that stayed at my hotel and who rode the shuttle with me to the airport. We all flew out about the same time, so we had about 3 hours to kill. So we hung out together just chatting it up about everything. They were cool. One from Florida and the other from Ohio. It was nice to have someone to talk with. The whole trip was kind of lonely for me. I made friends with some peeps in my class, but we weren’t hanging out after class or anything, basically because everyone was going to strip clubs and what not afterward. So I was happy to be a home body during the trip and stay in my room the whole time, as lonely as that was. I did some work while I was in there, watched some sports center on ESPN and some classic boxing matches like George Foreman vs. Evander Holyfield. Ate some Panda Express, watched some pigeons venture into my 8th story room from my little balcony I had but then fly out when they realized I was right there. That was about it. Time went fast there though. But I was getting bored and lonely. The training was good. I’m actually starting an investigation tomorrow (Monday) already, using that method to get a confession from a manager who has been doing some things he shouldn’t. I’m looking forward to trying it out and getting the practice. I have to say, watching tapes on these interviews actually conducted, seeing and hearing examples and even watching the instructor use it on some peeps in the room for demonstration purposes, it’s very impressive the way it works. I’m excited to use it when the girls get a little older and I start interviewing (Interrogating) the boys who come over. Mwah ha ha ha ha!!!! They are in so much trouble!
Last night I went to an Odyssey Dance Theater show with John at Kingsbury Hall. It had some peeps from So You Think You Can Dance in it. I know that was your favorite show as well as mine, so I bring that up. It was so good! I loved it. I love cool dance things like that. John loved it and in fact has season passes to this company’s dance shows and I told him that if he likes that stuff, the show on Fox is all that and more. I told him he’d love it. He denied it though and tried holding strong like you did. But mark my word. I have a strategy that involves Lynn Marie who loved that show too, and come early summer time, I will own him. He will become a huge fan of that show! Hear me now and believe me later. It shall be done!
Brinlee is here right now. She sent you a letter that she wrote you last week. It went with Shelli though on the day that I flew out to Vegas. She picked me up with Staci and the two of them and Ajax took me to the airport. So instead of making them all run to the post office with me, Shelli said she’d send it with some stuff that she had to send anyway. So hopefully she’s sent it and didn’t forget. But you have some art work and letter from Brinlee, along with some pictures of Aynslee. So look for that. Along with your photo card and some ties and some Parker refills. So look forward to that package. The ties are good. I just don’t ever wear them. So they are on their way to you to wear, to use as tie trading leverage, or to give away to someone. Your call. Let me know which ones you keep and like. Let me know what you did with the rest too. Hopefully the parker refills come in handy. I just switched mine out to my new cartridges. I still have more, so don’t go sparingly on those. Pound the journal entries, write a ton of letters, write your information in hundreds of Books of Mormon. But use them like crazy!
Let’s go right to the Quote of the Week for this week. The reason I chose this one this week is because of what you said you were doing with your companion recently in making covenants with the Lord to receive blessings. I really didn’t figure out the power of covenant making till later in my mission and you are already in full swing. I am impressed with your ability to use the Lord’s pattern for really getting things done through his committed servants. On with the quote…

“The Lord’s formula for receiving the Spirit is to get on our knees and communicate with Him. Tell Him what we are going to do – make commitments with Him – outline our program – and then get up off our knees and go and do precisely what we have told Him we would do. In the doing, the Spirit comes.”
- Hartman Rector, Jr.

Keep up the solid work the way you have been. That’s great you have seen so many blessings as a result of your covenant making and obedience and of course diligent hard work. I guess Janet is baptized by now. How was that? I can’t wait to hear all about it. What about Transfers? Anything happen? We are excited to hear about that too. If something happened, I’m sure it was something good for you and for Elder V. If you two are still together, then I’m sure you will see even more sweet success together as you both continue to tear up your area. I forgot to tell you about one of those ladies I was hanging out with in the airport the other night. Almost all of her family is in Ashville, NC. I should have gotten some information for you to have the Ashville boys go find them. They seem like an awesome family. I told her that you were right out there by Ashville. Even though I’m not sure how close you are. But it seems like Ashville must be pretty close. I seem to remember you saying something about the Ashville Elders, am I wrong?
Oh, I was looking at Chad’s MySpace page the other day because I noticed there was some activity on there recently. So I clicked on it and he has all kinds of picture updates and other stuff on there. Apparently he gets on there all the time and updates it. What’s up with that? Elder’s getting on MySpace? That CAN’T be kosher with Mission rules. There is way to much to see and do on MySpace for a missionary. I mean, RIGHT???!! I was talking to his Dad in Quorum today. I didn’t know Chad had an older brother. About 23 with a kid and lives up by Seattle. That kind of shocked me.
Well, I need to get going so I can put this interrogation together for tomorrow morning. It takes about an hour of prep time for a 20 minute interrogation. I’m only planning on 20 minutes because I think I’ll have him cracked within 15 minutes max. Ha ha ha. I’m going to be a regular Jack Bauer Corporate Edition. Yeeeeah! I’ll let you know what happens next week.
I am excited to hear back from you tomorrow. Fill us in on all the work, any changes that may have happened, if you have received anything from Shelli yet, etc. Oh, I just TXT’d Shelli to see what the status was and this is what she said… Shelli Alexander: I'm sending it first thing tomorrow. I planned on sending it saturday but i got stuck at work. So look for that this week hopefully.
K, Choch. Starting on my prep. I’ll talk to you again next week and look forward to your e-mail tomorrow.
Love you, miss you.

Trav

Some more Pics 3/25/07

Photo Caption Contest for this picture. Click the comments link at the bottom of this posting to add your caption for this shot.

Which one of these two is more cocky?

Hands off my Family Pantry brand Snack Crackers Foo !! They're so good, even Elder Herbert comes with his own emergency baggie full of them.

Would it kill ya to crack a smile Mike?

Last visit at Sister Kay's house

Christmas morning Risk game. Mike is sporting his rosy cheeks of strategy here.

latest letter 3/22/07

Another good letter from Mike this week. Sounds like they have a Baptism this week. Thanks for your prayers, Mike is benefiting from those and from all of his hard work and obedience. Here is a section of his last letter...

"We'll find out tomorrow about transfers, we're not sure whats going to happen but it'll be good whatever it is, I'm not too worried about it. But we've got Janet's Baptism scheduled for this Saturday at 4:00. She is so excited. She's been reading like crazy too, going nuts in all the literature we've given her and she is so stoked about becoming a member of the church. Plus, she's inviting a bunch of her family to the Baptism so we're pretty stoked about that, we'll have a few peeps there to try and introduce to the gospel. Transfers are this Thursday so if one of us leaves then we'll be missing Janet's Baptism, but its all good, she's getting baptized and thats what matters. The Ward has done a good job of fellowshipping her too, we had been taking A couple of sisters over with us to teach her and now she has made instant friends with them and they all have about the same lifestyles, all in their 50's and single. the 're funny with each other, and one of them is a Recent Convert of about a month, so she is on fire too and so excited to help with the missionary progress. I like missionary work like this, its so sweet to have it all work out great. Its cool too cause we know it wasn't us, it was the Lord flopping a prepared person right into our laps. I love that about the Lord, i swear, its after the tough times in an area when it just takes off and you are so blessed by the Lord. You may not see all the blessings but you know they are there, especially, when you hog through the tough times and stay diligent. So anyway, life is awesome out here, we're stoked about the work here in Lincolnton."

03/18/07

E.A.:

Another week, another letter. The Weeks are going fast for me. What about you? But then I look at your trunkee counter on your blog and it seems like time is standing still. I won’t tell you how many days, hours, minutes, seconds, or milliseconds you have left unless you want me to tell you. I took Brinlee for a drive today to the SteepAndCheap warehouse to pick up my new purchase from there. I snagged an Oakley tactical backpack last night, that goes for $95 dollars normally on the Oakley site and even on S&C’s parent company Back Country.com’s site. But I picked it up for a cool $28 even. It’s super stylie. It looks all swat team style. It’s black with some industrial strength snaps, webbing, loops, etc. It looks way nice. I’m making it my “Go Bag” for a disaster/emergency/fire/etc. type of thing that I can grab on my way out of the house. I’ll fill it full of 72 hour kit sort of stuff. Foods, MRE’s, bottles of water, a purifier, flashlight (battery less) wool or fleece blanket that will work well if/when wet, my swat knife I got a long time ago, but never used. That sort of thing. You know? It will be cool. I just dug through it and it has some cool inclusions they just had in there. I’m way psyched! You’ll have to check it when you get home.

Your e-mailing me and letters home to the fam is working well. That way we spread it all out some. I forward your e-mail to everyone right after I get it and then I read your letters during the week when I visit. (it sees like I just wrote this in my last letter last week. Did I?) Anyway, the set up works well for me at least. I think the family likes it too.

I have pimped out Dark Angel quite a bit lately. The last time I was over at ma’s and pa’s I saw the iPod movies DVD on the desk, so I snagged that and brought it home and put all of those movies on there. I have added some music lately too, so here is the stat sheet…

Music: 9969 songs, 161 days, 39.57 GB

Movies: 21 items, 23.4 hours, 3.57 GB

Podcasts: 11 items, 11.4 hours, 629.9 MB

Audiobooks: 3 items, 5.9 hours, 81.2 MB

Oh, I was going to give you my Pictures stats too, but the iPod is upstairs, so I can’t get that info. But I have about 1 GB on there of Pics alone. I still have 11 some odd GB free space still too. What a cool freakin’ invention that iPod is! When you get home the 80 GB video iPod will be only $300 bills brand new since they will have an even bigger and sweeter version available. I wonder how far off I am. I bet it’s beyond what we expect. Even in that year plus you still have left.

I had a crazy week at work again. This week, actually on Thursday, I had an employee who was acting weird all week, but Thursday, she was way off her rocker. It became pretty obvious that she must have some kind of mental thing and was off her meds all week because of the decline in her behavior and cognitive abilities we noticed. So we pulled her in on Thursday when she was wandering around the machines, dancing, saying really strange things to people, and asked her if she was taking medication for anything? She told us that she was bi-polar (which I hadn’t known before Thursday) and she took meds for that. I asked her if she had stopped taking them, or missed a dose or two or mixed them up. She told me she was fine and her meds were fine, but every so often she would say something that was “off”. We kept talking to her to sort of evaluate the situation a little further and finally decided that we couldn’t keep her there at work. It was her supervisor and me talking to her. At first, we were going to give her the day off with pay so she could go home, take her meds, sleep it off and come back next week. But after a few more minutes, she was declining so bad that I didn’t feel safe even letting her get behind the wheel of her car. We were going to call her a cab to get her home, but even by the time we tried tracking down a doctor she had in her phone, and talking with Valley Mental Health, she had declined even more and I determined it was time to get her to the ER to have someone check her out and get her re-medicated. So I got her friend she is pretty close with at work, and the 3 of us got in the car and headed to the ER. She was saying the most random things all the way in to the hospital, like I smelled like Buck. When I asked her who buck was, she told me it was her dog. I was like, wow, thanks. She said, it’s OK, he’s a Boxer. I thought I smelled pretty good that day but maybe not. Her filter was off between her head and her mouth though. She spoke whatever came to mind. While we were waiting in the crowded ER waiting room, she would engage in conversation with other patients waiting in there. One lady came in shortly after us and my employee stared at her for a minute, making the other lady a little uncomfortable. Finally asked her if her name was Tina. The lady was like no, my name is Pam. She said, yeah right. I know that’s you Tina. The lady goes “excuse me?” my employee goes “you heard me you fat B!*@#”. The lady looked at me and I just gave her facial expressions to ignore her, that’s why we are here, etc. the lady just smiled big at us and my employee goes “Oh, your teeth are so yellow. Close your mouth” then started mumbling some more swear words and looked away all disgusted. This persisted with nearly every new patient that came in who were completely unsuspecting. Finally, the whole waiting room figured out what was going on here and would ignore her, but still laughed at the new (but completely honest) comments that would be thrown at the next new victim. One big black guy came walking in and I just pinched the bridge of my nose and put my head down, knowing that she was going to get me killed this time. She saw him walk in and said super loud to her friend (who is from Bosnia) Wow, look at that BIG BLACK NEGRO Alma. We grow ‘em big here in the US don’t we??!! He stopped and looked at us when he heard the word Negro and looked at me to see if I would be defending that comment. I just shook my head at him like dude, just have a seat, ignore her, do not engage in any form of conversation, or we are all in for it. My look said it all and he had a seat. After a while, he was having as much fun with her comments as everyone else had been previously. The nurses finally caught wind of what was going on and put us back in the family room where we could be isolated from the rest of the group and have some privacy. That was the best thing that could have happened. I was much more comfortable. Especially considering they had a soft couch, soft chairs, and more room to spread out. The doctors who were coming in did not ask the right questions or stick around long enough to figure out just how off she was. Of course they didn’t know her like we did, so they didn’t have any reference to judge her by, but they just didn’t ask enough of the right questions. Between visits, she actually made a run for the outside door telling us that she had to go install a satellite. She took her belt off in the hall and threw it towards the people waiting out in the hall that were over flow chairs from the waiting room. She also gave me a strip show which was more than awkward, but luckily her friend Alma helped her to contain herself there as I looked away in pure embarrassment. She kept talking about being a 16 year old virgin who was pregnant and that her dad was going to kill her. Even though she’s a very young and fit looking 49 year old, but she looks nothing like a 16 year old. The doctors weren’t getting any of the good stuff. She called me about 11 different names and thought I was them on several occasions. But finally, the doctors came in and asked her if she was OK going home. She said she wanted to go home. They said will you be OK going home by yourself? She said she might be scared to. They asked why and she said if everyone in the world knew who you were, you would be scared too. The doctor asked her if she thought everyone in the world wanted to hurt her. She told the doctor, that if everyone in America knew who he was, don’t you think they’d shoot you too? He said do you think you are going to get shot? She leaned back again and just said no. so no matter what he tried to get out of her, she never posed a threat to herself or others. So he said he was releasing her. As he was shaking my hand, I told him I needed to see him out in the hall. So we went out there and I told him flat out that he wasn’t getting it. I told him I’m not a medical professional, but I can see just how messed she is right now and we can’t just release her to her own devices, let alone drive. He told me that part of her anxiety was that her car was going to get broken into and that she should get her car home. I told him that her car was in our parking lot that was patrolled by 5 west valley police cars all night. We have the most secure parking lot in the city. He told me that legally he can’t hold her unless she poses a threat to herself or others. I told him that we need to get her checked in somewhere if not here to get her back on her meds. The only thing they prescribed her was some anxiety medication and this had nothing to do with anxiety. She had a history of mental illness specifically Bi-polar disorder. She came out and saw me talking to the doctor and got mad. He told me that he was going to go get her a crisis hotline number to call and left again. I went back in the room and she stared at me all mad and said do you want to call Amy Joe yourself, Mr. Too big for your Britches. I said is that your sister? She said yes. (up to this point, we hadn’t been able to extract any family information from her no matter how hard we tried.) So I said do you want me to call her? She said “I don’t give a $#!*.” (She had been dropping S and F bombs all night at that point) I said OK. What’s her number? She rattled off 7 digits and I hurried and scribbled it down in my planner. Then I looked at the phone next to me in the room and she said, nevermind, that’s not her number. I said, who’s number is it then? She said I don’t know. I looked at the phone again thinking I would just try it. She said, don’t even try using that phone, it doesn’t work, it’s just a toy phone. So I said OK and left the room and dialed it up on my cell phone as I was walking down the hall to the outside. I was just hoping that it would be the right number since it was 11:00 PM at this point. A guy answered and I asked if Amy was there. He said all bugged, no! who’s this?? I told him who I was and that I was with his sister in law at the Cottonwood ER and relayed the situation. He was like Oh my gosh. I’m sorry you had to go through that. I’ll call Amy and get her right there. She had luckily been out with some friends at the Olive garden by Fashion Place not far down the road. So she was coming right in. As I walked back in, she was standing by the door. She said are you ready to go? I asked if they had cleared her to leave. She said they had and that she was just waiting for the plane. I asked her what plane and she said the plane to Iraq. I said why would you want to go to Iraq. She pointed at the TV and said because they need volunteers. I told her that would be fine, and asked if she wanted to wait for it back in that room. She said yes, so we went back to that room. This was like the 3^rd time I had to trick her back into that room. Well, the Doctor came in again and gave her the number to call in the morning to the crisis hot line. I told him look Fooo! She is not going to remember any of this in a minute, let alone in the morning. Secondly, she won’t ever call this number on her own, so set it up so they call her first thing in the morning. Thirdly, I’m not letting her get behind a wheel tonight. From an employers perspective, we have way too much liability here to let her cruise off into the night. He said, well, we are done here. I told him that I had tracked down her sister and we would be waiting in this room till she got here which he was fine with. So we waited it out, but it was a chore to keep her in one place once she knew she could go. While we were waiting, one of my other employees came walking by and we saw each other. He poked his head in our room there and asked what we were doing there. I hadn’t been able to tell him what was up yet before she came over, looked at this full shaggy mop of hair he has on his head and right in front of his wife said, WHOA! Look at that #&@^’n Hair! Then started full on molesting his head. He and his wife were looking at her like what is wrong with you?? They caught on kind of quick though and started messing with her like a sober friend would with their dumb drunk friend. They left shortly after they had their fun with her. I had been in communication off and on with the husband of the sister and coordinating what we were going to do. Finally, the sister got there and we were able to convince her to get in her car with her while we followed behind her in her car so we could get it home. We all had an understanding though that the sister was going to get her up to the U of U psych ward where she had taken her a couple times before. So Alma and I went back to work, while I called the husband again to tell him they were on their way to their house and to get ready for a fight once she found out she was not going back to work to get her car or going home. He called me in the morning to let me know that he got her up to the U and they had her transported to Provo to the Utah Valley Mental Health. She was admitted there for at least a week. They said this was the worst they had seen her in that condition. So they were glad we helped get her to that point. She will get back on her meds, back to normal and should be ready to come back to work after a week. So I’m putting her on FMLA and hopefully she doesn’t remember much if anything that she said or did, or it’s going to be awkward for her to be around certain co-workers and me. Ha ha.

Well, time to get into the quote of the week. You mentioned in your last letter to Ma and Pa that you were sewing some fatting seeds. You had a great attitude about it and I always had the same. I never cared whether I baptized someone or if the guy after me did, honestly. As long as they were baptized, that was all it was about. It’s not a competition of numbers between missionaries, it’s a competition against the evil forces fighting against us who are on the Lord’s side. In light of the seeds you are planting, I always liked this quote by John Taylor:

“We ought to be full of light and life and the power and spirit of the living God and feel that we are messengers to the nations of the earth: we ought to feel the word of God burning like fire in our bones, feeling desirous to go and snatch men from the powers of darkness and the chains of corruption with which they are bound and lead them in the paths of life. We ought to be prepared to go forth weeping, bearing precious seed that we might come back again rejoicing, bringing our sheaves with us.”

Well, I’m on page 5 here so I need to wrap this up to give you some time to respond and write some peeps or whatever you do on your P-day about this time of day. I will get your camera card sent off to you this week with Brinlee’s pictures and letter she wrote you. Not to mention some other sundry items that may be of some use. So look forward to that. I guess I’ll send it to your current address. I’m not too concerned you will be transferred. When are transfers again? You think your comp. will go ZL then? I wouldn’t be surprised with all the good you guys have been doing. I can’t wait to hear more about your contact Janet? Great work finding and teaching her. I’ll be in Vegas from Wednesday to Saturday this week. So I will have to get to your next letter on Sunday and pound it out until it’s ready to send that night. No multi-day writing this week. Although, I’m usually writing the majority of your letters on Sundays anyway. That will make for a busy week though. That’s for sure. I’ll be missing my class on Thursday which will hurt. I really have to go to these classes to get the most out of this. I’m not thinking I’m going to pass this monster exam anyway, so what’s the point? I’m so burned out on reading and studying anyway. Seriously. I’m HR’d out. I work with HR stuff all day long, then I come home and read about HR stuff all night long and I do 2 hours study groups on Tuesdays for HR stuff, then 3 hours worth of HR class every Thursday. ENOUGH already!! I have to try to stay motivated though. But I’m ready for it to be over so I can read other things like PMG for instance. There is a great quote in the Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith. I don’t mean to hit you with two quotes in one letter, but I have to give you this one while we are talking about education and learning. I love this quote. I have to go upstairs to get my Tof the PJS book though, so hang on…

K, I have it. You can’t even have this book out there, can you? The fact that this book is apostate in your mission is blasphemy in my opinion, but nevertheless, here is the quote. Hopefully I’m not breaking any rules by sending a quote out of an apostate book which is way more rich in pure doctrine than nearly any other book outside of scriptures themselves. This quote is one of the reasons I hardly ever read anything that’s fiction or novel stuff, I feel like it’s a waste of my time. I’d rather stick to a good church book or educational type of book or business oriented book. It’s on P. 217 under the topic Men are Saved Through Obedience to Knowledge: “We have thieves among us. Adulterers, liars, hypocrites. If God should speak from heaven, he would command you not to steal, not to commit adultery, not to covent, nor deceive, but be faithful over a few things. As far as we degenerate from God, we descend to the devil and lose knowledge, and without knowledge we cannot be saved, and while our hearts are filled with evil, and we are studying evil, there is no room in our hearts for good, or studying good. Is not God good? Then you be good; if He is faithful, then you be faithful. Add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, and seek for every good thing.

The Church must be cleansed, and I proclaim against all iniquity. A man is saved no faster than he gets knowledge, for if he does not get knowledge, he will be brought into captivity by some evil power in the other world, as evil spirits will have more knowledge, and consequently ore power than many men who are on the earth. Hence it needs revelation to assist us, and give us knowledge of the things of God.”

Now don’t get me wrong about me saying I don’t read fiction or novels because I think it will lead me down the path to where I’ll be corrupted by evil. I think most books are good. After reading this over again, I felt like I came across that way. I just haven’t been much of a fiction reader just because I feel like I am wasting time on books like that. Although, I have read my fair share of those books too. I just get way more out of church books and the type I listed before. But knowledge is the key thing I point this quote out for. I found it super interesting when I read this that knowledge plays such a key strategic point in the grand scheme of things. How important is learning and education and increasing in knowledge of every good thing to keep an edge in this world? The devil is so smart that I can never begin to comprehend his wisdom and knowledge in the scheme of all things eternal that I can’t even wrap my head around. He shares that wisdom with his armies who in turn can have an extreme advantage over people who let their brains go to waste, or don’t seek after “knowledge of the things of God”. This quote points out the importance of revelation too. Where if we didn’t have constant learning through fresh revelation to add to and compliment what revelation we already have through the scriptures, then we would fall behind because the devil continues to learn and expand his wisdom. He knows what works to lead people down the path to hell, he shares his insights with his evil buddies who in turn use cutting edge knowledge to fight against the works of the Lord. So my exhortation to you this week is to continue to learn at the pace you have been. I’m amazed at the knowledge you are dropping on us in your letters. You have grown in wisdom so fast, but still have so much to learn. Stay on top of your scripture studies, your book readings, your PMG study, etc. Where are you in Jesus the Christ by the way? I can’t wait to read that again too. That is one of my favorite books! It is so loaded with good information. You really get to know the savior so much better after reading that book.

Well, I don’t know if I even got my point across there. Sorry if I rambled and didn’t make any sense. I’m not really sure if I made sense or not. I’m so tired that I don’t think I’m conveying what I want to, so that’s a sign I better sign off, read a few more pages of homework and go to bed.

Good luck with Janet and keep working your butt off for more investigators. Keep focusing on losing yourself in the work. It’s such a great feeling to get in the zone where you totally forget home, personal interests, hobbies, music, girls, etc. and just zone in to the work and nothing else. It’s almost a zen like state where you are so focused that you can literally draw on the powers of heaven and work miracles. It’s so difficult to tune out the world to such a point where you “lose yourself” in the sense of the phrase the savior meant, but wow, what an experience to get to that point. I feel like I only reached that level I’m referring to for about 7 or 8 months of my whole mission. At it was at the end when I really caught the vision of what I was doing, had some experiences to help push me to that point, and when I could actually focus the way I had to in order to feel that level of closeness to the celestial. I still get chills thinking of those times. I loved every day of my mission and think I did a great job every day of my mission with maybe a few days of exception when I just got lazy and couldn’t drag myself to do all that I should have done. But you increase in ability to zone into that level of spiritual envelopment the more practice you have at it and the more obedient you are and spiritually minded your companionship is. Be focused, be lost in the work, be diligently obedient and strive to do all the Lord’s will and continue to increase in blessings and closeness to the Lord. That’s my wish for you this week and always. I’m confident you have been doing that to perfection, but keep it up. It’s a constant effort, one that you can never coast. When you are riding a bike, think about when you can coast and stop pedaling. Yep, downhill buddy! So keep pumping, keep pedaling and keep pushing your way ever upward. And don’t forget the fact that you are on a tandem bike with your companion. Keep motivating each other. I’m so glad you are in a great companionship where you keep driving each other to better your previous performance. Continue to do that every day.

I love you Mike and we are so proud of you and all that you have accomplished and have yet to accomplish.

Have a great week. Be perfect!

Love you,

Trav

Letter Update 3/16/07

We got a detailed update of how things are going in his new area. This is some of his last letter...

"Its been another awesome week, we've met some cool people and we've definitely been blessed by the Lord in our efforts.
We taught Janet a bunch this week, she's freakin awesome. She's been reading the BoM and every reading assignment we leave with here, she came to church and loved it too. earlier in the week we taught her half the Plan of Salvation and then a day or two later we taught the rest, starting with the atonement, we watched "To this end was I born" and used that to introduce the Spirit World and then taught about the Resurrection, judgment, Immortality and the 3 kingdoms of glory. She told us that it all makes total sense, and then asked us what D&C was. so we explained and she was totally cool with it, she likes it. Then we asked her if she had a chance to pray about the things that we have taught her. and she says: "This is going to sound ugly, but No..." Then she paused and she goes: "I haven't prayed because when i talk to you guys and when i read this stuff, i feel it in my heart that its true. And i feel like I'm finally home." And then she bore her testimony about this stuff and it was all spiritual and she was in tears, so it was awesome. I expect she'll get Baptized here soon. We go back to teach her the second half of The Gospel of Jesus Christ tomorrow afternoon, and we'll probably set a date for March 24 for her to be baptized. Transfers are on the 22 so hopefully neither one of us will get transfered out of here, but we'll be able to see her get baptized. She's awesome. Then, throughout the week, we've been blessed with some cool investigators. we don't know too much about any of them, but we'll see how all our return appointments go this week. Its been an awesome transfer."

Sounds like Mike is doing great and really liking how things have been going in his area with his new companion and the new investigators they have found. Keep praying for his success.

Matt Ashton Mission Profile

Matthew Ashton:
Oklahoma, Oklahoma City Mission
Served from April '95 - May '97
Areas: Wichita Falls, TX. - Norman, OK. - Edmond, OK. - Ada, OK. - Fairview, OK
Memories: I served in the Oklahoma Oklahoma City Mission from April 1995 to May 1997. I had 5 areas. We strived to work hard. I loved my mission. I attribute the fact that we strived to work hard as to why I had such a great mission experience. As we were obedient and worked hard to fulfill the purpose of why we were in Oklahoma, we were blessed with the spirit. The spirit helped us discern what was important and helped us find joy. My most enjoyable companions were companions that focused on missionary work. Missions are for such a short period of time and each day is important. I look forward to being able to serve another full time mission.

Matt's first area, Wichita Falls, TX


Transfer Day


A reminder of what he was out there for...


Going home... Last day in the mission


Name that caption contest: Click the comments link and enter your caption for this photo.

03/10/07

Yo Elder A,

Supatchu? That is what I used to tell my cub Scouts who were all into Pokemon, is that my favorite Pokemon character was the rare and powerful Supatchu! They were always perplexed and told me that there was no such Pokemon but I always begged to differ. I think I caused countless hours of research since they thought he must be so rare and powerful, they MUST have him!! But never found him. Anyway, It was great to hear from you on Monday. That letter was seriously a big delicious meal that I had been craving for a while. All of the little appetizers you had been sending me for weeks prior were all forgotten as I ate till I was filled with the content of your last e-mail. I really did feel filled and content. I almost wanted to unbutton my pants and take a nap afterward. OK, too much visual there, but I really enjoyed it. I’ll respond to it shortly. But to address your challenge first and foremost. It’s funny when I read that because I was going to tell you in my last letter I sent you Sunday night, that I had gotten my hands on a Preach My Gospel finally. My EQ Pres. gave me a copy on Wednesday night when he was handing out some priesthood manuals. They had some extra goodies in the clerk’s office cupboard so he asked me if I wanted a PMG. I was like Heck ya foo! Hook me up! So I got one just before my challenge. I haven’t read it or even glanced over anything in there yet, so that will be my challenge now, to pour through it and glean some serious information from it. I’m excited to do it. It’s just that I’m so overwhelmed by the amounts of reading I have to do lately, that I am a little over-booked on my reading. So I’ll get to it as soon as I’m done with school which will be May 12^th. That’s when I take my final test that tells me if I am certified or not. I’m really not hopeful at all. Yikes!! But at least I have met the first part of your challenge and will keep harping on Ma and Pa and Stosh and Geegng.

I need to go to Mom’s and Dad’s house Saturday and Sunday to take care of the animals since they will be in Vegas all weekend at the NASCAR race. Yeah, they have tickets, I’m sure Dad has told you all about it already. So he is stoked. He talked Ma into is somehow and I think she’s actually excited now about it. I told him that you would be way jealous and Dad just said “WAY!!”. John was at our after blessing get together at our house for some light refreshment, there with LM making the introductions, and he and Dad got talking about NASCAR. John is a fan all the sudden too. So he is the lost son that I never became to Dad when it comes to NASCAR lovin’. My neck isn’t red enough to like it as much as Y’all. So that was good conversation for Dad and John. Well, I need to get my bones home. It’s 5:40 PM on Friday night and I’ve been at work far too long already. So I’ll e-mail this to myself so I can finish this letter this weekend and send it Sunday night as usual. But I needed to get a head start while I had some time after work. Going to be yet another busy weekend so I had to sneak in some writing now. The Girls are at Wheeler farm right now and have been at Gardner village before that. So it’s an Emery girl family outing with Patt, Monica, Suz and Brinlee, Carlie, Aynslee, and Davis. So I wasn’t in a hurry to get home since no one will be there anyway. I’ve had a rough week at work this week. Really busy and emotionally draining again with one of the pressmen who has nut cancer and is going through some rough times with that. He has a young family, and his wife doesn’t even know how serious it is because she is so depressed right now over just knowing about it. She’s seeing a psychiatrist about it and for some dumb reason, he recommended to this guy that he not tell her if it gets serious. WHAT? Where did this idiot get his degree and/or expertise? What a loser! So how much worse is it going to be when he goes in on the 15^th for his procedure (that his wife thinks is just exploratory) and ends up hacking away a huge portion of his junk and a bunch of his insides there where is spread and tells his wife that the outlook on a life much past 1 year is not good? Seriously! The whole thing is way sad, especially considering that he resigned and declined any FMLA or benefits that we were offering him. So now he’s on his own financially, can’t talk to anyone at work because he doesn’t want anyone but me knowing about it, he can’t talk to anyone in his family about it because he’s been told not to by some “professional” and he’s not thinking straight about turning down these benefits, but no matter how hard I have tried, he just won’t sign any paperwork. Now he’s gone and coming in on Monday to fill out a waiver saying he understands what he’s turning down and won’t hold us accountable since we tried out guts out to make him take his benefits. He’s the EQ pres. in his ward and I just don’t get why he’s acting this way because he’s even voiding his life insurance policy which will leave his family in a lurch. Oh well, I can’t concern myself anymore with it or I’ll get all depressed over it too and that’s now how I roll. K, I’m off for home…

Back home now. It’s 8:00 PM, so I’ll start responding to your e-mail now…

Oh, I posted E. Van Leeuwen’s bio on your blog. I also put a countdown timer on there which is cool as jive. It counts days, hours, minutes, seconds and Milli-seconds. Ha ha ha. It’s cool. I liked your story about looking for the LA’s house and finding that lady. Sounds like she was prepared eh? How is that going now?

Did you ever get my pics I sent to the mission home a while back? I don’t think I heard back on that. They better have gotten to you. I sent them just before you got transferred so that’s why I sent them to the mission home, since I suspected you’d be going. But let me know.

Good to hear you are doing better in your journal. How are the Parker© ink units doing? I can send some more anytime that are just sitting here. So make sure you let me know. You also have more mission journals waiting for you on your shelf in your room. I just noticed those when I was over there a couple of times ago. So apparently Ma and Pa bought you some too, so you best be for filling that thing up so you can get more mission journals and Parker© refills sent out to you. Congratulations on bringing more souls to the knowledge of Parker©. It sounds like you are having much success and my heart glories in your successes, no matter what it is you are converting people to out there. What do you hear from P-Diddy? How are his efforts in Oregon? And how is his Patented Parker© writing system working out for him? I just checked out the Parker site and found the next line of Parker I’ll be picking up. I’ll have to keep my eye out next time I’m in one of the 4 stores it’s sold in around SLC.

It sounds like you are really getting along with E. Van Leeuwen, eh? It’s always so good when you get a great comp. that you really like and really click with. It makes a huge difference in your teaching, in your work, in everything. In fact, I’m selecting this week’s quote based on a good companionship relationship.

“I hope you and your companion are true to each other. I hope you draw close to each other as companions, that you uphold and sustain each other before the Saints, before our friends, before the world. When you reach the point where you can enjoy and rejoice in the success of your companion, even when that success exceeds your own, then you have got the real missionary spirit, the real unselfish spirit of love, the spirit of the gospel.”

- Ezra Taft Benson

I was going to expound on that, but I think it speaks for itself and I really can’t add something to a Prophet of God’s quote when he pretty much said it all there. But try to get to that level with every companion you have after your current comp. Even if you don’t like them as much as you like someone you have had or have currently, still follow this advice and you will achieve tons of success and see many blessings because of it.

I’m really digging my new calling as EQ Secretary. I get to know everything that is going on and have none of the responsibility. Ha ha ha. That’s not true. I am being kept super busy by it, but it’s a great kind of busy. My presidency meetings have been awesome. The spirit is always so strong in there and the things that we discuss are lead by the spirit and inspired and it’s stunning to me to realize it when I feel it and hear some of the things we are discussing and the plans we are making. It’s the same kind of awe that I haven’t felt in much abundance since my mission unfortunately. But I love to be in that zone again where I feel the spirit, go with it, say things that truly are inspired and acknowledge the wisdom and inspiration of other comments by the counselor and president of the quorum when they are sharing certain things. I’m super motivated by that right now. I actually need to work on some EQ stuff tonight in fact, but I better go up and help put the girls to bed first. It is 8:44 now and I have spent more time down here on this letter than I planned on. Back in a while…

OK, back. It’s 11:00 AM Saturday morning. I have Matty Cakes coming over to bring some mission pics for the Blog. I still have about half of everyone to go on the mission profiles. That’s one of the most popular things on there that people like to read and see.

Now it’s 10:22 PM Saturday night. I am just listening to some music and taking a load off from reading my homework. I am so overloaded with information, I don’t know how I’m going to keep it all straight. Anyway, Suzanne and I went out tonight to Iggy’s in Jordan Landing. It was good. It’s the first time we’ve both eaten in there. Just thought we’d try something different. Brinlee stayed home with a girl in our ward that she adores. So that cost me an extra 10 spot, but it was fun to get out. We had Aynslee which was weird since I was already paying a babysitter, but what can you do when the boss wants the baby with us? Then we went to the Circ (Arctic Circle) to get ice cream cones. Those were good. Then over to Ma’s and Pa’s to feed Abs, the Fish and check on the cats. Then we went to Sam’s club to buy a pallet of Turlet Paper and other sundry items. That’s how we rock date night now that we are old. Nah’m-sayin’?!

Now it’s 9:00 PM Sunday night. I had good meetings at church and even better meetings at our Priesthood leadership meeting tonight. I don’t think I’ve ever been to one of those before, but I was very much edified and spiritually rejuvenated. The main talk was on Elder Bednar’s talk before he was ELDER Bednar, but the president of BYU Idaho. And it was on the Enabling power of the Atonement. It was good. Then we had some break out meetings where those over the Aaronic Priesthood quorums met in the Chapel, those over the High Preists and Elder’s quorums met in the Relief society room, Clerks met somewhere, and the Bishops met in the Stake Presidents office. That meeting was good too. After our meetings, the EQ Pres. And I went to Jordan Valley hospital to see one of our Elders who has Pneumonia. His story is cool. He is sort of my kitty corner neighbor, who I used to see out there smoking in front of his garage all the time. His home teacher was relentless about never missing a month with them and brought his A-game lessons. He eventually decided that he and his wife wanted to come back to church. When I saw him there the first week, I was all about the fellowshipping and making friendly so he felt welcome every week. He was showered with that kind of welcoming by several of the elders in the quorum. He and his wife just about 2 weeks ago went through the temple to be sealed. So now the family is all happy and on fire spiritually. We just made him the committee head of the Redeem the Dead committee in the EQ. Anyway, he has had pneumonia since August and it finally nailed him and he’s been in the hospital since Friday. So TJ (EQ Pres) and I went to visit him. So I’m really enjoying my calling so far.

I was going to address one more topic before I “peace out” as you call it. I read your last two letters over at Ma’s and Pa’s which were good. There was one part of the 2^nd to last one that you mentioned you had been chastised and that Mom’s and Dad’s and My chastising cuts you to the core or something like that. I hope that I have not overstepped my bounds at any point. I have never meant to chastise really in any letter. I wonder if it was when I was talking about the dude who was flipping a bird for the camera and my feelings about missionaries conducting themselves in that manner. Not sure. I asked dad if he has chastised you and he wasn’t sure. But anyway, I know that dad can throw a javelin through your heart when you least expect it like our homie Teancum has been known to do. I hope if I have come across as chastising that it wasn’t harsh, but I feel like I am not a person in any position to chastise you. My point is, I always hated getting chastised by dad, but I always learned something from it and tried to apply it. I think the reason I hated it is because I thought I was doing so great most of the time and the humbling effects actually pained me to feel. But I think about chastising examples from the scriptures and they always turn out as a great step forward for whoever it was who experienced it. I look at the Brother of Jared when he was chastised in Ether 2:14 for not praying. What happened there? He was chastised by the Lord himself for 3 HOURS!!!! I think I always read that and many other examples of the Lord chastening his servants as cruel and unusual, but the more I feel chastened by the Lord as I go through life, I feel his love and his pattern of showing an increase of love afterward. I bet you that those 3 hours were actually some of the most uplifting and inspirational 3 hours the Brother of Jared ever had in his life! I think anytime Dad has lectured on something, I know he does so with love. I hope that if and when I throw a little chastisement to whomever I do, I can do so only when moved upon by the spirit and that I can show an increase of love afterward and make them come away from it feeling better than they went into it. I hope it’s the same way with you, that you feel the concern and love from whoever you get the chastisement from, be it Mom, Dad, or me, or whoever. I don’t write all this because I think it concerned you or bugged you. I can tell that you took it all well and learned from whatever. I think you were just saying, don’t think I don’t listen to your counsel, because you do, etc. I just wanted to give you my perspective from what I have seen with Dad and his chastisement. Whether it’s you, Shelli, Staci, or me, he and mom both do so out of pure concern and love. I think it’s hard to express all of the feelings in letters though, especially that increase in love afterward. So hopefully you are feeling it, because it’s there, whether it gets conveyed in the letters or not. And not like you give us hardly any reason to chastise anyway. You are doing such a great job out there and you have proved your character in so many ways and at such a young age, it boggles my mind. It amazes me the age we are sent out on missions. We think we have it all figured out, but man, we are still so young and inexperienced and have so much more to learn, but I think that’s exactly why we are sent at 19. What a beneficial learning experience a mission is every day of those 2 years. You will be blown away at your own development by the time you come home. You may or may not see it because you are seeing it every day, but the weekly letters we get and the things we all hear amaze us at what kind of person you are becoming and the things you are doing.

Keep making us all proud and doing the work you have been called to do. Magnify your work in every way.

Brinlee is going to work on a letter for you tomorrow. She will draw you some pictures and tell you what she’s been up to lately. So look forward to that. Maybe we will send that on soon with your picture card now that I’m done with that.

We love and miss you. Keep up the hard work and write back soon. Let us know everything that’s going on with your investigators and companion and area, etc. We look forward to your letters every week.

Talk to you soon.

Love,

Trav

Latest Letter

We got a great letter from Mike this week. It sounds like he's doing well and the work is progressing for him and his new companion in Lincolnton, NC. Here is a snippet from this last letter about someone they just found...

"We actually found a lady by mistake that we think has a lot of potential. We were looking for a Less Active's house and we couldn't see any numbers, so we just stopped and decided to knock on this one door to see if we could get lucky. Well, it wasn't the Less Active's house, but we introduced ourselves to the lady and told her who we represent. and then she said that she had a friend in the Mormon church. so we got to talking to her and set an appointment to come back and talk to her about the church. Well, we went back and taught her a Restoration using the new pamphlets and the Restoration DVD and she loved it. She was baby sitting, but she was paying close attention and she asked us to pause the video while she put the fussy baby to bed. Then when she came back and we had finished the DVD she was already saying stuff like: "How could people think there isn't a prophet on the earth?" So that was pretty awesome, she is praying about the things that we taught her and we hooked her up with a BoM. We were supposed to go over there yesterday, and she was going to come to church, but she got really sick, but we rescheduled for tonight, so we are pretty excited about that. But we can already see the blessings the Lord has given to us for our focus and obedience."

03/04/07

Elder Choch,

Suppatchu? This one is going to be short and sweet, much like all of yours have been for the last 4 or 5, but still about 10 times longer. It has been about the busiest day this year so far. It started early so we could have the girls up and ready and Aynslee in her Blessing dress and Brinlee’s hair actually done for church. Then to get to church early enough to secure enough bench seating for the whole fam-damily. We had most everyone there except for Squash and Shelbs. They were both working. So the blessing was awesome. It’s a cool experience to bless your own baby. I will have to show you my journal entry for what I said about Aynslee since it’s too long to put in a letter. But you can read it when you get home. I wish I remember what I said in Brinlee’s. Do you remember any of it? I am going to recruit some help from Grandpa, and mom and pop about hers. Aynslee’s too since I barely remember a few words I said even in Aynslee’s. I had to have Suzanne help me tonight to fill out my journal since I don’t remember what I say in those blessings, except a few key things that I’m like, “wow, that is interesting” as I go. It’s a cool experience though. Have you done that yet in a blessing? Have you confirmed anyone out there yet? I’ll tell you what, out of all of my baptisms, I bet I confirmed 80% of them and my companion baptized. And I was usually the senior companion who had worked longer with the person and always wanted to be the one wearing white. I guess it’s the symbolism of it or something. But they always told me that they wanted me to confirm because they looked at that as the crowning event which in reality, it is. That is really where the sins are forgiven, that is really where you become the member of the church and that is really where you receive your promised blessings. It’s crazy how the actual baptism itself is just a symbolic event. Sure, it’s still an ordinance, but it has less… what’s the word? Effect? I guess is what I’m looking for, than the confirmation its self. The baptism is kind of like the anointing of the oil in a blessing. The confirmation is where the whole meat and potatoes of the blessing takes place. Am I making sense? I have never really thought of it that way till now, so sorry if I’m going off on a tangent here. I’m just working this all out in my own head, really.

So anyway, I’m glad I could bust out the journal today and whip out the Parker pen and put some thoughts down with Suzanne’s help since she listened so intently. She remembered most all of the key points. I wish I would have done that with Brinlee’s. In fact, I wish I would have designated a fast note taker in both of them to thrown down some short hand, copious notes during the blessing. I wonder why we can’t record blessings like that when we can record and transcribe patriarchal blessings. Really, that is what I just gave Aynslee, is a patriarchal blessing today. I had a similar experience on my mission where we baptized an African family in the Bronx who spoke only French. They were from French Guiana. We taught them using Gina Francois, my favorite member friend from Haiti who spoke French, English and Creole. So she was a great member support to have there anyway. But they were super humble and a natural baptism just waiting to happen. So when we baptized them and I confirmed the mom, I asked Gina to take notes in French for her so she would know what I said. So I confirmed her, blessed her, etc. and when she got up, she was happy, she felt the spirit, and was smiles. She shook our hands and Gina told her she had the blessing in French for her. She sat down and started reading with this smile that eventually became tears running down her face. It was awesome to see her make sense of what was just given to her and to understand the actual confirmation and to realize she was now a member of the Church, etc. It was a spiritual experience just to watch her comprehend it all for the first time even though it was on hand written notes, probably lost some of it’s kick, etc. But really cool experience. So I wish I would have done that with these baby blessings. So after the blessing and the sacrament, we had testimonies. I stood up and gave mine since it’s kind of obligatory to do so on a day you bless your kid, you know. But I wanted to since I don’t have much of an opportunity to do so in front of all of the family on both sides like that. So it was cool to have the whole family there in a church setting, feeling the spirit together and just to have this large group of peeps there who you have an eternal bond with, who all share your testimony and love of the truth. I was just feeling the love today I guess. So we missed you today, obviously. Grandpa was feeling it to apparently, since he stood and bore his testimony to my ward too. He asked me if they’d run me out of the ward if he stood and bore his testimony, I told him of course not. So he did. It was cool. He’s good peeps, Gramps is! So we went to the rest of our meetings so Suzanne could teach and I could do my EQ stuff. Everyone else bolted and took naps. Lazy bums. Bishop Ron had to get back to his flock which was understandable and Marian just got called to the Young women’s presidency, so she was excused too, along with the Hein kids. So we got home from the rest of our block and everyone met back up at our house. It was a packed house too! We had a nice spread of all kinds of food. It was good. Brinlee and Carlie played in Brin’s room and A-Jax kept trying to join in their fun and they were being mean girls and not accepting him because of his boy-ness. I felt bad for him because they were being rude and excluding him. But Davis is a rough and tumble little dude, so he can hang with A-Jax and his rough and tumbleness too. So they can be friends. So after all of the festivities here at our house, we went to Patt’s and Ron’s for Carlie and Davis’s birthday party. So more cake and desserts there. That went on till 7:00 and I had to run up to Ron’s and Marion’s ward to see Riley’s Eagle Court. That was cool. Riley is such a goof. He was making most everyone laugh during his pin presentations on his parents. They do a cool new thing now too where the Eagle talks about his service project and then gives a mentor award. Someone who was a mentor and influential in his getting the Eagle. So the first dude (there were 3 getting their Eagles tonight) gave it to his dad who was a scout leader with them for a while. The second gave it to a scout leader who had followed him through his scouting career so to speak. That dude was all happy and a good friend of the family apparently since he was sitting with that dude’s family all up in his scout uniform himself. Then Riley gave it to Grandpa. That was cool! He said it’s because Grandpa had ridden him harder than anyone and stayed on his case more than anyone else about getting his Eagle and that is what motivated him above most everything else. Grandpa, you can imagine was overwhelmed and emotional and the water works started from there. So he was super happy and we were all way happy for him. That was a cool thing Riley did. So grandpa went up, got this cool gold lapel pin put on that has an Eagle, and on it, it says, Eagle Scout Mentor. Grandpa was floating around that gym the rest of the night after it was over proudly showing that off. So I was happy to see that action.

Yesterday, I was over at Ma’s and Pa’s and we looked at your pictures and videos for the first time. It was fun to look at them. That one of Herbert snoring was pretty funny. The bike ride in the rain was cool too. I’ll get those copied over tomorrow and send your card back soon. We passed around your letters today too. It took all of us about 30 seconds to read all of your letters. Ha ha ha. I guess I’ve razzed you enough about how short they have been, but we all had a good laugh at your expense about that anyway. In fact, and this is no joke… it is funny as a good joke, but I’m serious about it… you last letter you sent me in the pink envelope, that was like 2 paragraphs long, the post office didn’t even cancel out the stamp. I guess they felt like it wasn’t worth a whole stamp so they mercifully left the stamp un-stamped or whatever they do to it. Ha ha ha. Well, that’s all I’ll say about that. Thanks for getting me your new companion’s bio back to me anyway. Did you tell him to tell his family to check out your blog? His info is up there so they will enjoy checking it out while you two are together to get some updates now and then. Well, anyway, it’s 12:00 midnight now, on the busiest day since who knows when, I’m exhausted, and I still have about 2 hours worth of reading to start getting caught up on my class I have to do. Not to mention I’m back to work tomorrow bright and early and I’m still sick. I’m not going to get any better as long as I keep up this pace.

Hopefully you are keeping up on your journal. It was great to bust into mine again tonight. It was cool strutting around with my parker in my pocket, sitting next to Gramps at Riley’s Eagle court with his sweet parker set in his pocket and then looking back at Dad in the row behind us sporting his … WHAT??!! Imposter cheapo plastic crap??!! I called him on the carpet right then about that and he got all embarrassed and said he didn’t like to wear them when he thinks he might get them gunked up. I told him what is he going to be doing at an eagle court to get them gunked up? He said that he wore them earlier in his suit to my ward though and asked if I saw that. I told him I didn’t and that I expect he carry the truth around with him wherever he goes and not slack when he thinks it’s convenient to pack around something else other than the true pen. I think my challenge was adequate and hopefully he humbles himself enough to heed my counsel and exhortation. Time will tell. Maybe you can work on him a little bit next time you are writing him a letter in true Parker fashion. He even handled mine for a while. The nice Stainless Steel shaft with gold arrow and gold clicker area nice contrast to the stainless shaft and barrel. They have a narrowed shaft too so it’s a thin fit in the fingers which is good for extended writing. It limits hand cramping and writing fatigue on those long letters which everyone knows I’m prone to write. He was admiring that quality about it.

I better throw in your quote of the week… Since you referenced obedience in your last letter to Ma and Pa, I selected this one.

“The Lord has outlined the steps we should follow to draw near unto Him: seek through the scriptures, ask through prayer, knock through obedience.”

-J. Thomas Fyans

I appreciate the fact that you are more obedient than most. And I didn’t think you came off arrogant or whatever. I knew that you were stating fact and I’m happy to hear that. Obedience is particularly hard for MOST missionaries for some reason. I think it’s because they haven’t realized the cause and effect relationship yet with Heavenly Father. He is a rewarding God who will reward obedience. It’s such a simple concept that so many missionaries and just members in general for that matter don’t get it. It’s so simple to understand that it becomes a hard thing to figure out. Like Moses and the serpent. The children of Israel only needed to look at it to be healed and live, yet it was too simple of a way that they would not do it and ended up dying. If missionaries would only realize that cause and effect of obeying the mission rules, commandments, their covenants, etc. they would see that the blessings they receive in return are so abundant, they would never choose anything other than strict obedience. It’s awesome that you have figured it out at such an early stage of your mission. I’m proud of that and I’m proud of you as always Mike. Continue to Seek through the scriptures. Continue to ask through prayer. I’m a firm believer in the power of prayer and the miracles you can perform through it. And of course continue to knock through obedience. The Lord will let you in time and time again to the abundant blessings he has in store for you if you follow this simple precept.

What do you know. I have rattled off 4 pages on my short letter and it’s been well over an hour into it. Time flies when you are having fun, but alas, I cannot have much more fun or I’m going to be in a world of hurt. I have to get studying. I love you Mike. I pray for your continued growth and much success while serving our Lord in North Carolina.

Be well, be humble, be obedient, and be successful for those souls who are waiting for you.

Love you and miss you always.

Your brother for eternity,

Trav