The Rolla Holla

Life is an adventure. EVERY day of it! Sure, the adventures come in many different shapes and sizes: this part of my life LOOKS rigid and structured and repetitive, but is ALIVE with new personal frontiers, while the coming part consists of foreign lands, strange surroundings, and a clear purpose. NO MATTER the superficiality or depth of the adventure, "all these things shall give [me] experience, and shall be for [my] good." (D&C 122:7). Some Business for everybody: I'm sending home 3 pictures today, hopefully my beloved Mom will be able to scan them in and send them to you. Also, another batch is coming this Friday, so I'll send them next Tuesday. Also, all of the 8 Elders in my district get these letters from "Dearelder.com." They said it is free and you just go online to the website, type in the e-mail and send it to me, and it shows up the next day! Cool, eh? It will also continue to work through pouch mail once I'm in Paraguay. Anyhow, it feels SO good to get letters throughout the week, so I'd love it if you used that. Oh, and I'm going to devote my e-mail time to the Rolla Holla and to printing off my e-mails. So, my immediate family may send me their e-mails and I'll WRITE letters back. If you write me, you WILL get a letter back. i love those ongoing correspondences the most!

So, We sent off another group of missionaries this week. The Elders that welcomed us in are now mostly gone. There is a tendency here towards pride, and it seems like the most RIDICULOUS attitude to have. But, any missionary who's been here more than 2 weeks AUTOMATICALLY assumes they know everything and are therefore somehow superior to others. We have avoided that pretty well in our companionship. More than anything, it's hilarious to me to see these OTHER Elders who put their confidence on the sandy foundation of self. Of course, in reality, it's more sad than funny, and I TOO have a pretty full reservoir of pride to drain. Anyhow, one of those Elders left. His name was Elder Greene. His Visa had been delayed and so he was here for 13 weeks. 4 weeks EXTRA! Needless to say he was a bit discouraged as the weeks wore on. On his last Sunday here, he slept through church, and was generally disobedient to the rules. But, when his visa came, I saw an amazing change. Suddenly he wanted to LEARN again. He asked everyone advice and to help him learn and grow. His last two days served as an awesome example to me of charity and love and diligence. I always knew he was a smart and capable young man, but it was awesome to see him change into a GREAT servant of our Heavenly Father.

Well, the Spanish is coming along awesomely. I love it. Everybody, including me, is amazed by how quickly I'm picking it up considering my ONLY having studied it personally. Everybody in my class and district has at LEAST 3 years, and some have extensive college study of Spanish. I am truly being blessed with fluency and remembrance. THE GIFT OF TONGUES IS REAL! Last week we taught Lesson 1 in Spanish and now we're working on Lesson 2. It is so much fun for me! We set a goal to ALWAYS talk in Spanish as companionship. Every 5 words someone says, they have to iron the other two companion's shirts. It's funny, and we're not perfect. But we're improving! Elder Prettyman, I discovered, was a student at "That school down South," which we don't like to name. I found this out after describing BYU as the school where the girls are girls and the boys are too. We've been having some fun banter about it. Deep down, though, I think he knows the truth. But hey, we can't all be perfect. In fact, one day we had an AWESOME conversation at lunch about returning from a mission (a bit soon, I know, haha). We talked about all the RMs we knew and their resolve to remain spiritual and disciplined RIGHT after their mission, and then immediate falling back into NORMAL life. We decided that these days, the world is such that if you aren't at least a LITTLE peculiar, you probably aren't doing something right. I love my district. We are 7 Elders and 1 Hermana (Sister) large. It is great. We are all really close and, as I mentioned last week, I LOVE singing the hymns after every 12 hour day. There is a lot of love in that little classroom which has become the place where we spend our LIFE for now. The companionship is also going well. I'm learning a lot about EVERY relationship in life. We started doing NIGHTLY companionship study. I'm basically begging my comps, as a favor to me, to tell me what little annoying or frustrating things I do throughout the day, so I can overcome them and be a better friend and companion. it has been great and we have grown a lot closer through it, and there is almost NO tension now throughout the day.

We got new teachers. That is very abnormal. Each district has 2 that take them from infancy in the mission, to preparedness. But, both of ours got married and left. We threw a party for them, with our limited resources. Everybody bought candy from the bookstore and drinks and we made a card. Then, the big day came and I had a brilliant idea. After we'd left the class for a practice teaching appointment, we had the District Leader, Elder Palmer, stall the teachers, and my roommates and I went and grabbed ALL of our ties (probably like 50). We ran back and tied them together and made a HUGE tie streamer, to decorate for the party. Pics will be coming. It was AWESOME! Overall, I am just so happy right now. I know it is an ABSOLUTE miracle that I have the strength and endurance to do as much work as I'm doing every day. Thank you so much for your love and support!

Elder McCarty