Nov 10, 2014

Alright well I think this week has been one of the most cumulatively
embarrassing weeks of my life. Good stories to follow!

Well on Tuesday, we had a district service project for our investigator, Hannah. She has troubles with addictions and well, long story short, we were moving her out of her apartment. She had a looot of stuff, let me tell you. Well a few of us missionaries are standing in the kitchen and boxing things when one elder, Elder Burton, makes a mention of how men can't be married after this life, but women can. I was like 'Whoa now that isn't true'. Remember that- it leads up to a story later. So a little while later, we- Elder Burton and I- were talking while piling stuff into the moving truck and I think the topic of us being late to our own service project came up. My excuse was that I had to shower that morning and that men have a lot less hair than women, so it takes a while and he says 'Why not do it the night before?' And I said 'Because then you sleep on wet hair and you might get sick and plus it dries weird. That's why I only wash my hair every other day.' And he gives me this grossed-out look! Excuse me, elder, that is totally normal! 
Awkward moment number one.

So remember our doctrinal disagreement? Well the next day I found a conference talk to support my opinion (because I was right) so I was like, 'Yeah! I have to show this to Elder Burton!' So I screenshotted it- which, by the way, the talk's title was "Celestial Marriage". The day after, we were at zone conference and all the elders are standing around while the sisters are sitting front and center (it's a rule in this mission that whenever a sister walks into the room, or is standing, the elders must stand. I approve) and I thought, oh hey, I
should airdrop (you can send pictures from iPad to iPad which is really handy for a lot of things) that screenshot to Elder Burton! So I motion to him and he turns on his iPad and I was like, 'I better send this to both him and his companion so this doesn't look weird'.
So airdropping to Elder Burton, not a problem. To his companion? IT DIDNT WORK!! Oh my gracious so embarrassing. I literally just sent a picture of a talk called Celestial Marriage to an elder. So him and his companion are looking at this screenshot and have these weirded-out, confused faces on. I was urgently whispering to Sister Corbridge 'oh my goodness this looks so bad, I am mortified' and she is laughing hysterically. So like 45 agonizing minutes later, they excuse us for a bathroom break and I immediately go up to the elders and I'm like, 'I have to apologize. That looked SO bad.' Elder Jorgenson said 'Yeah. That looked really bad.' Hahahaha but it was fine and we all laughed about it. (But of course other elders are hearing this conversation so they had to know what happened too. Ugh.
Awkward moment number two.

And now we go into awkward moment number three of this week. A couple hours later they excuse us for lunch (8 foot subs, yo!) and afterwards we're all standing around waiting for our zone's turn to have pictures taken and, I mean, it's three zones of missionaries so it's loud. My district is standing around and one of the elders is autistic and came out at the same time as Sister Corbridge. He is so funny, we love him. But he's explaining to us that last night he was feeling better about missionary work but after today he felt so chastised that he just wanted to go home. I heard the opposite so I said 'That's great, elder! The spirit edifies and uplifts.' And every single missionary in the district looked at me in suppressed horror because they heard what he had actually said. The elder gives me this piercing look that, I mean, if looks could kill I would be long gone. I apologized profusely but, alas, it went on my embarrassing moments of the week list.
That night we had a meeting with our ward mission leader and we got there before the elders so I had plenty of time to entertain him with all my embarrassing stories. So at least someone got joy out of it  hahahaha.

I found out this week that Sister Corbridge doesn't believe in dinosaurs. Like literally doesn't believe they ever existed.

Hannah, that investigator with the addictions who we helped move, accepted a baptismal date for November 29th. Sister Corbridge and I had been discussing baptismal invites and I told her my philosophy is to just do it unless the spirit tells you otherwise. It's just one of
those things that you always do, like getting out of bed in the morning or saying a closing prayer at a lesson. So she extended the baptismal invite in that lesson and holy cow I have never heard a more powerful baptismal invite, ever. Ever! So she's on for November 29th,
but we'll see if that happens. She struggles a lot, and she's missed dates in the past, but she has improved so much. She really does want to be baptized though. So, with Sister Corbridge's newfound confidence in baptismal invites, she invited David, our investigator in Pakistan that we skype with, to baptism and he accepted! He has the most solid date- December 6th. He was supposed to have gone to church yesterday, so we will follow up
with him soon and see if he did. He's incredible, he searches everything out himself. He basically told us that he would talk to people at church and get his baptism all set up. He's really amazing.

We were walking out of Panera the other day and there were two guys our age sitting at one of the outdoor tables and as we walked past, we heard one of them say 'oh never mind, they're Mormons'. Hahahahaha.

Sunday was stressful, trying to coordinate rides for like 8 investigators. Only three showed up, but it was all good because it was the primary program. I cried several times. Especially because the deaf kids went up there like everyone else and the primary president just voiced for them. So beautiful.

It's always an adventure in St Augustine!

Love,
Ashley

Sister Corbridge and I waiting to have a Skype lesson with David

We carved a pumpkin
and it rotted outside of our apartment and it was too far gone to put
it in or on the car so Sister Corbridge ran the 0.2 miles to the
garbage while I drove :)

Nov 3, 2014

Hey everyone!

So we literally can't remember much of what happened this week. I'll
tell you what I do remember :)

On Friday, Sister Corbridge and I went to the urgent care for her- she
has a cyst on her neck that we think is pressing on a nerve because
it's been giving her headaches and a sharp pain down her arm. We were
in the children's waiting room and I was talking about how childrens'
shows are super lame now and I rolled my eyes. She said she couldn't
roll her eyes and I didn't believe her so I tried to teach her how.
She literally can't roll her eyes. Ahahahaha. So we go in to see the
doctor and he starts checking her and whatnot and says 'Well I know
yall are Mormons so you have no chance of being pregnant'. Hahahahaha.
He minored in theology at whatever big important school he went to so
he basically said 'I know more about religion than you all ever will
so don't even try'. lol whatever.
       Long story short the nurse came back in and he prescribed her an
antibiotic and we were all joking about what if she was allergic to
the medication because she's allergic to everything else. The next
day, what happens? She's all red and fevery and sick. She's on four
Benadryl for like three or four days so she's tired all the time.

On Saturday we had a lesson with the man with a baptismal date. We'll
call him Don. He is very indoctrinated with the Jehovah's Witnesses.
Like, he's been studying with them for 20 years, he says. But he wants
to be baptized Mormon? I don't know. So we bring our Ward Mission
Leader's daughter with us and, poor girl, it was just such a weird
lesson. He talks nonstop about how wicked the world is and about the
Second Coming/apocalypse and we had to interrupt him to get any word
in edgewise. He'll answer any question except the one you asked. Poor
girl, the last lesson we took her to was to a man who swore he was a
prophet. We'll take her to someone promising someday hahaha.
We went home for lunch and Sister Corbridge was just feeling too sick
to go back out, so we stayed in for the rest of the day. It was later
that evening when she was standing in our closet in the bedroom,
lights off and everything, and I passed by and saw her, and when I
passed the doorway again, the lights were still off and there was no
noise or anything. I definitely thought she was trying to scare me. I
flipped on the light and holy cow she's on the floor in the closet. I
woke her up and called the mission nurse (I'm sure she has memorized
our phone number by now) and she said she would be over in 45 minutes.
In the meantime we were talking to the zone leaders about permission
for things and Sister Corbridge decided she wanted a blessing.
The ZLs were hosting a zone-wide conference call in 30 minutes so I
said 'The other elders are on bikes and you all have the conference
call to conduct, so what should we do?' thinking that they would have
us find someone in the ward to do it. Then, the elder on the phone who
is normally so loud and happy, got very quiet and said 'Sister
Corbridge is much more important than a conference call. We'll be over
in a minute'. Wow. So they're at our apartment in a few minutes' time
(I think I got a glimpse of how it must feel for people to open their
door and see missionaries standing there) and since they can't come
in, they held the door while I set up a chair and brought Sister
Corbridge over. She was a little bit of a sick wreck and I don't think
I've ever seen such faces of compassion on elders, or men in general.
The spirit got stronger by the second as they quietly discussed who
would anoint and who would bless. It was such a peculiar setting- them
standing out in our cold, dark stairwell in suits, us just over the
threshold in our warm apartment. I don't know if I've ever been more
sure that the priesthood was real than in that moment. I couldn't do
much more than just cry. Haha. :)

I think that was the highlight of my week. I don't share spiritual
moments too often, so I figured it was about time. :)

David, our investigator in Pakistan, is doing wonderfully. He says he
know Joseph Smith is a prophet and that the church is true, and on our
second Skype lesson, he introduced us to his parents (after we were
introduced, he says 'I just wanted you both to meet my parents' and
fear struck into our hearts hahaha. I literally was afraid he would
propose in that moment but he immediately brought out his Book of
Mormon and started talking about the church again. Whew) and we taught
his father the restoration! David goes 'you tell my dad what you told
me, and I will show him the Prophet of the Restoration movie'. He's
already a missionary! Hahaha! There are no church buildings in
Pakistan but apparently there are underground LDS groups that you've
gotta scope out. We told David this, and in his funny accent he says,
'I will research that'. He learns everything by researching it out,
he's very good at it.

Oh also we tracted into a member this week. We were looking for a
certain potential investigator and walked up to the wrong house (it
was dark) but decided to knock anyway. This woman was so kind! She so
readily took a pamphlet and gave us her full name and phone number and
she's like 'yes! Come back any time!' And we walked away thinking she
was golden. Well when we were putting her into the iPad, her name came
up and Sister Corbridge goes 'oh NO'. Yep she's a less-active member.
Well at least she's a nice less active and not the kind that tore me
to shreds a few weeks ago hahahaha.

Well that was my week, folks! I can't believe it's November.

Love
Ashley

Before planning one night, we were discussing how weird people look  without eyebrows. 

                   There are a lot of houses and sidewalks made of seashells here. Who

knew there were that many seashells to go around? :)

Sister Corbridge's breakdown when we found out our plans
for the day had been deleted. Hahaha :)