Email to Mom: Monday, July 19, 2021

From: Kaitlyn.garcia@missionary.org
To: Mom
Subject: That Did Not Just Happen

Hey hey hey! This week flew by the recaps are longer so I'm just gonna get straight into your email! :) 

- Don't cry! Think about it like this, it's literally only 1 year that I'm missing out ;) 

- Carmel suckers are the best! But you do have to slurp em haha! 

- I don't think my heart had ever yearned for something so much in my life. I miss the temple so so much! When I get home can we go? Lile just me and you? 

- Those masks are freaking hard to breathe in! Haha! I love that they grabbed em though 

- It makes my heart happy to know that she had good friends around. Not drama or anything dumb she has to deal with 

- Rich and his FOMO man.... I mean I guess it's nice because you aren't staying the whole time and don't have ti deal with him too much 

- Youllbhave to keep me posted on the 24th horseshoe shenanigans haha! Is that even how you you that?? 

- I still need to do my tye dye! We've been finding things to fill the time on pdays but Ill do it soon! Mines gonna be better for sure ;) 

Alright! Here's my week! I love you!

MONDAY 

Gooooooooddddd morrnnninggggggg Vietnam!  I know it's not morning or even close to it but kinda fun haha! Isn't that from a movie or something?  Anyways! Today was a pretty chill pday but having rain kinda kills the mood bit it's okay. Nothing too crazy to report that's for sure haha! Just some good Ole Facebook finding and watching the rain dump on all the cars outside. I hope ylu had the best rest of your Monday and that you're getting things all put together to head out :) Don't have too much fun without me ;) I love you forever and for always mom!

TUESDAY 

I only have 1 year left?? That's gotta be a joke or something. I swear I just started the CTM.  Today was a jam packed day and I don't think I've ever eaten so much food haha! We started the afternoon off with Irmã Fatima. She's such a sweetheart and even made us couscous com leite. I was a little worried when I smelled it but I would 100% eat it again. It was actually so good! Right after her lesson though we went over to Irmã Odete's house. She even shared a scripture with us and was so super cute. She had donuts for us though. I'm telling you, this day was just full of food! One thing about most cultures is that if you don't eat the food they give you, they're offended. Sister Parrish and I literally were popping at the seams walking back to the car haha! We ended up going to UNO pizzeria out here with the district to celebrate Elder Burdick only having 1 month left on the mission. It just worked out that I have one year left. The pizza was actually super good and it made me think of the time we went to CPK while waiting for COVID test results. Haha! We took some fun pictures too. I hope you enjoyed all of them haha! This district is so cool and I have a feeling I'm gonna leave so that's a bummer but hey, that's what we have Facebook for haha! ;) Today honestly just went by so stinking fast, kinds like missions do ;) We had two really great English classes and I'm proud to say I am a pro at trava linguas by the way ;) Honestly today was just super crazy but typing it all out doesn't seem like it was busy, but I promise that it was. I can't believe 6 months are already done of my mission. How crazy is that?! I only have one year left. ONE YEAR?! How is that even possible??  But for real, being a missionary is the best thing I've ever done and I love that I get to do this everyday :) Thank you for coming to my TED talk haha! I hope you to the moon and back!

WEDNESDAY 

Service day! I love doing service so much and I love getting to help people. The only thing I don't love is loving allllllll the furniture haha! I thibkbi might just hire that out one day haha! After service though we had such a miracle mom! We had a meeting with Helmer, our most progressing friend! He wanted to meet in person but the weather looked rough so we just decided to call because we normally meet with him at a park. At first it was a little rocky because of WiFi problems but it was another lesson that was tooooo good to be true! He literally already has friends at church, our members are tope de mais! He also kept bringing up that he's been praying about the Book of Mormon and the church. We never really have the chance to being any of that up! He just brings it up in the most casual ways and he's so comfortable. It was so so good! :) I hope he really gets an answer soon and that he feels the Spirit I can see in him. His lesson really took up the majority of the night na verdade. It was just so freaking cool! And I had a scripture to share with him and he actually really liked it, I love when that happens. It just makes me feel like my impressions are worth something. I don't know that's probably super dumb but oh whale ;) How was your day? It's hump day! Already halfway through the week? How are you feeling about Lake Powell? I think Brooklyn is bringing Jada right?? I'm so excited to see pictures and hear all about it! I love and miss you!

THURSDAY 

Okay what!? I'm a real life missionary?? Just bear with me as I explain my day today and just know that I literally love being a missionary:) We kicked off the morning by FINALLY finishing the papers and papers of family history from Irmã Guzman haha! It feels so so nice to have all those done and not on the floor anymore. It feels so CLEAN! We got them all alphabetized and put neatly in boxes. We're gonna give them to her on Saturday and I'm so so excited to get to give them to her and see her face :) Then to celebrate a little bit and to weekly plan of course we went to this super chique smoothie bowl place. It was actually so so yummy and it even had oreos in it! What more could you want right? ;) It was kinda in a sketchy place though so we didn't stay too long there but it was fun to get out and try something new. We had a lesson pretty quick after that with our friend Annie. She's so sweet and always sends us music and pictures of her outfits haha! I hope to look like her when I'm a grandma that's for sure! It was after that, thay literally the entire night went by at rocket speed! We had an in person English class with a woman who saw our flyer. We out up those flyers forever ago! But hey, the Lord works in mysterious ways and we were able to teach her. I don't even know how to explain what I felt. I was so humbled seeing this woman and her home. It was nothing mom, but it was everything to her. Not only that but after our English class she offered us food. Unfortunately we had to go but she literally gave us the majority of her food. The cape verdian people have the biggest hearts and are so so humble. I don't even have words to explain it amor. While we were driving back though I had set up a phone call to get to know this guy. Long story short, Sister Parrish and I don't know Rhode Island hardly at all and we got lost. We had a lesson on the phone and he's actually our new friend! He's a dot that I've been working on for a while and it finally all worked out :) When we pulled into the parking lot we had ANOTHER lesson! It was just one after the other. It was just crazy mom! Anyways, hopefully that all made sense haha! It was such a good day and I loved every minute of it :) Being a missionary is incredible and I love the fast paced, stress filled days. I've never felt so fulfilled :) Ahhh such a good day! I hope you had the best day and that the drive down to Powell wasn't the worst thing haha! I love you mom!

FRIDAY 

Man oh man am I gonna be sore tomorrow! Haha! I found this workout on Facebook that I wanted to try and during the workout I could already tell that I was gonna be sore haha! I'll have to keep you updated on if it really does hurt! UPDATE: I'm freaking sore man! Haha! Anyways, today we had DC and it was actually really good. We got to talking about the woman in the Bible that was caught in adultery. Okay now just bear with me because I had a moment haha! Okay so in the story the Savior goes down to her level right? Like he kneels down and thinks about what he's gonna say to her. I never noticed that until the video haha! Buttttt this woman was at rock bottom and they brought her to the Savior. The Savior got on her level and helped her stand up. The most perfect man in the whole world, knelt on the ground and helped His child up. He helped her know she was a daughter of God. Okay now this is where it might not make sense haha! The Savior is always said as being the rock of our lives right? Well when we hit our rock bottom, we're just laying on the rock, the rock of the Savior. That's when we have to choose to accept and allow Him to rise with us and help us. I think this makes more sense in my head because I can see it so if it really doesn't make sense I can draw it out or something haha! Anyways, that was my moment:) Today was a pretty low key kinda day after DC not gonna lie. But man could I feel Satan working on me today haha! I don't know what it was but I was just getting so annoyed with Sister Parrish. It was just a lot of little things that shouldn't bother me but they totally did. I don't know comps are hard sometimes haha! But I got over it and had a productive night :) I did set a goal to be more productive productive my nights, so far so good but the elders haven't come down either haha! Love them but they always stay super late and then we don't get to bed until wayyyyyyyy later than we should. I hope you're having the best time in Powell and soaking up some sun! I love you forever and for always!

SATURDAY 

Saturday! Saturday! Saturday nights alright!;) Do you know know song reference? Maybe, maybe not? Anyways, today was so so nice outside! We had a pretty open open so we decided to see if Helmer could meet with us. Luckly he said yes! We ended up going to park we always meet at and we had a lesson. I think think even got a little sun on my arms ;) But that's not even the greatest part! For one, we planned to go over the commandments with him and touch on the word of wisdom and things like that. When we showed up and asked what questions he had, he said he had questions about the commandments! So cool:) Anyways as we were finishing up the lesson we asked one last time what he had questions about. He says, "I want to be baptized, what's the process?" I wanted to jump for joy and grin so hard amor!!! I didn't haha! I held it together but we told him to pray about it and then we could make a goal to be baptized. He seemed so down for it too :) When we walked back to the car I couldn't believe what just happened. God is so so good! Anyways, I also don't think I've sweat so much in my entire life. Haha! I literally couldn't feel my boob sweat stick to my garments. It was a struggle let's just say that, but so freaking worth it. By the time we got back though, it literally started to pour rain. I'm just so confused by New England weather haha! The rest of the day was pretty routine though, nothing too crazy to report. Also! I got my package from J.Crew today! I love you! And thank you! I think it might be the wrong order so I'll have to ask you on Monday. But seriously thank you so so much for being willing to ship things to me :) I love you! I hope you had the best day!  

SUNDAY 

We love Sundays! Today was one for the books in almost every single aspect not gonna lie. It started off with sacrament. We had our friend CiCi come!! She's the sweetest human I think I've ever met and even brought us all these Cape Verdian rolls and stuff for 'breakfast' How sweet is that?! I was excited to sit in Sunday school with her and see what she had to say but President Fairbank told me that I needed to be the other adult in the youth classes. Ratoes! That means that Sister Parrish got to go to Sunday school with her and I got to chill with some 11 year olds haha! I didn't mind honestly but it just felt weird to hear everything in English again haha! After church Sister Parrish told me about Irmã Joana and her class...bless her heart. We don't think she really understands the doctrine or something because as missionaries we always have to correct her and/or have to bring it up with President Fairbank. We love her though haha! Helmer couldn't make it to church but he did say he wanted to meet and study because he had questions about the Book of Mormon and some of the verses. We set a time to meet and went about our day. We did decide to do any English class LIVE too, they seem to do pretty well and we had the time. Sister Parrish said something to me today too and it kinda bothered me so I made sure to work extra hard on talking during the LIVE. I'm over it obviously but kinda chato. We had the rest of our meetings and then it was time for our lesson with Helmer! He's a very literal person and he always has questions when it comes to analogies and metaphors in the scriptures. We tried our best to address his questions but man it's hard! Haha! It was a good lesson though and he seemed to understand better. We came back and were finishing up our night when I got a text from him saying he had a question. Of course I responded and asked what was up. Then my heart literally dropped and I don't think I've ever felt so defeated in my whole life. He asked me if it was a sin to ask me on a date. I don't even know how to explain how I felt. I was so angry and upset, but also wanted to just play it off like no big deal too. I feel like I failed honestly. I told Sister Parrish and she just said he doesn't understand. I can see that but the only thing in my mind is that's the reason he's taking the lessons. It so hard because he really is ready but now I feel like I don't know what his motivation is. I responded the best that I could and then he asked if we could call and say a prayer with him. We did and I low key pretended like nothing happened. If I make it awkward he's gonna push away so I just need to pretend like everything is sunshine an rainbows. I just feel like a total failure and like I fed into Satan's stupid games. It honestly kinds feels like when my dad would mess with my head. I don't know how to explain and maybe I'm over reacting but it's just hard. I definitely needed a pick me up after that so we told the Elders we had some sheet masks and that we wanted to do a spa night. It was so funny and definitely made me feel better haha! I'll have to put the pictures in the drive once I get em. We seriously all looked like Jason the Halloween guy haha! Anyways, thanks for coming to Sister Garcia's rundown and innermost thoughts haha! I can not wait to talk to you tomorrow! I love you the most!