October 28, 2013

It's finally stopped raining so much, and instead has been warm and sunny most days. So awesome. Especially when I think about how all of that is almost over back home and you're all heading into the dark abyss of winter. It's light from about 6 AM to 8 PM here.. Love it!

I feel like I had so much to say, and I came so prepared, but now that I'm actually sitting here emailing I don't remember what the awesome story was that I wanted to share. I'm probably just so old and wise now that my brain is having difficulty deciding what wisdom to share. Let's just go with that. Of course, we email in an internet cafe, and there's a bunch of people in here playing LAN games and cussing their faces off, so that's kind of distracting.

Honestly, nothing even really happened different this week, but for some reason it was awesome. Since conference I've really been trying to get better at seeing the good-finding happiness and joy in everything that happens. It's interesting how much of a difference it makes. It's so amazing how much there is in my life to be thankful for and happy about. 

Take yesterday for example. We left the flat to walk to church and it was sunny as could be. Not a cloud in the sky. Our chapel is about a fifteen to twenty minute walk from our flat, but I wasn't worried about it, because being raised by Dad I love mornings, and going on a walk to church in the morning sun with the birds chirpin seemed like a pretty sweet deal. We had walked about 5 minutes and clouds rolled in. They didn't seem that dark or ominous, and we had just gotten to the bottom of a big hill, so we weren't about to go back to the flat to get rain coats or anything. We made it about half a block and it started to pour. My companion goes, "come on, send somebody," and not a second later, the second counselor in the bishopric rolled up and offered us a ride. A really simple thing to do, just offering us a ride. But to us, in that moment, it meant everything, and I was certainly thankful for it. 

It's awesome getting letters every week from so many people, and I love getting so many letters from Dad. The man has some awesome insight and thoughts to share. Keep it up, and I'll try to do a little better with my emails, I'm just not that interesting most of the time.
Love,
  Elder O'Neal