Greetings from my new area of Carthage, New York. Nothing like being in my third area and being on my 4th Companionship in 8 months! Most Sister's have 3-4 areas their entire mission. I am pretty sure that the Lord just likes to spread me around everywhere. At my current rate, I will have close to 6-7 service areas for my mission. HA HA. But, it just means I get more people to love !!
I really do consider myself really fortunate. The Lord has blessed me with really amazing experiences and people. Now, I get the unique opportunity to work with one of the bigger wards in New York and serve on a military base and the surrounding ex-military areas. It is super cool. I just love it. This area has the most members, less-actives, part-member families than any other area I have served in. We work primarily with the Army wives and the families so I need to brush up on the kid lessons. I haven't really taught families or kids on my mission. It is always been single adults or older couples. That is a new learning curve for me.
6 days a week, we work on the Fort Drum Army Base. It is so cool once we are inside and we've cleared the security gate/clearance--because it looks like I am back out west. Cute maintained homes and everyone is nice and friendly. The only weird thing is that we cannot actively proselyte on the Base. We even have to take off our missionary name badges !! Another weird thing is that when we go to meet someone we made an appointment with, we can only say our names and ask if someone is a certain person/name. Then we have to wait for them to invite us inside before we can start talking about anything like Church. I feel so naked without my name tag on, it is FREAKY !! Instead of the standard Missionary Name Tag, I have to wear a "military clearance pass" tag. Yes, they did a Dept. of Defense background check right in front of me...slightly freaky, but thankfully, I am as clean as a bar of soap :)
Due to recent changes in boundaries and apartments, we are living in the wrong area and are currently burning through our monthly miles allocation just to get back to our service area. All we need to do is give the Watertown, NY Elders a new apartment and everything will be solved. Everyone here within a 45 miles radius is army or ex-army. We go outside and everyone is either in military fatigues or in redneck clothing with a shotgun. Hooah!! Soooo.. that's been new.
My area is so very different compared to the rest of New York. There are actually young families here. We easily had like 120+ people at Church this week. Most families had 2-5 kids and/or were pregnant. Since it is the summer block leave and PCS (when soldiers get deployed or change forts) the ward was actually thin. It was scary to have to learn so many more people. Sadly, most people were standoffish because they move every 6 months to 3 years. So, I grabbed a 6 month old ward list and my companion laughed and said, half of those people don't even live here anymore. CRAZY. Everyone we work with for the most part (90%) are super cool and normal.
We also have one of the coolest investigators. Her name is Bev and she is a PV-class two Army medic that is best friends with some recent converts. She just started investigating the Church. She has already come to Church 3 times and I gave her a Book of Mormon to read. We just need to get her to switch from being agnostic to being a Mormon. She is my favorite 22 year old Filipino I've ever met. Such a firecracker... but trying to work to clear her dirty mind after living on the barracks for the last 2 years will be a challenge.
Speaking of baptism, we had a 9 year old get baptized on Saturday. Easiest baptism of my life! I just showed up... taught her about tithing and temples and filled a font and took a picture. I wish the others would have been that easy. HA HA. She didn't take the lessons until her father got back from deployment. We also have 2 more potential kid baptism this month depending on the father's plans and if they show up to Church. Boy, I love part member families. The are so cool. We are teaching a Korean wife of a member who is deployed and she will get baptized soon; but the language barrier is hard. Thankfully, we have a few Korean military members in the Ward who come to translate for us.
Oh... also.. on base .. every couple of hours a loud siren goes off. In Carthage, the sirens go off every hour to remind the soldiers what time of day it is so they can program their bodies to sleep right at 8:30 and wake up at 4 am. IT IS SO WEIRD. I feel like an airstrike is coming or something.. but it is just a time clock that the military uses. Weird. I don't understand military lingo at all and feel so dumb sometimes it is hilarious. Thankfully, that is why we have companions.
Also, the other big thing this week, I went to a vow renewal of some members and that was a BLAST. It was a barn wedding and it looked like something straight off of Pinterest! So this week, I had my first wedding, my first kid baptism, and lots of military clearances, protocol and sirens. CRAZY! Hmm.... and the rest... trying to unpack, catch up on sleep and figure everything out. Good things to come... love you all.
The Church is True :)
Love Sister Kylie W.
