Four Corners Mission: The Canal of Doom and Other Crazy Experiences

From email on 12/05/16

Hello there,

Well this week has been a very interesting one... It started on Tuesday, literally 30 minutes after our studies. We were going to an appointment, and we had Elders Bratt & Prescott accompany us because we needed a third male, and their appointment cancelled. Anyway we decided to walk to it because it wasn't too far away, but it had just recently snowed. So we were walking, and Elder Middleton and I, we always take a shortcut to get there, so we decided to take the shortcut. The shortcut involved crossing an irrigation canal. There hasn't been much water in it and there was this median block, or whatever you want to call it, in the middle, and that was what we used to cross. The shoes I have don't have any traction on them, and the block was covered in snow and mud along with the sides of the canal. I didn't originally want to cross and said we should take the long way, but they had all already crossed so I had to anyway. We got across just fine, and when we got to this lady's house she wasn't home, so the appointment was a bust. But we then decided to take the shortcut back because we had made it earlier. Well, Elder Middleton and Prescott made it across just fine, and it was me and Elder Bratt left. Elder Bratt was getting ready to go across, but he had a Book of Mormon in his hand. I told him to give it to me so I could put it in my bag, but he said, "No, I'll just throw it across." So he was sitting there getting ready to throw his Book of Mormon, that he had customized, and the whole time I could just picture in my mind what was going to happen, and it did. He threw it, the book opened up, and didn't make it across and hit the side of the canal. The cover broke off, and fell into the canal, the pages slid down but were stopped by a sagebrush before hitting the water. We just stood there for a couple of seconds, processing what had just happened, then Elder Middleton decided he would try and save it, so he started slipping down the side of the canal, got mud all over his pants, and didn't get the book pieces. Well, Elder Bratt got frustrated and decided he was going to get it, so he stomped into the canal, picked up the pieces, and attempted to scale the steep, icy, muddy, canal side in is now sopping wet shoes. As you can imagine it was a vain attempt. He ended up slipping down, his shoulder sliding in the mud, and then splashing once again in the canal. Then he rolled over, getting more mud on him, throwing the book all the way up this time and climbing out. So that was a fun adventure, and then the rest of the day, all of our appointments fell through.

The next day I went on exchanges with Elder Prescott. While we were doing companionship studies, we witnessed a drug deal going down in our backyard... It was quite funny because the guy who did the drug deal was the first person we were going to teach that day. We went to teach him about the Atonement, but not surprisingly he wasn't home. Then the rest of the day we drove around the Rez, all of our appointments for the day falling through. We did meet a fair number of cute Rez puppies though. And while tracting we came across a "pirate," his name is Herman, and he only has one eye. I was a bit alarmed when he opened the door. We also met a lady in her pajamas. So another interesting day. ("Rez" is the reservation.)

Most of our appointments fell through this week, but we did give a couple of blessings to a lady named Carla.

Friday we went to dinner with the sisters, and with an investigator named George Atcitty...and he is a really cool old guy. Anyway he took us to Doc's Barbeque, and after, I was putting on my suit and my name tag flew off. I found the back green magnet part but couldn't find the name tag part. So we were all on our hands and knees in this place looking for my name tag. Yeah, I was really embarrassed, cuz other people in the place started to help look too. Anyway we looked for about 10 minutes, and I went to move a chair and I felt something weird in my sleeve by my elbow. Turns out that my name tag had somehow gotten in my sleeve. So, yeah, that was a fun little episode as well.

And then on Saturday while we were doing yardwork I found like 5 giant black widows, and we killed them. But other than that it has been a pretty good week.

Love you all, and God Bless
Elder Takis