It's been a few weeks, and, as usual, things have changed. At this point, I think that I would be concerned if things didn't drastically change at least once a month. Some of the things aren't worth mentioning here, but one is - new roommates!
Okay, so only two of the roommates changed, but that's okay. My roommate (referred to previously as Elder Gamma, I believe) and the missionary formally known as Elder Echo both moved out to different apartments. We got in two brand new elders who are both very nice and are far less annoying than the previous occupants.
That said, my new roommates have caused me to do much in the way of pondering. While they do have some social problems, those problems are minor. What was most startling to me was the fact that both of them, as well one of the elders that was already in my apartment when they moved in, are addicted to anime and manga. For those of you who don't know what those are (which is most of the "normal" people, whatever that means), they are PG-13(ish) Japanese cartoons and comic books, respectively. While they are not in and of themselves bad (usually), I have noticed a troubling trend related to them. It seems that those people who have intelligence but for whom social graces do not come naturally, the nerds of the world, are sitting and wasting time with these things until it consumes them. It's all they want to talk about. In several cases, it's all that they can talk about. This got me to thinking - many of the LDS youth who are into these things are not going to come to this mission; they are going to go out in the proselyting field. How ingenious is it for Satan to destroy their ability to socialize with normal people, even if only in part! I often wondered if some of these kids hadn't spend all night in front of a computer screen watching anime (as one missionary told me that he actually did) if they could have been able to serve regardless of handicap. It truly does sadden me to watch it happen.
However, not everything has been so deep and philosophical this past few weeks! In fact, some things have been downright nice. For example, this week Elder Dean and I were expected to put on conferences for the missionaries that we are over (his are the ones that live at home, while I am over the ones that live downtown in the missionary housing). The last conference we held was the second week of December and was Elder Dean's and my first. A couple things may have gone a little wrong, but it was far cry from a disaster. A few people who were supposed to bare testimony didn't show up, and the people praying were asked at the conference. For most meetings, this wouldn't have been a big deal. We could tell, however, that President Simmons was not pleased.
Later that day, after the conference had ended, Elder Dean ran away to work in his other area (smart man) while I stayed to finish a few things in the office. The next thing I knew, President Simmons was at the door to my cubical.
"Elder Savage, could I speak to you in my office for a moment?"
Although I had a great feeling of dread, I still put on a smile and went to stand up.
"And Elder Savage?...You're going to want to bring a pen and a pad of paper."
This is the point where I figured out that I was about to be filleted. Forty minutes and two pages of notes later, I finally emerged barely alive from his office after having received the most brutal delineation of expectations that I have ever received. In fact, when either Elder Dean or I am worried that we might be getting a "talking to" by president, we nicely remind the man going in to take his pen and pad of paper. Elder Dean got the same talk as I did, but since his got to be a day later, his was only the ten-minute highlight version. I was quite jealous.
This week we had our conferences again. Both of us knowing very well the expectation ("perfect," to use president's exact word choice), we prepared the entire conference 2-3 weeks ahead of time. Everything was set and prepared as best as we could get it. Then we prayed. A lot.
Yesterday, Elder Dean's conference for the Live at Home missionaries went off without a hitch, putting the pressure on for my much larger conference today. Despite one of the testimonies not showing up (despite my personally reminding them the previous week) and one cell phone going off, it was "perfect." After eating lunch with the other missionaries following the conference, Elder Dean and I went back to our cubical and enjoyed a bottle of Martinelli's sparkling cider in celebration of not needing to be "reinstructed" by the president.
I have to admit, I don't think that I've ever had better tasting sparkling cider!
No comments:
Post a Comment