I'm not gonna lie

Alright, so, I have a missionary. Ok ok, I know a lot of you already know a lot about it. And, I also know that a lot of "you" aren't really out there. You probably don't even read this. So, I'm not taking any big chances by making this post. But, if I am taking a chance, I don't care...I can't help it anymore. I have to talk about it. I just have to. I really really like him, and he's in the majority of my thoughts.

Yes, this missionary is serving in my mission right now and by "my" I mean the mission I served in. The MJM...the Mississippi Jackson Mission. That's right, we served there at the same time. Actually, we were in the MTC together. I was one of three missionaries in our MTC district to go to the MJM. He was one of the three as well. "He" is Elder Colby Smith. The other one was Elder Burton, who is now one of the A.P.s of the MJM. But anyway, back to Elder Smith, or Smitty as I like to call him. :) Well...never in my life had I even had the thought "hmmm...maybe I'll find a man on my mission...maybe I'll find my future husband." In fact, I didn't want to serve a mission. The thought of a mission scared the pee out of me. Seriously. I was in denial that it was probably my calling. But, finally, a dear dear friend/cousin convinced me that I needed to pray about serving. That I owed it to myself and the Lord to find out if this was something that I was pre-destined to do. Well, the thought of praying about it scared me, because I pretty much knew the answer, which is why I put it off. But, when I did, I said, "Heavenly Father, I'm not going to serve a mission. Are you ok with that?" Not even two seconds after I said those words, I knew they were wrong and I said, "Actually, I'm supposed to serve aren't I? I am." And when I said that, I felt like I was floating. So, from that point on, I wanted to serve...for the Lord. I knew that the Lord wanted me to, and that's why I did it. And that was the ONLY reason I did it. The Lord wanted me to. So...to say I ever thought I'd find a man on my mission is stupid. It never crossed my mind. A mission is WAY TOO hard of an experience to just do it because I might find a man. Now, some may have that thought...and more power to them. But it just wasn't my case. With that said, I did find a man. Well, to say I "found" a man leads one to believe I was looking...so I suppose the situation presented itself. Ok, enough of that. We met in the MTC and became good friends. I mean, yeah. We were both missionaries. There were only three of us going to the same mission. We all became friends. There might have been something deeper back then inside me, but I pushed it aside because I was at the very beginning of what then seemed like a "never-ending" journey. Well, we went our separate ways in the mission, occationally meeting up for zone conferences and what not. But, we never wrote. So, we'd only hear about eachother if other missionaries would talk about us.

And THEN...my second to last transfer he was called to be my district leader. NICE. Yeah right...it wasn't that nice. I was already getting a little trunky if you want to know the truth. I had just killed someone off ( hope everyone understands mission lingo...trunky:ready to go home...Kill:you're someone's last comp. and sending him/her home.) Ok, so I had just killed someone off, and was in the process of killing another person off, only to be left in the same area for 7 1/2 months...and then die myself. And then they put me with Smitty my second to last trasnfer? Right. I constantly had this internal battle of "Stop thinking of him like that. You're not done with your mission yet...but he's so great, I like him lots....stop you fool, you're a missionary...you should be ashamed of yourself." So, after struggling with this for a while, I finally brought it up with the President. And guess what...he didn't care! Of course, he didn't want me to act on it, but he really didn't care. In fact, I think he found it amusing. :) It was fine though...cuz the next trasnfer Smitty became zone leader and was trasnferred. And supposedly, President and his wife tease Smitty about it whenever they see him (cuz I guess people know now.)

Wow, this is turning into a novel. Anyway...come to find out, he likes me a lot too. I always had a hunch, but we, of course, never talked about it. When I got home I wrote him...and now we write all of the time, and right now I'm expecting a tape from him that I should have gotten by now because he sent it on Monday. Anyway, I got a letter from him today...and yeah, it was TENDER. I love this experience. Who knows what will happen from it. Either it will work out, or it won't. I obviously hope it does, but what I do know right now is that I'm having lots of fun with it. There's no doubt about that. Am I crazy? Stupid? A little girl? Maybe. But I don't care. It feels great. :)


Sweatin' it up on the chicken farm...why is my mouth open that wide?


My MTC homies...Smitty's on the left (looking at the pic) and E. Burton's on the right