Mile One and Little Thoughts

There she is, almost there, coming around the corner and....WOOHOO Hermana Simonson finishes mile one and she's looking strong!!! Two more to go. Woo! That's right. 6 MONTHS IN THE MISSION!!!!!!!!!!! It's not that I'm excited because I'm less than a year from coming home, more than anything it's realizing what an accomplishment this is!

SO, I wake up on the big day, pumped to have completed my 6 months and everything is just normal until the phone rings. I was in the middle of praying so my companion answers it and I hear this panic in her voice. I'm a little stressed out. I end my prayer and look up at her and she informs me that I had received an Emergency Transfer and had to be ready to go in a manner of minutes. I got up numbly and started taking the sheets off my bed. I just started thinking about the converts I wasn't going able to say goodbye to and how I was leaving Shilcayo after so much time and how could I be ready in minutes and I didn't even have letters to leave for the people. Yes, I broke into tears just as my companion started bursting into laughter. Oh wow. I totally fell for it! She never jokes about anything. Those mischievous Zone Leaders talking my companion into tricking me!

Later that day, we had interchanges again and this time I got to be with Hermana Reategui, the member that is living with Hermana Ryder right now. It was a lot of fun and watching her really made me realize how much I've grown. I watched her stand in the plaza shaking because a few Catholics had yelled at her and she didn't want to talk to anyone else. For a moment, I remembered being in the same place doing the same thing and Hermana Vasquez (I don`t know how she had so much patience for me) talking me into going out and talking with more people or knocking a few doors. It made me think of how scared I used to be and how much I've grown! It also made me start to miss Hermana Vasquez all over again.

That night, I was just getting ready for bed when the phone rang and a brother from Morales told me he was outside waiting to give me something...okay? I was a little weirded out because I haven't touched the Morales area since we got more Sisters here. I opened the door and he had a big smile and was holding Inca Kola and a box of pizza (which in the jungle is just bread with cheese and bologna but I still love it) and he told me it was "a gift from Hermana Vasquez and her companion in Pucallpa. HAPPY 6 MONTHS IN THE MISSION!" I laughed and maybe even cried a little bit imagining Hermana Vasquez and Hermana Price celebrating Hermana Price's 6 months and thinking of me and knowing I wasn't doing anything. It was so sweet.

I also got to watch the Relief Society Broadcast this week and it was great! Hermana Ryder and I were able to watch it in English and we were just two women there together, but we were a powerhouse singing at the top of our lungs and rejoicing with sisters around the world. I imagined how many of my friends and family were doing the same with us around the world in missions and in normal lives. I LOVED what they shared about the new Provo Temple.

How God let the Tabernacle burn so that it could be a Temple. It made me think about the Refiner's Fire thoughts that I had had. God sure has let a fire burn in my life these last 6 months! I also thought of how my life before was like the Tabernacle. I remember that when the Spirit prompted me to give up my opportunity to run in college, how sick I was, how hard I had to work to make up for the scholarship that, for some unknown reason, God had informed me I was not to take. I didn't understand anything. I felt my life was in flames until, one year ago, God told me that He was changing my Tabernacle life to be a Temple!

He was making normal, spoiled Meghan learn to become Hermana Simonson. I also loved the focus on covenants. It made me think of the Covenant I made six months ago when I stood in the MTC, scared to death, shaking, already missing my family and friends, felling completely incapable as a sister stood before me and asked "Have you been endowed en the Temple of the Most High? Have you been set apart as a missionary of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints by your stake President?" and as I answered yes, put a tag on my chest. I had no idea what I was getting into, but it was a covenant with my Heavenly Father and I am really trying to focus on what more I can do to keep this covenant for just a little less than one more year!

Lots of Love,

Hermana Simonson

SIX MONTHS!!!