“A
Bicycle built for one”
Monday
August 19, 2013
Hello
everyone!
Well, it's been an interesting
week. As transfer weeks usually go, it was long a busy and I am completely and
utterly exhausted, but in the best way possible.
My new companion is Sister Kagie
from West Bountiful , Utah
Here are my thoughts and
experiences with biking so far:
- Sweat. So much sweat.
- Helmet hair is not my style.
- Sidebag on a bike....whose genius idea was that?
- Bugs hit my face like it's a car windshield
- I'm grateful for my thickly padded bike seat
- Pedestrians hate drivers. Drivers hate pedestrians. Everybody hates bikers.
- Thank goodness for Mary Kay's Finishing Spray. My make-up still looks decent at the end of the day even if everything else is in disarray.
- If you need help fixing your bike, make Elders appear in person. Them explaining directions over the phone goes something like this "You just squeeze the wire together."
- Where bikes go, area books cannot follow.
And amidst all of this, I
actually am starting to really enjoy biking. Especially at night. Which is
funny because poor Sister Kagie HATES riding at night. She's convinced that Carmichael is the biggest ghetto on planet earth and that
we will be shot and killed or mugged and killed or hit by a car and killed. I
think it's lovely. For example: The other night we were pulling up to a traffic
stop and a guy drives by in this car and yells something and I just laugh. And
then like 10 seconds later all these firecrackers go off across the street and
I thought "That was strangely beautiful. Like the 4th of July. Wonder
where they came from." And then I crossed the street and started singing,
"You can make the pathway bright".
We got home and sister Kagie
says, "I never want to bike at night again." I asked why and she
looked at me in shock and said, "Didn't you see all of that?!" She
then explained that they guy that drove by had previously been standing on the
side of the street yelling at his girlfriend and they were fighting and got in
the car and where still fighting when they drove past us and the woman was
crying and he was yelling and that two punk boys dropped the firecrackers out
of the window of their car after they lit it and that when they went off she
thought it was gunshots and she was about to have an anxiety attack. "Are
you totally oblivious?!" She said.
I just laughed and said,
"Apparently." I had a great night. I guess I have been on my mission
long enough and gone through enough crazy experiences to know that as long as I
am being obedient and as careful as I can be, God won't let anything bad happen
to us. The spirit will warn us of real danger and we really don't have anything
to fear. So I just sing a song and pedal down the street. Sister Kagie still
hates riding at night, but I love it. It's so much cooler than during the day
and there is music and laughter and lots of joy. I love Carmichael
at night. She will too...eventually :)
We have been having trouble
getting investigators to church in this area. I had been thinking and thinking
about how we could get people there when I had this burst of brilliant
inspiration. We have an area book full of phone numbers. Why not text them all
and invite them all to church. I call it a text blitz. So we did. We texted 99
people and invited them to church. Sunday morning came around and...
Nobody came. Not one.
But later that day one of the
numbers texted back to ask who we were (normal people don't realize that once
you give your number to missionaries, they will have your number forever) and
we started to talk to them and teach them about the gospel. His name is Jimminy
Cricket and we set up a return appointment to teach him this week. Miracle! And
in the most ironic way we texted the 99 and then went after the 1.
Beautiful.
Last night we had 5 minutes
before we had to report our numbers for the week and I felt like we should try
to contact a few more people with the time we had. We called a less active
named Mushu who we had never seen or heard of before. He said he wanted to come
to church but he needed a ride and he wanted to have the missionary lessons
over again. We said, "Sure, we can do that." Miracle!
Miss Piggy and Kermit had to
reschedule the temple tour for this weekend so we will be going with them and a
recent convert from the ward who is preparing for the temple. We are so excited.
It will be an amazing experience for them. I'm pumped.
The pictures are one of Sister
Kagie and I after our first day biking. Sweaty with helmet hair. Oh yes. And
the other one is the result of biking. I've decided it is easier to clip my
badge to the strap of my bag while I am riding my bike. So I take off my bag
(over my head) and then clip my badge to my shirt when we reach our
destination. The other day we got to dinner and I took of my bag and couldn't
find my badge. I was so confused because I had literally just seen it. We
looked around for five minutes before I turned around and Sister Kagie started
cracking up. It was stuck perfectly in my hair. Fun stuff.
Love y'all! Have a great week!
If you're biking in the dark, sing a hymn. It's refreshing and scares away the
bad guys.
Love,
Sister Burchett
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