Spiritual High

Something really fantastic happened to me over the last week, and no, it was NOT the Marie Calendar's Thanksgiving dinner I had. (blech)
No, what happened was I regained contact with one of my old converts from Germany. She found me through Facebook, which I just recently joined, and she just happened to be searching through some of the groups I am a member of, and saw my picture staring out at her. She dropped me a line, and we have been writing ever since.

So the story behind this particular girl is this: she was the perfect investigator. She was curious, active, thoughtful, sincere, intelligent, and fun to teach. In Germany, or all European countries for that matter, such a person is about as rare as a 4 dollar bill. She was one of a kind, and teaching her was easily one of the high points of my mission.

Well, it turns out that in the 8 years since her baptism she has served a mission in Russia, and her mother has also joined the church. Who knows how many lives she has touched or how many people she has helped come closer to God. I feel so humbled and blessed that I was able to be even a small part of that story.

I always hoped that someday I would hear that my work on my mission was bearing great fruits, or that the child of someone I converted went on a mission or something. I never dreamed that I would be hearing those stories so soon.

For me it is just one more testimony of missionary work. My mission never ceases to be a source of joy and pride for me. When I think of all the wonderful things that have happened to me as a direct result of serving for those two years (including my wonderful wife Dana), it is clear that I have been blessed by my service as much or more than the people I actually served. I think that is the way God intended it to be.

Random Ramble

Long time, no blog. I would say sorry about that, but so far I know of exactly one person who reads these words (Hi, Will!) and saying sorry would basically apply to myself, and I would not be sure what I was appologizing for: for not writing, for not giving myself something to read, or for neglecting something I started with good intentions of maintaining. Long story short: no sorry. Deal with it.

Today I am in a happy, almost silly mood. May have something to do with the excess of sugary food that seems to spawn in the office, and then mysteriously makes its way into my stomach. Wherever the mood came from, I am enjoying it. Rather like people in the early spring stop to enjoy the feeling of the sunshine on their shoulders. It makes them happy. However, Sunshine in your eyes can make you cry, but that is not an emotional thing. That is like: pepper in my nose makes me sneeze type thing. Anyway, this mood is a good one, and I am feeling like there is nothing in the world that could really bother me right now. (OK, Michael Jackson always bothers me, as does Ann Coulter and Martha Stewart and Dr. Laura among others, but they bother me in a distant way, like knowing it is going to snow in three days when I want to go camping. Not in the ruin-my-mood type of bother. But I digress.)

All this happiness has got me thinking: people should send out notices when they have good moods, so as to get the most usage out of the mood. For instance, I should call all my clients who bug me today and talk to them, because today they would not get me down. I can call my great clients when I am back to normal, and use today to deal with the pains in my posterior.

People in general should do this. Wait until you feel really great to do something that bugs you. And why not? Because it would ruin your mood? Would it not be worse to wait until you were really pissed off to do something that bugs you? You are then even more pissed off. What we are talking about is regression to the mean. Just makes sense to me.

So I am off: calling my pesky clients now. I will return and report.