Chapter 4: Primary Program!

There's so much work to do here in Calexico, but at the same time this past week has felt like a whole lot of nothing. We try to contact so many people, but very few answer their doors or phones. Of those that answer, few are interested in having a conversation. Of those that we can actually talk with, few are interested in receiving lessons. Of those that schedule lessons, few actually follow through. And every single one of the few lessons that have happened in Calexico have been in Spanish. In short, I've had to adjust expectations a lot. It's tricky when SO much of what we plan ends up getting cancelled at the last minute, and it's pretty common for us to try and contact a member or progressing friend only to discover that they've moved. I suppose that's often the norm with missionary work, so it's good to get acquainted with that right off the bat. It does make scheduling a lesson a victorious highlight of the week.

This is the beautiful San Diego Temple when I first arrived.
Haven't actually had the opportunity to attend yet, especially as I'm out in the Valley.

We've been trying to organize English, guitar, and Bible classes at the church to start making use of the building throughout the week. No one made it to the English class unfortunately, despite a few interesteds who contacted us, but a cat did turn up! We sat in the foyer waiting for arrivals, and he walked up to the glass doors, peering in at us. He was not the student we were expecting, but we were ready to accept him all the same! However, he ended up running off before we could start him on his ABC's.

Speaking of cats, I fear for the ones around our apartment. They always hang out right behind the cars' tires. Every time a car starts, a small feline form darts out from beneath it. Ah well, I suppose they've survived this long.

Next, I must relay to you the tragedy of Mike. In my first week, my companion and I were making calls when we came to a guy named Mike in our area book. We only had his number and a timeline of previous visits from other elders. It had been a while since any visits happened with him, so we wanted to see if he was still interested. He also spoke English, so my companion passed the phone to me and I excitedly dialed him up. Turns out Mike is super friendly and kind of hard of hearing, so he cheerily shouted into the phone about how he loved meeting with the elders. We chose a day to meet the following week, and just as we were about to put him down in our calendar, he said "Oh no wait, that doesn't work for me" and proposed the next day. This same interaction repeated like 3 more times, farther and farther down the week, Elder McLean and I cracking up more and more with each new reschedule, until we reached Friday on our calendar. At that point I began to wonder if he was pranking us, but we managed to settle on a time and he even began making plans to serve us ice cream! A missionary's dream! He then asked my name, and apparently "Elder Tolman" just couldn't make it to his ears cause what followed was like a 3 minute period of saying and spelling it out, until he said "Elder Herman?" And my companion and I looked at each other, shrugged, and said "Yup, Elder Herman! Sorry about that." I wondered whether I'd have to make some nametag alterations for our meeting. The next Friday rolled around and we realized we didn't actually have his address so we called him again to get that and confirm our appointment for the afternoon. He responded with an enthusiastic "Hey Elder Herman!!" and we had another entertaining conversation. But here's the tragedy. We plugged his address into Google maps afterward and discovered that he's not actually in our area! He lives an hour and a half north of us just outside the border of our mission! We grieved a lot and had to call him back yet again to refer him to other missionaries. We wish him well! 

This past Sunday was the ward's primary program, followed by a luncheon to say goodbye to a family that was moving, so much of our finding and visiting has centered around inviting people to that. One night we went out with the bishop to invite members, and he gave us a mini tour of Calexico. He grew up here, so he had a lot of stories and background information about all of the buildings. I saw the border wall for the first time that evening! It is so much closer to our apartment than I thought it was. There was this huge line of cars on the other side waiting to get into California (bishop said the average wait time was an hour and a half), and it's funny hearing about all the businesses crowded in Mexicali where people go specifically to be outside of the US.

The primary program was a success. Not quite as miraculous a turnout as I hoped, but attendance went up to 65 and one of the nonmembers we invited walked to the chapel that morning to attend! The kids' mannerisms were cute to watch, and partway through one of them called out "Another song??" in exasperation. We all appreciated his sacrifice.

Later on Sunday we did some brief exchanges with the assistants to the president who were dropping by the Valley. Both of the APs were English speaking, so we had to plan my companionship's visits pretty carefully. Those exchanges ended up being filled with small miracles on both ends. I had been really struggling to focus on and enjoy the work I was doing, but going around planning quick messages for our English friends on a shining afternoon reignited my hope, even though we barely got to talk with anyone. I was also feeling very socially inadequate that day, but Elder Mickle, my companion for the afternoon, gave some powerful words of encouragement that helped me move forward. He was an answer to prayer in multiple ways. On Elder McLean and Elder Udall's end, while they were out at a park near a member's house, the member's inactive husband sought them out and, filled with emotion, expressed how much he missed coming to church and how he wanted to put his life back together. Elder McLean and I got to meet with him again yesterday, and we have high hopes for him. I really wish I knew enough Spanish to understand the discussion they had and offer more encouragement.

That difficulty with language has been wearing on me quite a bit. I'm not even close to being conversational in Spanish, and an hour of language study per day hasn't changed a lot. I'm caught between the two equally negative mindsets of "Elder Tolman has it so hard serving without knowing much Spanish" and "pff, Elder Tolman has is so easy being able to take the back seat in most conversations while his companion does the talking". I know this is a God-given opportunity that He can consecrate for my good, but I'm definitely feeling a bit disconnected from the people and longing to be able to teach more. Hopefully by the end of this transfer I'll know enough to bear my testimony in Spanish and refer someone to Spanish missionaries.

Guess what?? I recently learned Elder McLean's middle name! Want to know what it is?? Floyd!! (To those unaware, my MTC companion and I named our favorite tree Floyd back in Provo.) This absolutely delighted me! Though I had to bid Floyd adieu, in small ways, he's still with me.

We had an awesome zone conference where we discussed the role of the Book of Mormon, and it's incredible looking at God's purposes in commanding that it be compiled and sealed away in the earth. Look at Moses 7:62: "And righteousness will I send down out of heaven; and truth will I send forth out of the earth, to bear testimony of mine Only Begotten; his resurrection from the dead; yea, and also the resurrection of all men; and righteousness and truth will I cause to sweep the earth as with a flood, to gather out mine elect from the four quarters of the earth, unto a place which I shall prepare, an Holy City, that my people may gird up their loins, and be looking forth for the time of my coming; for there shall be my tabernacle, and it shall be called Zion, a New Jerusalem." The Book of Mormon ("truth...out of the earth") is a tool to gather together the people that will receive Christ at his second coming, and God's intent is for it to "flood" the earth, giving all the opportunity to accept it, thereby becoming God's "elect". When life feels aimless, it's rejuvenating to look at how God is even now orchestrating mighty works.

God be with you,

Elder Tolman

Chapter 3: Calexico

I'm out of the shallows and into the deep end! Well, the next deep end, anyway. I'm sure there will be many more.

Firstly, there's the last few days of the MTC. That Sunday included some cool experiences, foremost of which was our fast Sunday testimony meeting with our branch, where each missionary bore their testimony in the language they'd be speaking, from Spanish to Japanese to Mandarin. The meeting itself was a witness that the gospel is for all nations, and the spirit is the same wherever it's invited.

Our last devotional with President Porter was an animated one. During his discussion on accessing Heavenly power, he began talking about the importance of having virtuous thoughts, and offered a method of eliminating unclean ones, which was, in a word, *PEW*. Right there on the pulpit in front of hundreds of missionaries he began pulling out little army men and recounting the glorious battles of his youth, describing each soldier's tactical role. The idea was to imagine unclean or negative thoughts as enemies and then energetically blow them up with your mind. He demonstrated, sound effects and all. Once a tank got involved the tech crew obligingly blasted the room with light for each of the explosions. He told us a Sister Missionary once asked him "What if the thoughts just keep coming back?" After a slight pause he pulled out another army man, this one like a foot tall, plopped it down on the podium and said "Go big or go home." While I do think that message has the danger of conveying to someone "You're just not trying hard enough," (not a helpful thing to say), I appreciated the comedy. Good stuff.

Also, with it being my last opportunity, I did my duty afterward and gave President Porter his hug. I will not be hunted down and kicked. Apparently some Elders once entered a member's house in another state where they were triumphantly joking with each other about how they avoided hugging President Porter, who unbeknownst to them happened to be the member's father. The member made a phone call afterward, and the next time the Elders visited, they each received a kick in the shin. President Porter lovingly rules by fear.

The rest is a blur. We watched a fiery MTC-exclusive devotional from Elder Holland where he DEMANDED that we use our mission opportunity to its fullest, had one last practice Teaching Opportunity which went pretty well (confidence in teaching is going up), packed up, got up early on Tuesday morning, bade Floyd the tree goodbye, and were off to the airport. Tragically, the Tuesday evening devotional we barely missed just HAPPENED to be Elder and Sister Rasband. Oh well. :(

I was pretty spooked when I first arrived in San Diego. It is way more hilly and dense than I imagined it being, and it was a day of low overcast, giving me the impression of a foggy jungle. Arriving at the mission office with no idea how anything worked, having to wait a few hours for the trainers and more new missionaries to arrive had my nerves a bit high. Didn't help when I was eventually surrounded by seasoned missionaries, all with close relationships. The sheer amount of things I knew I would have to learn was definitely looming over me, and I wanted nothing more than to be around people I knew again.

The mission leaders reveal assignments in a dramatic fashion, first having a trainer present their area, then after a drumroll, showing the new missionary's picture on a slide. As the different areas were presented, I noted that some were English and some were Spanish (one was actually Arabic!), so being an English speaking missionary, I sat there getting more tense with each English area and relaxing with each Spanish area. After quite a long while, Elder McLean went up and presented Calexico, the southmost area in the most distant zone, literally right up against the border. "Be ready to speak a lot of Spanish" was one of the main things he said. Just as I was beginning to think "Guess I'll be the next area" Elder McLean said "and I think there's only one Elder left who hasn't been assigned an area." Yeah...I went pale. On the inside, at least. There my picture was, up on the screen. English speaking. Spanish area. I couldn't help but wonder whether there had been some sort of mistake. To those of you who are familiar with Ben-Hur, I felt a bit like Judah being taken out of his prison cell for his sentence. "Tyrus? I've had no trial! I'm to be sent to the galleys without a trial?!" But that was that. For clarification, I am still technically considered an English speaking missionary. Not sure whether that's going to change. But for the time being, I'm WAY out of my depth, and I'm having to scramble to start picking up on Spanish. 

The San Diego California mission has many merits, and two of those are President and Sister Merritt (teehee). I'm grateful for having them as our mission leaders. They have a devoted love for us, they've offered me support already, and though strict, they're very reasonable. Since Calexico is about a 2-hour drive from San Diego and orientation at the mission office was going to be the following Thursday, my companion and I spent a couple nights at the Merritt's house and did a bunch of finding on the day in-between. Funnily enough, we were invited in to teach a lesson on the very first door we knocked. The family only spoke Spanish, so all I could do was greet them and sit next to my companion, smiling and nodding. I've had to get used to doing that a lot, unfortunately. I feel bad for my companion that I can't be much of a support to him in those situations.

Elder McLean is great. He happens to be district leader in Calexico and is very welcoming. I appreciate the contrast of having a friendly trainer after feeling a bit disconnected and aimless at times in the MTC. Nonetheless, I felt a pretty overwhelming sense of loneliness entering Calexico, having that language barrier there between me and many of the people. Thankfully, one of the first things we did when we arrived was meet the ward council (who speak English) and discuss weekly activities we could organize at the church building. Sitting there in the foyer with friendly members alleviated some of the initial stress I was feeling. Even out here, I could feel at home in Christ's church.

Speaking of the members, turns out I'm not just on a mission. I'm on a rescue mission. Ever since COVID-19, this whole stake has been struggling. In our ward alone, church attendance went from over 100 to only around 30 because of the lockdown. As a zone, we need to get 400 baptisms, or this stake will be combined with one in Arizona (which would be rough for everyone). It's one of those cases where the task before us seems unreachable, but we need to remember that through our faith, God can accomplish anything He needs to. And for whatever reason He believes I have something to contribute here.

Quick side note: our apartment in Calexico is surrounded by stray cats! Apparently one of our neighbors won't stop feeding them. That made me smile when we first arrived.

Elder McLean, the sister missionaries in our area, and I were all assigned to give talks this past Sunday, so with my companion's help I got to prepare a little blurb in Spanish, and I followed that with my testimony in English (shared Ether 12:27, which felt very appropriate to my predicament). The other 3 missionaries, being fluent in Spanish, gave longer talks, so I guess that made me the youth speaker!😆 The bishop complimented my accent afterward, so there's that. We had about 42 people there that day, which was good to see. My understanding is that about 75% of the ward is Spanish-speaking.

We've been doing a lot of door-to-door finding, doorstep visits, and calls. We try to schedule visits each day, but most of them fall through in our zone. I haven't actually been able to teach a single lesson with my companion. BUT, from Sunday afternoon to Monday morning, we did exchanges with the zone leaders farther north in El Centro, and that was a relief. I got to teach 2 lessons that day! With Elder Clifford's help, I felt inspired to share Mosiah 24 with a struggling friend named Paul and we discussed how faith in God can strengthen us to bear our burdens. We also shared the Book of Mormon title page with another friend named Heather.

Elder McLean and I were also part of a small miracle yesterday when we met a man named Rudy, who's briefly visiting Calexico because his grandpa is in critical condition. He was very genuine and receptive to our discussion about hope and eternal families. He told us he believed it was no coincidence that we found him that day, which we were overjoyed to hear. We left him a Book of Mormon with Alma 40 marked so he could learn more about resurrection.

So already, some pretty incredible things have happened. I'm only really seeing that in retrospect, so I'm glad I'm able to write these emails to give me hope for the upcoming week. I'm not gonna lie, this has been hard already, and not for the reasons I expected. Home is where the heart is, and my heart is honestly still back in Utah. It's been a struggle letting go of that and focusing all of my love and effort on where I am now. I hate to quote the Star Wars sequels, but... I know what I have to do, but I don't know if I have the strength to do it. I've been praying for the gift of charity, cause my goodness, I need it. Guess we'll see how this week goes.

Quick tidbits about weather and then I'm done.

1. I'm lucky to be going to Calexico in the fall, cause apparently the summers are well above 100 degrees (120, I heard from someone). Apparently missionaries who serve through the summer get custom "I survived" t-shirts.

2. We got hit with a CRAZY rainstorm last week. It came and went so quickly, but it blew down a few trees and flooded the street next to our apartment.

God be with you,

Elder Tolman