And he's off....

June 15th. Ugh. That was a rough one. It's hard to say goodbye to someone you love for two years, even when you know that those two years will bless them beyond measure. The new system of dropping a missionary off is a lot better than it used to be. Pull up, hug, drive away. Like a bandaid. It's best to just rip it off. It still hurts though. I wasn't able to watch him walk away but Tracy did. He said he was smiling. That night we received our first quick email from him telling us he was happy and that his P-day (preparation) was on Saturday and he would be able to write then. What a blessing to know when to expect his first letter.

That Saturday at 11:32 it came! He told us about his companion, Elder Johnson from Boise, ID, and how well they got along. He also talked about learning the language, the food at the MTC, and seeing some of his friends that had entered the MTC a few weeks ago.

Here is an excerpt from his letter;

"...let me tell you that the Gift of Tongues is nuts. I taught my first lesson yesterday entirely in Spanish to an "investigator" named Jorge. I've passed my companion in language comprehension and he took 3 years of Spanish in high school. Plus, my accent is awesome."

Side note: Jack has never taken a day of Spanish and had only had 10 hours of instruction at that point. What a miracle!

"The food here is very...alright. I will probably end up losing weight instead of gaining like the other missionaries. Oops. Don't worry though, I'm being healthy.  We had our first exercise time yesterday and it was nice. As long as your companion is in the same building you can do whatever you want, so it's nice to have some alone time while running."

"That's what's happening with me. Nothing much. I'm putting my shoulder to the wheel like you've always taught me."

"I love you to the moon and back and then back again. Love, Jack"