April 6

Hola,

Well, I know I've said it before, but one of life's inescapable truths is that change is inevitable.  So, if you can't tell from that, I've had some lovely special changes this week.  Although I've never had them quite like this before.  First off, I didn't change companion, just area.  Elder Ortiz and I have left our area in Ayotla, and we are now in a small pueblo named Ayapango, close to Amecameca.  And that's the second weird thing about these changes:  this is the first time I've been in one of the zones of the mission for a second time.  Still, if I'm going to repeat, I'm not too upset to be in Amecameca again.  It's also kind of weird because we traded areas with some sister missionaries, and the house just has a different feel to it, and more long hair than I've had in any of the houses I've lived in in the mission.  Oh, and the ward where we are working has another pair of sister missionaries, and we eat with them pretty much everyday, which has been kind of weird to get use to.  Still, there are worse fates in this world, so everything's good.

Other than that, the obvious news would be general conference.  When we got to the chapel, there was an area with conference in English, and the sacrament room with Spanish.  So I decided at first to watch it in Spanish, but then I realized that the translator was from Spain, and their accent is pretty weird so I decided to go to the English.  And then President Packer started to talk, and I almost went back to the Spanish.  I love his talks, but he hasn't gotten any easier to understand recently.  Anyways, I really like conference this year.  Like you said, pretty much the entire first session was talks about the importance of the family, and this was a theme that kept up through the entire conference.  There were a lot of really good talks though, so everything's good.  I really loved Elder Bednar's, which was about worldly fear vs. godly fear, and Elder Hollens, which was about the atonement.  But I always love theirs, so that's no surprise.  Other than those talks, one of the Seventy, Elder Wilford W. Anderson, gave one that I loved about the music of the gospel.  He started with a story about a doctor who worked in a hospital near an indian reservation.  He said that one time an old native man walked in, and he asked him how he could help him.  At first he was silent, but then the man asked the doctor, "Do you dance."  The doctor figured that he was a medicine man, and told him, "I don't dance.  Can you teach me how to dance?", to which the man replied, "I can teach you to dance, but you must learn to hear the music."  He then talked about how in the gospel we often focus on the dance steps, or the commandments, but at times we forget to listen to the music, or the blessings.  He explained in particular that it is important to teach those around us, in particular our children, to hear the music of the gospel.  He talked about how, if you don't have music, dancing can feel very uncomfortable and awkward, and that it is the same in the gospel.  If somebody can't hear the music, they may not understand why we do the dance, or in other words, if they can't see the blessings, they don't understand why we keep the commandments.  Anyways, that was one of my personal favorites, and I recommend that you read it when you can.

Well, other than that, things are as normal as they can be here in the mission.  I've been here in my new area since Thursday in the night, and I really haven't had a chance to do too much there thanks to the conference, so we'll see if I have more to report as far as that goes next week.

It sounds like you guys are having a pretty good time down there in Green River.  (Or up there for me.  It's weird thinking of Green River as up, but I guess it would be true for me right now.)  I'm glad that you get some time to get out and do things still.  I'm still amazed that dad can find new birds, because I'm pretty sure I know of fewer species of birds that exist in the entire world than dad has found just in Utah.  Still, it seems to make him happy, so I hope he keeps having luck with it.

Oh, and the end of mission date was given to us in the MTC, so there's that for you to wonder over.

OK, I love you, and I'll talk to you next week.

Love,

Elder Samuel Long