Life Prior to the Mission

I was born and raised a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (a.k.a. Mormon). My mother is a member and my father, although baptized a member, doesn't consider himself to be affiliated with any church. When I was younger, I wasn't very strongly involved with my church. I would be with my mom one weekend and my dad the next. At most, I'd attend church every other weekend. Eventually, I stopped attending church altogether.

A few months after I turned nineteen, I made a decision to go back to church. A good friend of mine was baptized into the church and was always excited to share her spiritual experiences with me. I listened, primarily to show support, but eventually found myself wanting to have some of those same experiences. It was her influence, as well as that of many close friends and family, that got me interested in a more religious life.

After attending church for about a month, I started to think about serving a mission, a religious service that young men and women often perform in my church. I talked to the Bishop, the leader of the congregation, about preparing for a mission and he helped me start to make the necessary preparations that allowed me to depart as a full-time missionary about eight months later.

I've found that until something is absolutely certain, it's best not to spread good news. For this reason, I kept my preparations, and often the fact that I was even going to church, a secret. For months, the only people that knew I was preparing for a mission were God, my Bishop and me. It almost became a game for me. Eventually, as things became more and more sure, I began to let the news leak. By time I formally received my call to the Texas McAllen Mission, Spanish speaking, pretty much all of my close family members and friends knew.

The MTC

Before a missionary teaches in his/her designated area, he/she must first attend the MTC. The length of time required to attend varies based on the missionary and where he/she will be serving. Given that I was to speak Spanish and had no real experience with the language, I stayed at the Provo MTC for two months. I entered on January 28th, 2004 and left March 31st, 2004.

The MTC experience was great. It's probably one of the most consistently spiritual environments I've ever been in. If the world was able to maintain such a level of spirituality, I doubt we'd have even one thousandth of the problems we have now.

Just about as soon as a missionary arrives to the MTC, he/she is given a companion. These companions are responsible for each other. They study together, sleep in the same room, eat together, and, to put it simply, do everything together. They will not even leave sight of each other. There are many, many reasons for this but, considering the average missionary is between the ages of 19 and 23, I think one of the primary reasons is to keep each other out of trouble.

My first companion was Elder Martineau. Coincidentally, he was from the same city I was from, us having actually attended the same highschool at about the same time. I could have had a companion from any part of the world but I managed to have one that lived only minutes away from my home.

The MTC schedule was extremely rigid. We were required to wake up by 6:30 AM, often getting up a little bit earlier in order to get to the showers before the other missionaries, and be to the classroom by 7:00 AM. For the next thirty minutes, we would do silent study. Following that, we were given time to eat breakfast.

I don't remember the specific schedule following breakfast but we typically had class time until lunch, which was followed by about an hour of exercise time, followed by several more hours of class time, followed by dinner, followed by several more hours of class time. During class time, we would usually have an instructor that would help us learn to teach the Gospel in Spanish, among other things. All in all, we spent a lot of time in class.

Some days would break the routine of being in class all day. We would have meetings, be given time to visit the temple, be given time to do laundry and write letters to friends and family, and even have time set aside to do service. I don't know if I've ever enjoyed cleaning bathrooms and toilets more in my life. I was always extremely happy to get away from that classroom. It could get pretty exhausting sitting at that desk all day.

The Mission Field

I finally left the MTC after two long months on March 31st, 2004. My Spanish was horrible but I was ready to get started, nonetheless. I was tired of being in class all day, nearly every day of the week. I wanted to get out and do some work!

I arrived in McAllen, Texas on the very afternoon of the day I left the MTC. The remainder of the day was spent orienting myself for the mission life I would live for the next two years. I learned that I would be leaving for my first area the following morning to be Elder Berkley's companion. My first area was to be Roma, a small border town where primarily only Spanish was spoken. I was psyched!

Roma was just about everything I pictured in a mission. The majority of the roads were of dirt, many of the houses lining them built from cinder block and other cheap materials. Roadkill was extremely common, ranging from several day old cats, dogs, and oppossums. I spent my entire first day with Elder Casperson and a big grin on my face. I didn't even understand more than 5% of what I heard that day. I was green.

The morning schedule was quite a bit different in the mission field than how it was in the MTC.

Both Elder Berkley and I were new to the Roma area. It was actually being split into two areas so, because we didn't know the people, we thought it wise to work with the missionaries that were already there. It's for this reason that I worked with Elder Casperson rather than Elder Berkley on my first day of real missionary work. What's funny is they recombined the two areas into one after only four weeks. I left for McAllen to be Elder Webb's companion.

I stayed in McAllen for a total of fourteen weeks, eight of them with Elder Webb, six of them with Elder Hendershot.

Following McAllen, I served in Laredo for eighteen weeks, the first six with Elder Buhler, the last twelve with Elder Urrutia.

After McAllen, I went to La Feria to serve another eighteen weeks, the first twelve with Elder Griffith, the last six with Elder Kellogg.

Once I was done in La Feria, I was transferred to Corpus Christi where I was companions with Elder Ieti for six weeks. I left for Hidalgo after that.

I spent one week in Hidalgo with Elder Call before another missionary broke his arm, causing a change in companionships. It was best that Elder Brush be able to use a car and, because Elder Call had a car assigned to him, Elder Brush and I switched places, I being moved to a biking area.

I spent the next five weeks with Elder Loyala in Las Milpas. At the end of that time, however, both Elder Call and Elder Brush left Hidalgo. Probably in part because I was somewhat familiar with the area, I went back to Hidalgo to serve there for another six weeks. I served that time with Elder Perez as my companion.

Once I was done in Hidalgo, I left for Rockport, where I served a total of twenty-four weeks, eighteen of them spent with Elder Alcaraz as my companion, the last six with Elder Otero as my companion.

My Companions

• Elder Martineau
• Elder Berkley
• Elder Webb
• Elder Hendershot
• Elder Buhler
• Elder Urrutia
• Elder Griffith
• Elder Kellogg
• Elder Ieti
• Elder Call
• Elder Loyola
• Elder Perez
• Elder Alcaraz
• Elder Otero