Old Tom Lives On

 Awen Ullr

Yesterday at 6:58 PM  · 

My new 4 in one! Thank you Elder

Hudson Nelson

, Elder

Jonathan Norton

,

Trevor Perry

, and President Gilday!!! Love you guys!!!

Hudson said his best experience this week was the reaction Ryan had when he received this book. This is the Facebook post Ryan put about it. I asked Hudson why he didn't share the experience in his email. He said he recorded it in his journal and in his letter to the Mission President. He didn't want to repeat himself. I told him we all wanted to hear about it. Please share next time.

For P-Day they went back to the pawn shop and one of the other elders bought a $100 guitar. Wowzer! He also went to the church with the missionary group and played Planet or Atmosphere. I'm confused about how to play, but he had a good time. No updates on if transfers are going to happen or wait for the next 6 week time frame.

Hudson says the branch will start holding second hour meetings after conference on April 11.

Hudson is happy to report Old Tom is eating and moving around like he owns the farm yard. Hudson thinks he was depressed from being in solitary confinement. Hopefully he keeps improving.

Pictures again🤥 (Hudson Email Week 28)

The Good Shepard and Ryan my favorite person in Lafayette

 

Coronavirus Strikes Again

Coronavirus has struck the Tennessee Nashville mission.  The Franklin and Tennessee 2 zones got together to make an Easter video and someone had coronavirus!  Both zones are now in quarantine for 10 days and transfers have been put on hold until further notice.  Hudson does not know what is happening with the new missionaries that flew in.  The missionaries that had flights home, have been cancelled.  Hudson does not feel too affected.  He didn't think he was moving this transfer, and they weren't involved in the video, so they do not have to quarantine.

Hudson went to Gallatin, TN for P-Day.  They went before the information of the virus outbreak happened, whoops!  They got to play an intense game of soccer and get some sweat going.  Hudson said that felt good.  He hasn't had as much physical activity as he would like.  They ended the day by getting chicken and waffles.  Hudson over ate.

Hudson went to do service for someone who's father left.  She said they could take anything they wanted from the garage as she wanted it all thrown away.  Hudson got some records that included moldy covers, a croquet set and a captains hat.  Elder Norton came away with an accordion.  Excitement has ensued back at the apartment.  The Elders discovered an attic space and in it the previous Sisters left a box that stated they had found treasure.  Unfortunately, they didn't put anything in the box.  The Elders put it back with a couple of ties for the next missionaries to find.  Ridge thought it will be funny if it is sisters that find it.

Connie played the organ in sacrament meeting this week.  Hudson loves how she adds all the "extra notes" to what is written.  The Elders had her speak with a member that has a farm Brother Staples.  They asked what she should do about Old Tom.  Brother Staples asked how old he was.  When Connie said two and a half, he told her she should have killed him a long time ago to eat.  Connie got very emphatic about not killing her animals.  Brother Staples said he might be able to help, if Old Tom needs to be put down.

Hudson is sad that the investigator he spoke of last week won't return his calls.  He says it has been a let down of a week in regards to teaching.  Hopefully, they will find someone interested.

Pictures (Hudson email week 27)

 

In Six Months Hudson has learned "the gospel is simple"

Hudson "celebrated" his six month anniversary of being a missionary this week!  He asked for a few things including:  deodorant, pomade, a book of rules for single deck card games, physical pictures to add to his book and Ellie baked him some applesauce cookies.  He did get his package from Elder Herrick.  Everything was in it except the Unbroken book and the Kool-aid man shirt.  Not too bad of a loss, but still frustrating.  He emailed Tuesday night asking how dangerous a spider bite is.  His ankle was looking funky after working in Connie's rose bush.  The next day he was pretty sure they would not need to amputate so that is good.  While at Connie's he was included in the plan for Old Tom, her turkey.  Apparently he is sick.  Connie is doctoring his water with antibiotics, but if he isn't better next week she wants the Elders to kill him.  WHAT?!?!?  How are Elders supposed to kill a turkey?  Hudson asked if she had a gun.  She said of course not silly, I would probably shoot myself on accident.  Hudson is looking at Old Tom's spurs and the sheer size of this thing.  He is also remembering how upset she was about him killing the rat.  I'm not sure a turkey has ever been prayed for by missionaries, but Old Tom has.  Here's to me also wishing him a speedy recovery.  Hudson recorded Connie playing the piano and singing while on a call with her.

Hudson went to Gallatin, TN for a blitz.  It is similar to an exchange, but since Elder Norton is the District leader it's a bit different.  While there Hudson ate at a restaurant called Old Glory.  He learned catfish strips are good, catfish fillets are bad.

The elder's went to the church house for family home evening.  A sister in the ward shared a spiritual thought and then they played games.  Hudson said they had a good time.

Hudson has been living a bit vicariously I think through Ryan.  He is getting a kick out of hearing his dating stories.  An elderly gentleman took Ryan to the Daisy Duke Dancehall.  The name sounds scary, but it actually is a family place.  Ryan who is 31 was introduced to three women of which the youngest was 72.  They pursued him to dance through the night.  He gave his number to another lady he met who was in her 50's.  She picked him up after church and took him to lunch.  He signed the Elders up as his wingman.  They were to call him in two hours in case he needed an excuse to leave.  Funny part was when they called him he said all good here, thanks for calling.  

I was asked to speak in church as part of the missionary mom list about Hudson.  Brother Jeppson said I had three minutes.  What do you do with three minutes.  I asked Hudson what he wanted me to tell the congregation.  Hudson said to tell them the gospel is simple.  He has met so many "scholars of the bible" that try to find answers that aren't pertinent to what we are doing here on Earth.  We need to focus on bettering ourselves through repentance and the gospel doctrine we have.  He ended with "if anyone wants to learn more, they should call the missionaries".  I relayed his message with an honest taste of how hard his first few weeks in the mission field were.  I told how he had reached out to Colby who told him the first two weeks are awful, but it will get better and Sarah Hobbs, who's trainer taught her to look for one good thing a day to focus on.  I told of his first positive cold call that turned out to be a member and Alaina reading the Book of Mormon with a glass of wine and a cigarette.  At the meeting the Olsen/Graves baby was blessed and Sarah Gibson reported on her mission so we had several visitors.  One of which was Hudson's boss from the dairy department at Stokes.  He told me he went to Tennessee last year and spent a week with the Newsham's.  He wished Hudson the best on the rest of his mission.

A not so standard week (Hudson email week 26)

Today was a pretty standard week

We had a killer restoration lesson with a woman named sheila, she actually came and toured the church

and we had the lesson there. When we finished up we asked her her thoughts and she said it was all true, we swiftly put her on date hahah and then she texted us later that night asking if her dad and sister could be baptized too and what they needed to wear. Hopefully we don't fumble this one. 

 Friday night we drove out to meet a referral and stumbled upon this vintage car dealership in the middle of nowhere Tennessee, there were some pretty sick cars

 We went and visited bro wegner, hes a very inactive, tatted, mustached, burly biker. He also just had a full hip replacement. We went out to check up on him and he was all curled up on the couch watching fantastic beasts and where to find them hahaha me and him talked about Harry Potter for a long time, he said that was on his recovery watch list (they're his favorites) and he was going to watch some marvel stuff too. I love guys like him

 We had zone conference Thursday, I was able to meet up with a lot of the OG franklin south district, including my trainer Elder French, parkin and petersen were really happy to see me😊😊

We had interviews monday, they went really well, Prez called me and norton a dynamic duo and we had a cajun bag boil at a restaurant called storming crab on the way down, I'll definitely be eating there again 

 

I guess it actually wasnt a standard week come to think of it 

Breakfast isn't always easy

When Hudson called today he was sitting on his deck, in a recliner soaking up the Vitamin D.  It was 70 degrees outside and he was loving it.  He had decided to treat himself to a great breakfast since it was P-Day.  Unfortunately it didn't turn out awesome.  He made Kodiak brand pancake mix that was burnt on the outside and gooey on the inside.  His bacon was frozen and he didn't know how to cook just a few pieces.  He poached his eggs, but they got too done and had too much salt.  He has a large container of salt, but no shaker so you can see how that wasn't going to work out!  He then went to Burger King for lunch.  Not as awesome as he had hoped.

The sister missionaries went shopping and he told Elder Norton they were in their pros. I asked what on Earth that meant.  He taught me that when you are in your missionary attire they call it your pros.  Because that is what you proselyte in.  Hudson has taught a lot of lessons, but nothing that feels like it will lead to a conversion. 

The hike in winding stairs last P-Day wasn't as good as it could of been, as they never found the wooden staircase.  The sisters wanted to turn back after the waterfall.  They had a district P-Day today, but no real plans.  They made it to a pawn shop where he found $1 records so that was great.  The shop had a lot of strange things including  head mounts, bugs in jars, lizard feet in formaldehyde and even a zebra skin.  

Hudson mailed a box home when he transferred four weeks ago.  It never made it here.  Come to find out the smaller inside box made it back to his Lawrenceburg address.  He is supposed to get his returned mail  tomorrow.  We will see what exactly is in the box the post office sent back and hope we can find what they didn't.

Connie and Trevor (Hudson email Week 25)

 This week is going to be a short one. We spent a lot of time out at Connie's farm yesterday, which is always fun, she randomly will just scream at the top of her lungs when the slightest inconvenience happens, it's weird but she gets me.

We spent a lot of time with trevor this week too, we went to mission prep with him and that included a dinner date thanks to president Gilday, then we helped him and president Dickey clean out the sketchy gym at the church, I got a shirt that was left behind by the old ministers

Other then that not much has happened, nicole finally got a job, she's at McDonald's and we went out to see her on her first day yesterday. We pulled up and she was actually running the drive through, she messed all of our orders up Norton had to pay 16 dollars, but hurrah

 

Also the homie in the gym that's sweeping is trevor and the other is ryan, our parolee friend

Winding Stairs Park

Two Exchanges in One Week

Hudson was able to be involved in two exchanges this week.  Since Elder Norton is the zone leader they had Zone leader exchanges Wed - Thurs and then District exchanges Mon - Tuesday.  Hudson said he enjoyed working with the other missionaries.  

He was able to expand on his excitement around Connie's farm.  Connie is a hobby farmer having trouble making ends meet since her husband died.  A point that she makes often.  Example:  Do you like this shed?  My husband built it, before he died.  While cleaning out the shed they kept seeing the same rat.  Connie would scream "get rid of it"  and the boys would chase it away.  Near the end of the project Hudson saw the rat hunkered in between some misaligned planking.  He took it upon himself to throw his shovel "spartan style"  at it.  It was about 6 yards away and he hit it.  It took most of the rats head off, but not all the way.  Connie starts screaming at Hudson, "You Killed It!"  Apparently she feels everything living thing deserves to live and was upset that Hudson took such brute force.  He felt like he was doing her a favor.  Oh well, you can't please everyone.  He finished the rat off and took the remains away.  Connie had the boys cut up pallets and place in garbage sacks as she does not like burn piles and the landfill won't accept wood.  Hudson didn't think her plan was going to work as the wood was ripping out of the garbage sacks all over the place.  Hudson also relayed, while he was playing her grand piano she went in to the kitchen to make lunch and kept yelling "there's a sharp!".  I think he felt right at home as I have been doing that to him for years.

Hudson got another assignment from the SLC temple missionaries.  They were to find a referral.  After driving over 45 minutes they got to his trailer park.  He was in trailer #55.  It got worse the higher the numbers went.  When they got to the door the Elders could smell pot.  They opened the screen to knock and the smoke billowed out at them.  After multiple minutes of knocking and hearing people inside someone finally answered.  He told the Elders he was afraid to open the door as he thought they were the feds coming to arrest him since they were in slacks and white shirts.  He's not sure he will go on the next "assignment" they give the area.

Men at Work (Hudson Email Week 24)

This week was almost straight service, between the end of last week and this week we've done prolly 15 hours of service and more than 10 were on Connie's farm. She is a wonderful old woman teach and she cracks me up, I'll have some pictures and videos of her and her COLORFUL farm. We did just about everything out there it's been awesome to actually do work stuff. We have the likens family on date and we've had some really good lessons with them. 

This Paso Fino horse is not very well trained.  It lays its ears back and spins around just before it kicks at you.  She also has 4 goats, 3 dogs and about 14 sheep.

But Connie has definitely been the highlight of the week, shes an amazing pianist. She was singing and playing and it was very entertaining! She plays using chords and a melody, I would like her to teach me, its definitely different. I told her I could only play sheet music so she got some for me, she put up the sheet music for "Memory" from cats and just told me to start playing, so I did. I played alright but Connie was the star of the show by far. She started singing and it threw me so off guard. She was amazing, I was on the baby grand it she was singing super high, I felt like I was on Broadway! Definitely not what I was expecting going into her home. 

After the short musical I was looking through her other sheet music and found some type wrote applications from 1962 applying for musical talent at universities and stuff, idk much about that education but the stuff was legit. I may have to try and snag some stuff shes got a 100 songs from the 60s that would really compliment my 100 songs from the 70s book😏

We also had a weird experience with service, I felt like I was playing slenderman.. we helped this lady try and find her laptop... her ex husband had kept coming back to the house and stealing/wrecking stuff so there was all these random burn piles and he hid the laptop on the property, idk I was on edge and sketched the entire time... very sad and sketchy situation.Trevor is the young man running though the Lafayette branch church house.  Hudson is playing the piano in the background.

The boys splurged on a shrimp cocktail.  Hudson wanting to savor his only ate a few and put the rest in the fridge for later.  The problem was he took too long to finish them and had to throw a few away.  Next time he says he is just going to binge on them.