Elder Wilson's first letter from LA

Hello everyone from LA! I got here fine and everything. I had 2 days worth of orientation and nonsense like that. We got assigned temp. companions for the first day and then our permanent comps the next. I ended up changing comps my second day but Ill send pics of both of them next week. So youre probably wondering where good ole Mitch is at... Get this. Compton/Watts area. Yikes. I am literally in the Hood. Its so sketchy its weird. It doesnt seem real yet. I have plenty of stories of weirdos already, so more to come on that. My comp is from Dallas actually. So its nice to have someone know what I mean by QT. Hes been out just about a year. The ward was good. Everyone is really nice, I just wish I knew what they were saying. They forget that Missionaries have to learn spanish since the elders in this ward before me were there for a loooong time. So they greet me with a mess of spanish that I dont understand quite yet.

Woo Hoo to Nick! Thats the QT dream. Hes now part of "The Office." I cant believe that Karson is getting married already. Its still weird for me to think hes home from his mission. Im excited to see you when I get home. I saw a lady at church who had dark curly hair like you and I thought It was you at first. I thought how awesome it would be if you got exercising consistently while Im gone and you looked completely different when I saw you next. I know thats what you want and Its the only way you and dad will be around for your grandkids. Im excited for you. 

I havent gotten mail from anyone yet. I think it got here friday and I get my mail on thursday. So ill have to wait until next thursday. Everyone who is reading this please mail me at 1591 E. Temple way. The address is actually on the blog. Glad to hear everyone is missing me haha. Im guessing everyone saw he picture one of the members sent to Austin. That was too funny that he knew him. That guy is really cool. I dont understand all his jokes so that kind of awkward at times but hes funny when I do. Hopefully As I get better at spanish Ill just be buds with him and he can send pics home and stuff like that. 

I feel like such a grandpa at night. All I ever want is to go to bed at 8pm. Its a struggle, its gets dark at like 5pm so we cant go to certain parts of the zone in the dark. And then at 7 we have to be out of the "red" areas. So from 5-9 we dont have a lot of stuff to do. literally 4/5 of our zone is red zone so it makes planning hard to do. Theres a lot of people that seem interested but we just dont have a way to contact them besides an address but we cant go knocking on doors in the dark. Frustrating. We had our first stroll in the projects last friday. A lady yelled good luck at us as we walked in. eek. We do have a car full time which is nice. Im just hoping I dont get fat because of it. Our apartment Is so disgusting. it looks like that one house I went with you to show that had the baseboard raised, something about hardwood over carpet. The carpet is just so nasty which doesnt help while Im trying to eat. We had a bit of a roach problem. Ive yet to find any in the food but Its bound to happen. Its so weird but probably 90% of the members are converts. Even more sad most of them are inactive or just about, right before they can enter the temple. On a lighter note we were looking through an old teaching record of a past investigator, and found a guy names Surgeio. Hes an old gangster who is in a wheelchair because he got shot and lost the use of his legs. It has a record of the past visits with him and if hes been to church and why not. about 5 rows down we see "Wasnt at church this week because he was at the beach burying himself in the sand - He heard it helps with nerve damage" I kid you know this was on an actual teaching record. We got a real good laugh out of that. 

Well thats about all the time I have. This is literally the hardest thing ive done and at times I really wish I could just go back to my clean bed back in the Lou. But I know this is what I need to do. The scripture of when Jesus says "Thy will be done" has never been more relevant. This is where the Lord wants me and so I will do it.

Con Amor

Elder Wilson