Week 9 in Alaska, Fairbanks

Dear family,

It gets in the 20s every night. Your weather app is weak. Pretty soon it'll be permanently in the 20s. Then the 10s. And so on and so forth. Winter is settling in. Today is icy. I'm the designated driver now, so I get to deal with it. Our cars headlights are bad, so driving in the dark is fun. Never buy a Jeep Compass. Worst car ever. I preferred the red car. But last night an incredibly dense fog rolled in. Then there was lightning. We drove down this old dirt road with a thousand potholes looking for this house that we couldn't find so we got out and started walking. Someone was listening to music really loud in a house down the street so all we could hear was this droning bass. I was literally in a horror movie. Halloween up here is spooky. Everyone has hanging effigies and weird, really dark stuff. If we don't stay in the city limits, every neighborhood we go to is basically a cult commune. Interesting doesn't even begin to describe it.

On Tuesday I came the closest I've ever come to being found dead in a ditch. We were tracting this culty street, and we knock on the last door when this lady comes outside of another house and starts screaming at us. She was yelling all manner of obscenities and about how Jesus wouldn't save us and that kind of fun stuff, so we walked away. She followed us down the street, screaming and yelling. I thought about turning around and just yelling back at this vile woman, but when I turned my head I noticed she was ready to draw a gun on us. If I had been like Lot's wife and turned around I might have gotten shot. So I didn't. We got in the car and left really fast. I've almost died a couple times up here, but that's the closest I've ever come to being murdered by a sad lady who thought I was ruining the world. I'm getting kind of tired of almost dying in not cool ways. Death by moose is cool. Death by deranged old woman is less cool. I'm not ready to make the eternal transfer just yet.

Other than that we had a really good week. Our Ward is getting really excited about missionary work. We had a really good lesson at the Bishops house on Sunday with our investigator Karla. She could probably use a prayer. She's recently divorced and has four kids, two of which live with her and are in high school. The others are moved out. We also have an investigator named Jennifer who's a hippie woman. She's 24 and has a 5 year old daughter, I don't know if I already told you about her, but she's a really solid investigator and has a lot of interest and desire to learn. Oh, we also learned that Lorinda, who's 20 with a 1 year old, has a psychotic exish boyfriend who does meth, sells drugs, and abuses her. He has face tattoos, and the anarchy symbol and swastikas tattooed on his hands. So I could use some help. Sh needs a lot of prayers, and I don't really know how to help her. We keep going over to teach her, we can't when he's there, and she loves the Gospel, but if she can't break free from this guy it doesn't matter. And we can't call the police, and she won't. The whole situation is messy.

But this has been a good week. I get up everyday excited for another adventure.

I know it's Old Testament  this year, that's why I've been reading it too. I just finished the book of Job today, so tomorrow I start on Psalms. Some of its confusing but most of it makes sense. Isaiah may get a little tougher though. We'll see. I'm also studying the Book of Mormon. I finished it and now over started over. I'm at the end of second Nephi, and I'm going through and marking up my scriptures. It's been really helpful. I wonder how many times I'll be able to read though it on my mission. 

Life in Alaska is crazy as usual.

Love,

Elder Miller

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Elder Miller enjoying cream puffs from one of the ward members.