Weekly advice from Elder Gurksnis: "Yo, it's up to you to put a smile on..."

Sam flew from Dallas to LA on his own.  I stayed up until 2:30am Dallas time so I could make sure his flight from LA took off safely (I was stalking on a flight tracker app).  I knew he was going to meet up with some other missionaries in LA to fly together down to Guatemala on a flight that left around midnight.  As I was waiting, I happened to check my email and saw the most wonderful thing!  A picture that Sam had sent me from LAX with 9 handsome, smiling faces!  We left him in tears and it was such a blessing to see him happy and smiling with all of the other great young men!

There were 25 missionaries in total all flying together to Guatemala.  And to top it off, in the morning I received my first email from Sam.  WARNING: I am posting his letter without any editing.  My son has apparently forgotten how to use punctuation or capital letters.  He blames it on a Spanish language keyboard.  I frankly don't care... it is like Christmas has come early!  I love that boy!

Hey mom! Yes i am here safely everything is muy bueno!

i dont have a ton of time, or a cap button that works jaja but ill give you a quick update!  i flew into LA and met up with about 25 other guys.  it was so comforting seeing other albinos in suits and ties. the flight was long and i'm running on about an hour of sleep for about 32 hours jaja but guatemala is beautiful.  when we flew in you could see everything and it's a ton of singular random volcanic looking mountains.  you could see the smoke coming out of a few of em.  we all took a bus this morning to the mtc.  in our group its about 10 missionaries going to city east and 10 more going to quetzaltenango and about 5 other randoms.  the guys are great.  my companion is elder duncan.  he's a nice guy.  we should get along great.

we met the mtc president this morning.  his wife spoke to us first and she was really sweet and then he talked and it was like holy mary what he's a super intense guy.  i don't have my scriptures on me but i read something in doctrine and covenants that basically says "yo it's up to you to put a smile on."  its 14 hours a day in classrooms and little sleep but im going to do it.  a lot of the guys already know a lot of spanish which was a little discouraging but i'm not gonna focus on them and just focus on my progress. 

i want yall to know that i love you all so much.  don't worry about me because i'm going to be fine.  i love all you guys.  i should have a tad more time to write next time. 

i love all yall so much you guys are the world to me.  miss you and love you.

Adios! 

Elder stealyogirl