WELCOME HOME!!!!!

Jared arrived home on June 7th. He left Hawaii Thursday evening, flew all night and arrived in LA on Friday morning.  Then he had a 3 hour layover in LA before departing to Detroit where he had ANOTHER layover.  Finally he flew from Detroit to Albany and got in about 7:30pm.  It was very exciting!

Welcome Home Elder Brooksby!!!!

Final Email

Hey Everyone!

 

Sooo... here's the thing.  This is my last email home.  Pretty weird huh?

2 years!  2 whole years!  GONE.  Well spent though:)

 

Welp we've got a member (recent convert woot woot!) taking us out to lunch in a little bit here...  and I wont lie, my motivation to do this email is dwindling rapidly.

 

Just know how much my mission has changed me.  

I've really gained a testimony out here where I just didn't have any lasting one before.

I've learned a lot about myself personally and the gifts that Heavenly Father has given to me.

I've learned what true work ethic is.

I've gained so much knowledge about the Atonement and the Savior.

I have a true testimony of the power of the scriptures and of the importance of a modern day prophet.

I've learned that this is the true church, without a doubt.

I LOVE you all so much.  

 

Thanks for all of your support, be sure to keep in touch when I come home... rather I'll be sure to keep in touch when I come home haha.

 

Mahalo nui loa, Aloha, Ofa Atu, Alua,  Take it Easy!

 

Love, Elder Jared Glen Brooksby 

Second to Last E-mail

We got our email from Jared on Tuesday this week.  He had a Mission Leadership Conference on Monday, so P-Day was moved to Tuesday.  He started his email by saying:  "Well...  This is my 2nd to last email as a missionary.  That's pretty freaking weird.  Not quite sure how to handle that.  I'll probably just do what I've always done haha."

Jared said that he'd had a good week.  He did a lot of tracting and taught a bunch of lessons to potential investigators.  On Wednesday night they asked a recent convert to speak at a cottage meeting.  Jared is so impressed with how "solid" (Jared's words) he is and his desire to know and understand more about the gospel and his responsibilities in it.

Jared said he and his companion are beginning a program with the zone to help them get fired up for missionary work in the month of June. The missionaries in the zone are trying to be as exactly obedient as they can be for the whole week, then continuing through the month.  He said he knows the Lord will bless them for their efforts.

Jared also said that they had an investigator who said he'd read the Book of Mormon, prayed about it and knew it was true and wanted to be baptized.  He was really excited about that.

They also had a baptism Friday night and said it went perfectly. 


Jared said he ended the week with a ward Lu'au, which was wonderful.

I think Jared's done really well at staying focused on missionary work, and not on how many days he has left - but when he ended his letter with "T-minus 10..." I knew he really was keeping track.

We can hardly wait until a week from this Friday - he arrives at the Albany airport at 7:22pm on a Delta flight from Detroit.  I'm sure he'd love to see any of you at the airport if you're interested in coming.

A Great Week with a Trip to the Temple

In Jared's email he told us that the assistants to the mission president had come to their district meeting and decided to go on exchanges with some of the missionaries in the district.  He said that he had dinner with a recent convert who is orginally from Rotterdam, NY.  Apparently he used to work in an Italian restaurant in Johnstown and so the dinner was amazing.

He also had the opportunity to do service at Pearl Harbor for most of the day on Wednesday.  He said that it's always good to do service.

Jared said that he and his companion went on splits (where Jared and his companion each go with one of another companionship) with two of the Elders in his zone.  I'm sure that's interesting if only because it's different.

Jared also got to go to the Laie LDS temple for the last time on his mission on Monday.

He also said that he has a baptism this coming Friday night that is "100% solid".  He said he was "pumped" about that.

He ended by thanking us for our love and support throughout his whole mission.  I can't believe that we'll see him in two weeks!

Mother's Day Phone Call

We got to talk to Jared on Mother's Day for a little over an hour.  It was awesome.  He is doing well and trying to stay focused and working until he comes home.

He sent me an altered book for Mother's Day which was VERY FUNNY!  I loved it!

Other than that there wasn't much to say in emails that didn't get said in the phone call the day before.

Jared comes home on Friday, June 7th at 7:22pm.  If you're interested in being there let us know and we'll give you specific flight information.

What a great week!

Howzit!

Well this week was insanely long.  I have these gnarly bags under my eyes.  It's awesome.  I've actually heard that it's blood pooling under your eyes that does that.  Fun Fact.

Anywho, here is a picture from Justin B's (from Rotterdam, NY!!!!) baptism.  It was perfect, it went off without a hitch.  He bore his testimony at the end too.  AMAZING!  This guy is so elect it blows my mind.  He'll be ordained to the office of priest next Sunday.

 

So you all (it's weird I've gotten into this habit of saying y'all... I don't really know where that came from) are caught up to this last week Tuesday I think, so I'll start on Wednesday.

Wednesday:  We went on splits! Our ward is catching the wave of missionary work (thanks Elder Nelson) so we're pretty pumped about that.  Then we did a lot of tracting, had some accounting phone calls with President (always FUN!) got some baptismal suits for the Tongans and then called it a day.

Thursday:  We went tracting and visiting formers a lot!  Had a very good lesson with the PMLA family I've talked about.  They say we're the winning pair, so we want to get them active and baptized before I leave.  It was a good lesson, but the wife still struggles with the scriptures because she's had no religious background prior to this.  Starting from the ground up is new for me but it's a good experience.  Then we went on splits with a recent convert.  Also another good time.

Friday: He had a lesson with Justin B., and he got his interview.  Easily the quickest interview I've ever seen.  He and the missionary left, and were back within two minutes easy.  Awesome.  Then we went over some specifics for his baptism and who was going to baptize him( the Bishop's son did that.  He just returned from his mission 6 months ago... he's staying in the water haha!) what he needed to wear etc.  Good visit.  Then we went and typed up his program and went out Waianae side. The Tongan ward out there had a papi (Tongan for baptism) for a family of 5 and another guy.  6 person papi + Tongan feast afterward = pretty gnarly.

Saturday:  We took Matt M. out to a lesson with a potential investigator.  She wasn't super receptive so that was a bummer, but that's missionary work huh?  Then we had a lesson with a different part member family, and committed the husband to come back to church, so it was a good visit.  Then we had some investigators drop us, went tracting and set up for the baptism.  That went awesome.  

Sunday:  Justin was confirmed, we taught Elder's Quorum, and it must've gone well cause we got some referrals and a couple offers to go on splits out of it.  Always worth it.  Other than that it was a regular day and then we had to do numbers.  Yay.  We didn't get to bed until 11pm, but that was because of some other problems with that we've been trying to settle.  Hopefully we'll get everything smoothed out today.  We'll see!

Welp that about rounds out my week here.  Hope you all enjoy the pics and have a great rest of your week!

Ofa Lahi Atu,

Elder Brooksby

A guy from Rotterdam, NY - What?

We got a great letter from Jared today.  It's always fun to hear from him.

He said that he was fully recovered from the food poisoning he had the previous week and was feeling MUCH better.  He said that everyone in the congregation where he is serving heard he had been sick and was asking him how he was doing.  He said he just wanted to stand at the pulpit and say:   "It was bad Laulau everyone.  Bad Laulau."  He said that then they'd all understand what he meant.  I looked up laulau in the Pidgin English dictionary and it said that laulau meant traditional Hawaiian dish that consists of salted pork, chicken or fish wrapped in ti or banana leaves and steamed or baked.

Jared said that his week was pretty interesting as a whole.  He said P-day was spent driving around.  They had to go to Honolulu West stake to pick up an air mattress, then they went to Honolulu to pick up some commissary (not sure what that means - maybe they got some stuff from a member at the military base), and then went back to Kapolei.  He said the zone was supposed to go bowling but after following an elder (who swore he knew where the bowling alley was) for 30 minutes, they decided just to go to the stake center and play basketball.  

On Tuesday he had a district meeting in Waianae, which is a 40 minute drive away from where Jared lives. Since is was the last district meeting of the transfer they played the traditional game of jeopardy.  He said it was fun, and that he found out that he really knows his Old Testament and Doctrine & Covenants material.  After the meeting he and his companion had a baptismal interview for the Kalaeloa ward missionaries in Nanakuli.  When they got there only one of the kids was there for the interview.  So Jared's companion interviewed him while the other elders went to find the other kid.  Along the way the other elder's car broke down and Jared had to go wait there until a tow truck came.  Then they ended up driving the other elders to an appointment they had in Kapolei and were lucky enough to have dinner with a very nice family.

Jared said that he's been able to spend time with their bishop's son, who recently returned from a mission and that that was enjoyable.  He said they spent a lot of time contacting part-member families and tracting.

Being a zone leader involves a lot of paperwork and administrative things which tend to keep Jared and his companion busy.  He said they spent quite awhile doing some paperwork for the stake about names and numbers and that it took a long time.  But that the stake leaders really appreciate it.

Jared said that he's really trying to "finish strong" and trying to do as much good as he can for the zone so that when he leaves it will be a good zone for someone else to take over.  He said that two talks have been really motivating to him.  One entitled "Jesus the Perfect Leader" by Spencer W. Kimball and the other entitled "My Mission" by Jeffrey R. Holland.  He said that they've probably changed his life and his outlook on things.  With that kind of recommendation I guess I'll have to read them both.

He has eight new investigators, two of whom have dates to be baptized.  And he told about a great experience he had. He said:  "And then a miracle happened.  A girl that just moved into the ward brought her boyfriend with her and he had been meeting with the missionaries in Hon-west, received 3 lessons and had a baptismal date set.  He said that he wanted to finish the lessons and get baptized! BLEW MY FREAKING MIND!  Heavenly Father certainly blessed us with that one.  And guess where he's from?  NY!  Guess where in NY?  ROTTERDAM!  So cool!  I'm hoping that my last convert in the mission will be someone from my home-stake:)"

It's always great to hear from Jared!

Food Poisoning

Sadly Jared said that he and his companion got food poisoning and spent several days this past week just trying to recover. He had the same problem he had when he was in Kona, throwing up blood when vomiting. But this time he knew what was happening and wasn't so freaked out by it. Sadly it happened three times - no fun!

He did tell a couple of experiences he had this week. One was where he went tracting and was preached at by two girls for half an hour. They told he and his companion that they didn't know what they believe and that they don't preach about Christ. Then after that experience they got yelled at by some random guy. He said they were really tempted to just go home, that it was 8:00 o'clock already and people start getting grumpy about them knocking at that time, and they'd had a really long day/week so they really just wanted to go home, plan, and sleep. But instead they decided to stay out and wound up contacting a part member less active family they had been trying to get a hold of for a long time. The man set up an appointment for them to teach his wife and child. Jared said they got back in the car, started driving and were so happy they'd knocked on that door in the last 40 minutes of their Friday night.

Here's a picture of Jared's zone p-day hike last week which was on a steep ridge right off of Lahilahi street in Waianae. He said it was actually a tricky climb, but fun.

General Conference

Jared had a busy week.  On his p-day he got to play basketball. 

On Tuesday he got to go to Honolulu.  His companion had lost his wallet and had to get new identification. 

On Wednesday they tracted and visited part member families the whole day. 

He said Thursday was more of the same. 

On Friday they had a great district leader training meeting. 

On Saturday Jared and his companion were able to watch General Conference, which he thought was awesome.  He said the first session starts at 6:00am until 8:00am.  Then the afternoon session for they is from 10:00am through noon.  He said after conference they went to an awesome meeting with a man.  He said it was the most spiritual lesson he'd had in a long time.  They went to the Priesthood session of conference Saturday night. 

Then they attended conference again on Sunday.  After conference on Sunday he said they had bookend meetings with members of the stake presidency and the high counselor over missionary work in the stake.  He said it was an awesome meeting, but that they were really tired when they finally got home.

Happy Easter

Howzit Everyone!  Happy Easter:)

It sounds like everything was good over the past weekend, although it might've gone down a little when Dad totaled the Van... that's a pretty big bummer, but I guess Lauren has all the info on that so if you have questions then just ask her...  Anyways, on to other things on my end.

Hey Dad could you check the tracking info on my license again, Sister Smiley said that she got an envelope for me and shipped it out of the office to my address but I still haven't gotten it yet.  I'm going pretty stir crazy without that thing...

Mom, I waited till easter to open my package and everything was trounced on the inside!  All the boxes had glue on them so I knew they were like last year in their box design, but all the candy was out of the packages and had gotten a little Hawaiianized... but thanks for the thought Mom!

April fools.  

I got my license earlier this week.  I'm pretty sure angels sang when I opened that package (you all know how much I like to drive haha)  and I got the Easter package the box was intact and the candy has been delicious:)  Thanks for everything Mom, and Dad!  Was that a rude trick to do?

Well My Easter was OK (all joking aside now).  It was a really spiritual meeting in church, two missionary farewell talks and then sacrament, then gospel doctrine.  We talked about scriptures in modern revelation referring to the resurrection   Then because it was 5th sunday we had a combined meeting where we watched Finding Faith in Christ.  I think that was my favorite time ever watching that movie.  Then the Bishop got up and was talking about the atonement and missionary work and I started to get emotional.  Then he started getting emotional about his two sons on missions and his daughter who leaves for hers today and how he could literally feel their love for the Savior on Easter, and I almost lost it.  I just got thinking about you all and how much I missed you guys, but how much I love the mission and how long I've been out.  It was just a weird mix of emotions that just totally overcame me.  It would've been the first time I had flat out cried in public in a long time.  It was a pretty close call.  Luckily I carry a handkerchief so that kinda helped the situation a bit.  So a great day of church, and then we airballed in missionary work.  It was so frustrating. 

 Nothing productive happened from the hours of 3:00 to 8:30pm. We tried to see people but they we dodging us, or just weren't receptive in general.  Mom said that she loved proselyting on Easter cause the people were more receptive... but that just wasn't the case in Kapolei.  People are more interested in their riotous living to be concerned with the Savior I guess.  Oh and did I tell you that we got dropped by our last investigator last week?  So yeah now we've got zip.  Soooo.... pray for member referrals?  Haha that'd be amazing.

Well I think that's about it!  I Love you all, thanks for all your love, support and prayers, I feel them all the time:)

Ofa Lahi Atu, and Mahalo Nui Loa,

Elder Brooksby  

Zone Leader Conference

It's been a crazy week for Jared.  He said that Monday was a calm before the storm and that he didn't do anything too exciting.

On Tuesday he spent the day in the apartment while his companion cleaned up and packed all of his stuff because he was being transferred.  Jared is staying where he is and will finish his mission here.  He said that they also got to play basketball with the ward and that he had a lot of fun doing that.

On Wedensday he had transfers, which are always exciting.  Jared said he's with Elder Aaron Ormiston from Tempe Arizona.  He said that he's a super humble kid, and a very hard worker and that being with him for just these few days has been a blast.

It sounded like Thursday was errand day.  Jared said that some people had packages com into the office that couldn't be shipped directly to them, so he and his companion had to go get them and deliver them.  He said they drove from Makakilo to Honolulu, then back to Makaha.  Then back to Makakilo.  Then the mission sent them something that had to be given to the District leaders to they proceeded to drive from Makakilo to Waianae and then FINALLY back to Makakilo.  When they got there they were pretty much exhausted.  He said they'd driven 103 miles on an island whose rough circumference is 110 miles.  So they'd almost driven around the whole island.  He said they spent what was left of the night preparing for District meeting the next day.

Jared said that they had a great District meeting, and afterwards got to do some work in their area.  He said that he's never felt so busy in his whole life.  But that it's all good and he's loving serving the Lord.

Here are a couple of pictures Jared sent us.

 Elder T., Sister S., and Elder Brooksby

at the Zone Leader Conference

Zone Leader Conference

Last Companion

Jared started his letter home with this sentence:  "Aloha everybody!  Howzit?  Bumbai you like holoholo? K den you go stay go I go stay come."  When I went to look it up, I couldn't find a good translation.  So while Jared wasn't called to a foreign language mission, I still think he's in one.

Jared said one of the other Elders asked him what it felt like to be 21 years old.  He said he thought about it for a second and said "remarkably like what it felt like at day 364 of being 20." Jared said that he received the "party in a box" that I sent him for his birthday, and that he and the Elders he lives with really enjoyed it.

He said that on March 8th he and a few other Elders and members got to go through the temple with a convert of his from earlier in his mission.  He said it was great seeing so many people that he hadn't seen for awhile.  And he was so happy for the member who was able to go to the temple and receive her own endowments.

He said that he found out he's staying in this area until the end of his mission, but will receive a new companion, Elder O.  Jared said that he heard that he's cool and so he thinks that will be fun way to end his mission.

And BIG NEWS -  We found out that Jared will be arriving back in NY on June 7th.  We're excited to finally know when he'll be coming home!

I Love to See the Temple

The big news from Jared's letter this week was that he met Brighton's (our DIL) grandmother Sister Fielding on Sunday night.  He said she's awesome.  She just entered the mission field.  He said that she's not going to be in his zone, but right next door.  And that he'd have to keep tabs on her.  He said they didn't have a long time to catch up because he was very busy that night, but that hopefully he'd get to talk to her again soon.

Jared said that Monday was a regular old proselyting day because Tuesday was their temple day.  They got up early and went to the 8 o'clock session.  He said they had to leave at 5:30am to get there in time and he felt like he was in seminary again.  He said the temple was great, as always.  He also said that he'd get to go to the temple again on Friday with a member who he baptized earlier in his mission.

Jared gave a little run down of his week:  "Well nothing really new this week... we spent some time resolving some conflicts with some elders.  It's kinda interesting to see my mission come full circle.  I remember having these ZL sit-downs when I had been out for 3 months.  And now I'm in the ZL shoes.  It's just interesting.  Other things we've done include getting yelled at by random members (I'm sure we've all heard the "every member a missionary" but sometimes I think it's "every member a mission president"), having numerous conference calls with President and the other leaders, making sure some baptisms happen in other areas, driving around like crazy, giving blessings, typing reports, accounting with the stake, going on splits, and even teaching a little!  I swear it's never been so hard just to do missionary work in my own area, my time is just eaten up by so many other things.  But somehow it all works out, so in the end it's ok."

Jared said that he told the sister in the office he wanted to fly into Albany.  He said it was weird to know that the end is coming.  He said that in his mission they have a huge transfer board in the assistant's office with all of the missionary's pictures and information on it.  When you have 3 transfers left you get a green dot sticker on your picture, a yellow one at two transfers, and a red one when you are in your last transfer.  He said right now he has a yellow dot!

It's always great to hear how Jared's doing!

 

Makakilo

 It was great to hear from Jared this week.  He said that he was reminiscing about Boston with the Bishop and his wife in the area he's in now.  They had asked which temple he would attend when he's back home and he said the Boston temple was his assigned temple.  He also told them the motivation for going to the Boston temple was definately swayed by the Donut Dip - a fantastic donut place in Springfield, MA.

Jared said that the Makakilo apartment he was just moving into had just failed the apartment inspection.  He said it looked like it hadn't been cleaned in years!  He said the bathroom was horrendous and that he took that responsibility upon himself to clean it.  He said he spend $30 on cleaning supplies and that the four new Elders moving in spend most of their P-day cleaning.  But that when it was finally done it was awesome!  He said that before it was cleaned it didn't have the Spirit, but that now they were good.

Jared said that he and his companion gave the mission president some pretty ambitious goals for their week.  And that they got called four times to make sure they understood that they were going to be accountable for the numbers that they gave, both to him and the Lord.  He said they almost hit all their goals, and felt pretty good about that.

He also said there was a baptism Saturday and that he got to conduct the music for it.  He said the baptism went very well. 

This past Tuesday Jared had an interview with President and Sister Dalton.  He said that he LOVES interviews.  He also said that the assistants say that Sister Dalton loves him because he reminds her of President Dalton when he was younger.  He thought that was a huge compliment.

 

 

Photos

We got an email from Jared today - a little later than we expected. We were wondering if he couldn't find a place to email from because it was President's Day. But just when I'd resigned myself to the thought that I'd have to wait until tomorrow, or even the next week, an email came in.

 Jared sent a couple of pictures.

This is a picture of Kaena Point. Jared and his companion hiked it earlier in the day.  He said the weather was "AWESOME - Couldn't ask for a much better day:)"

Jared said he got an endangered Hawaiian monk seal 

to wake up and growl at him, and that is was awesome.

Jared said that things went really fast this week.  They had a trip to Honolulu where they had a lot of administrative things to do, and they also had a few good lessons and a good amount of tracting.

Jared said that his area Makakilo is geographically large with nine wards and three buildings, but one is under construction.  So there are 16 missionaries over here with an area that stretches from the edge of Ewa beach to Kaena point, and all the way up the hill.  He said he actually lives right across the main street from the Stake Center on Panana street.  So now you can look on Google maps and see where Jared is.

He said that they have a really good zone right now and that he's excited to be there.  He also said that he will be going to the temple on his birthday with a convert from earlier in his mission.  He thought that was a great gift.

He also told a funny story.  He said that two nights ago they got a call from the sisters who cover Makakilo and Palehuna wards.  He said they were hysterical on the phone and asked he and his companion to come over right away and that it was an emergency!  He said upon further clarification they indicated that it was an "avian emergency".  So he said they went to the sister's apartment and the sisters were laughing super hard at something.  So he and his companion walked up and they see a bird sitting on the sister's door and the sisters were too scared to even shoo it away.  So they had called Jared and his companion to rescue them.  So Jared walked up and found that the bird was asleep.  So he picked it up and started walking towards the sisters and they went ballistic - yelling at him and telling him to keep his distance.  So he let the bird go and they all went on with the rest of their nights.  He thought that was pretty funny experience.

It's always great to hear from him and we wish we'd been there to enjoy the hike and the AWESOME weather.

Happy Valentine's Day

We got an email from Jared.  He said that he's in the Makakilo Stake/ Kapolei Ward.  He said that it's been a busy week and that they've put a lot of miles on their car, done some service, taught a few lessons - the regular missionary stuff.

He said that he received the Valentine's Day package that I sent him.  He said:  "I got the Valentine's Day package (Single Awareness Day Package hahaha), thank you so much Mom!  Elder T. and I couldn't wait for Valentine's Day, sorry, we've opened it and devoured most of the candy already.  I'll make the cake and hope to eat it on Valentine's Day though, so that'll be awesome:)"

He said that he'll keep working hard until the end.  He said there's a lot to be done in the area/zone so it's a great way to keep from being "trunky".

It was a short email kinda day.  Hopefully the next email will be longer and have pictures.  A mom can hope, can't she?

Two Weeks in One Post

Here's the scoop - I just didn't update Jared's blog a week ago, and now I have an email from this week too.  So I'll do Monday, January 28th first and then write about this week.

Here are a couple pictures of Jared.  He said that they had a massive storm that "smacked the island" and that they got 2-3" of rain per hour.  He said he was more scared of that than he was of the tsunami warning back in October.  He said that he and his companion were thoroughly soaked so they spent the next hour or so just helping people in their apartment complex getting to and from their cars.  He said that even through all the rain it was still probably mid 70s outside.  He said he felt bad for us because I'd written telling him how cold it had been in New York.  He said:  " You might have been praying that your snow storms would come over my way, and maybe they did, they just couldn't handle the warm weather out here;) So I'm definitely not envious of you guys haha."

Jared said that transfers happen on February 6th and that he should know what is happening by sometime in the coming week and that we'd know for sure by the next p-day.

Jared told me a funny tracting story.  He said that they were tracting and they knocked on this "uncle's" door.  He said it was his companion's turn to give the door approach so he started it very nice and politely by asking the man if he was having a good day so far.  The man says:   "Well I was until you showed up on my porch!"  Jared said that he started to apologize to the man and asked him if they could offer a prayer for the man to have a good day, but the man says: "NO! Not you Mormons! You believe in having more than one wife!!!"  So Jared said they started to address that one and the man interrupts the and says:  "No, No, No, I know all about you guys, I read it in the magazine."  He said that his companion started to ask him about that and said:  "Well uncle" and the guy said:  "AND I'M NOT YOUR UNCLE!!!"  Jared said that his companion got a little salty and said:  "Well OK, SIR!"  Jared said he could tell that his companion was getting frustrated so he took him by the arm, told the guy to have a nice day and they walked away.  As they were leaving the guy said:  "Yeah that's right, get off my property!" and slammed the door.  Jared said he had a good laugh and thought the whole thing was hilarious.  But he said that his companion didn't share in his sense of humor.

He said that not too much happened that was exciting as far as missionary work in the week, but that it wasn't for lack of trying.

Now on to this past Monday's email - February 4th

This is a picture of a woman who wants Jared to baptize her.

This picture is of Elder B. and his bike which was super broke.  Jared said:  

"If you look both of his pedals are facing down hahaha, I was laughing sooo hard:)"

This picture is Jared with a poster that the Glenville ward YW sent him.  He was so happy to get it!

We learned that Jared will finish his mission as a Zone Leader in the Makakilo stake.  He will be with one the the missionaries from his transfer, Elder T.  Jared said that he's an awesome missionary so he's "stoked", and that he's hoping he's up to the responsibilities of being a Zone Leader.  He thinks he'll finish his mission there.  But he said it's good, and that they're not "letting me slack haha."

Jared said that one of the ladies he's been teaching said that she'd like Jared to come baptize her, even though he won't be in that area any more.  He said that is one advantage of still being on the same island.  He also said that one of his early converts is going through the temple on his birthday, and that he'll be able to go with her because she also lives on Oahu.  He's excited for that.

Jared ends by saying:  "Anyways, I hope you all have good weeks wherever you all are, and I love you all so much!  Muchos Mahalos and Aloha!!!  Elder Brooksby"