Elder Penner Spain Madrid Mission: Better Days

Happy New Year!

As The Goo Goo Dolls put it, last night was "the night the world begins again." We all get a fresh start going into the new year. I almost went with "The New Year" by Death Cab for Cutie, and then nearly "New Year's Day" by U2, but "Better Days" just got the nod. We spent last night with a couple of families here, but of course, we couldn't stay out until midnight. I was ok with it though since I was sick. It's pretty ridiculous to think that I spent the whole of last year in Spain looking back. 2017 was one big learning experience for me which is kind of funny because sometimes I still feel like I don't know what the heck I'm doing. I still lack a lot, but it's ok since I've got a whole nother year left.

This week was another good one with some ups and downs. We were traveling again, so we didn't have a whole lot of time in our area. We went to Los Cristianos in Tenerife for intercambios Wednesday and Thursday. I went with Elder Meeks. It was our third intercambio together since I was in the same district as him when I was in Toledo. Great guy and really good at frying stuff. He's from Florida and now I'm convinced that they don't eat anything there that hasn't been fried first.

When we got back to La Palma we had a lesson with Javier. It was a little disappointing. We realized that he hasn't been very good with keeping his commitments and now we're not sure if he has the right intentions. We think that after all, it might not be his time. We hope we can continue working with him and help him change, but I don't think we're gonna focus on him as much. The good news is that we had a group family home evening activity at the church on Friday night. A member brought a friend with her and we started teaching her and her son. She has an immense amount of questions so teaching her is really fun for me. I think we're gonna try and focus on more activities like that with the group now so people can bring their friends.

Don't think much else happened this past week. We didn't have anything to do this morning since everything was closed for New Year's, so we decided to go hiking. We went to La Caldera and La Cascada de Colores that I went to a couple months back. We explored a little more and found another waterfall (lit). Transfers happen this coming weekend, so I'll find out if I get to spend my birthday travelling or not. Hope you all have a brilliant week!

Hasta luego,

Elder Penner 🇮🇨🇪🇸

Fotos tíos:

1. Fútbol on intercambios