Feliz Diesiocho!

September 18th, or el Diesiocho de Septiembre, is Chilean Independence Day. In my experience, it is one of the holidays more celebrated than others by the Chilean people. I entered the MTC on September 17th, and so have two days back to back where I find my thoughts meandering to Chile and my experiences as a missionary. Usually I make completos for dinner on el diesiocho, but I didn't get to it yesterday. It was a busy day and I kind of felt a little sad for not doing something Chilean to honor the day. Still, I must have thought about Chile more than I thought I did because I dreamt last night that on one of my yw activities (I'm in charge of the Beehives, the 12-13 year old girls), we somehow ended up in Chile. It was an accident but I took the girls around showing them places I had been and telling them about my companions, my Chilean friends, and the food and candy that I liked. The other leaders were kind of freaked out, as well they should have been, but I just mingled and chatted and felt right at home. Because I felt so recently Chilean when I woke up, I have had a lot of mission thoughts today. The most important one, though, is who I have become because of that experience, the sure knowledge I have that my Savior will help me through the things that I just plain can't do. That is the part of the atonement (just to show how dang Chilean I'm thinking now, I had to pause before I wrote 'the atonement' because the only word that came to mind was the Spanish 'la expiacion') that I feel the closest too. There are things that are so important to me that I want to do right. But this life is way too hard to do everything right. But I can turn my life over to Christ and when I get to the end of what I can do, he will guide my steps. And this I know. HAPPY DIESIOCHO DE SEPTIEMBRE!