"WE HELPED SAVE A GUY'S LIFE"

Wed 7/07/10 2:55 PM
Happy Fourth of July and Happy Birthday, Whitney! I was really anxious this week to hear if Whitney had her baby yet, but I guess I'll get to be anxious for another week. Since the Fourth was Sunday, holiday schedule rolled over to Monday, so none of the libraries were open. And yesterday was just really busy, so today we get to email! Thank you so much for the nice birthday card! And thank you Dad for the birthday money - I was able to stock up pretty good on my protein and vitamins and we had a fun couple of times going out to eat. We haven't gone to Chili's yet, but next time we don't have a dinner appointment, we might do that.

Our week has been pretty crazy. Last Monday, later after we emailed, we helped save a guy's life. So, we decided to go out with the missionaries serving in downtown Milwaukee, and we went to a not so well-known beach to play football and hang out. After being there for a bit, we decided to venture through some brush and trees up the beach towards a more public beach. On the way, we were walking through people's private beaches who had their backyards up against Lake Michigan. As we were walking towards a big, concrete, look-out structure covered with graffiti, we saw a guy laying half in and half out of the water. Elder Radle is the one who saw him while a couple of other missionaries walked right past without seeing him laying there. We immediately called 911 and led the fireman and EMT's to the scene when they got to the house who's backyard we were in. It looked like the guy had fallen off the top of the rock structure onto the rocky beach, and he had been laying there for probably 2 days, in shock, hypothermia, with broken bones, and with maggetts eating his skin. He was still conscious though when we found him, so that was good. Since it was a private beach, we are almost positive he would have died soon if we had not decided to walk that way. After he was loaded up and taken up to the street where he was life-flighted, there were news crews there to interview us. We all just let Elder Radle do it, since he was the one who found the guy. So that's another cool mission story to remember. I'm glad we were able to be led to that guy before it was too late.

It is interesting to have President Barrett gone and to have a new mission president - President Jones. I'm not sure what to think yet, but I'm confident he'll do well. Fourth of July for us was sweet! (actually celebrated on the 3rd here) We went to the beach with a semi-recent-convert, part-member family and had a fun BBQ. We set up some beach chairs in the sand and watch the fireworks. Sunday went well too. Angela (lady we found at the bus stop) was at church and loved it, and we also had Patti there. She has been to church several times, but she is just hard to set up times to teach.

But yeah, everything else is going well here! Thank you for your prayers, and I'll be praying for you guys - especially Whitney!

Love,

Elder Vogan