Transfer news came one Saturday night as Elder Jones was teaching me how to solve a Rubik's cube. Among the skills he was imparting — which, in addition to door approaches and basic missionary talents, also included a few more worldly things — was the ability to solve the puzzle in under three minutes. Elder Jones often honed this skill on the toilet with the door open, sometimes carrying on conversations with me as he engaged in the other tasks at hand. Today, thankfully, I occupied his full attention, and I had finished the top when the zone leaders — the missionaries who occupied the leadership tier above district leader — called with our new assignments.
Elder Jones was to go to Gallup, on the borders of the reservation, with one of the new elders who had come from the MTC with me. I, on the other hand, was to depart for Haines, a ward in central Albuquerque known as the "War Zone." My companion was Elder Wodjcidek, whom I'd met briefly during our exciting jaunt a few weeks earlier to Albuquerque to get my personal regions violated.
When the time came to depart, all the fortitude I'd built up over the last three months leaked out my eyes, despite my best efforts to keep a stoic face. Elder Jones gave me a manly hug as his nearly newborn child prepared to once again venture into the unknown world alone and friendless.
Good.
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