not one, but TWO letters!

They came in the same envelope, one dated March 9th and one dated March 14th (last Tuesday and this past Sunday). I have to say that the timing was absolutely perfect. Just last night I was starting to feel like I was running out of...whatever the word is that I'm looking for...but I just kept telling myself that the Lord has ALWAYS delivered when I was at the end of my rope and I would trust he would do the same now. I turned the corner into the neighborhood this evening and let out my prepare-yourself-for-an-empty-mailbox-and-house sigh, telling myself that I was going to be fine. When I opened the mailbox and saw Andrew's handwriting, I almost burst into tears right there, mainly because I couldn't believe how God's provision had landed in my mailbox. Oh me of little faith.

Overall, Andrew sounds good. The first letter was mostly him encouraging me. He let me know that he's starting to believe more and more that this is the right thing and he's seeing the benefit of what we're doing. I'll spare you the mushy details, but it was very thoughtful and sweet. The second letter sounded even better - I can tell that he's getting into a routine and getting better at dealing with the circumstances. This part was probably the best to hear:

This is such an odd experience. It's easy, hard, fun, miserable, flying by and dragging on. We met the DI on Thursday and we've been doing all kinds of crazy exercise since then. I've also been eating three plates of food per day and getting about 5 hours of mediocre at best sleep per night. But surprisingly I'm not tired during the day unless we sit down for an extended period of time and then I could just about fall asleep standing up. But knowing you, that information might make you worry, so please know that I'm really alright and my spirits are fine.

I like our class DI a lot. He's at least as hardcore and intense as in movies, but I'm not scared of him or anything. He's made a few people cry, shake with fear and close to (??) people have rolled into holding class because they couldn't keep up. But the DI really just wants us to learn things and get in shape. I have a lot of respect for him and am looking forward to speaking candidly with him on graduation day.

From what we can tell, things will be like this for about 3-5 more weeks. It won't be easy after that, but it'll transition to more academic work around that time.

I definitely cried the entire time I read these letters. More than anything, it was a relief to hear from him and to know that he's managing. What an answer to a gigantic prayer. Sunday was the first day they were able to send out mail, but he mentioned receiving some of mine, so I'm glad they can at least read mail. I'm secretly hoping that more is on the way :)