On mutants and madmen

There are two conflicting things that are currently outside my window in unusually massive amounts - snow and robins. The snow is at least seasonal, if a little intense for the mother state. But the Hitchcock-esque gathering of robins exclusively in my yard is just silly. Flying around with their red breasts and their vernal melodies, those cheeky birds.

Can I please tell you what Elder M. sent me for Christmas? Because I received the package just today, and I think it's the perfect vignette of why I like the kid s'darn much:

-A VHS copy of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Turtles' Awesome Easter
-Two CDs without cases. I'm guessing he found them on the ground, and I don't think he knows what they are. My computer wouldn't read one of them, as it's so scratched up, but the other is Primus' Pork Soda.
-The following books, which he probably picked out of members' "For D.I." boxes and were wrapped in a Chinese copy of the proclamation on the family: X-Men: Morlock Madness, How to be Really Funny, Love You Forever, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: ABC's for a Better Planet, The Farmer John Collection (a picture book of pork in various forms), The Tao of Pooh, How to Talk so Boys Will Listen and Listen so Boys Will Talk, Testimony: How Our Families Found the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a Gideon copy of the New Testament, and How to Massage Your Cat, a picture book that made me laugh really, really hard.
-Two miniature wooden African masks in tithing envelopes for other churches on which he wrote that the enclosed amounts were "Face".
-An instant oatmeal packet. Peaches-n-cream.
-Superman fruitsnacks.
-3 peanut-based Portuguese candies that are squishy.
-A few random Chinese objects, like a plastic tile and a chopstick wrapper.
-A Star Wars action figure.

A few weeks ago, Elder M. was rambling in a letter about perceptions and color and dissonant music (these are things we would often talk about together, and we still do), and he concluded with, "Listen to me. I sound like a madman."

I told him I have a thing for madmen. I've since realized how true that is. Elder M. is the most responsible, solid, intelligent, and dependable guy you could ever ask for. Yet at the same time, he sends me African faces in tithing envelopes, he gets depressed at the fact that one of his eyes sees orange less intensely than the other, and he insists on listening to albums at top volume while laying flat on the floor. This is powerfully attractive to me. It makes me want him to be home right now, so we can begin our assault on the world, so we can live and live madly. It's the part of him that tricked me into falling in love with him.

Conversely, or, more appropriately, complementarily, he is a good and solid person. Starting a month or two ago, his letters began to get shorter, he seemed to be more excited about the people and the work than ever before, and he just seemed generally distracted from me. This, too, was powerfully attractive, but in a very different way. This was a you will be a good provider and father for my children, because you love hard work and you love the Lord and you change and you grow kind of attraction. When it really began to show that he loves the Lord more than he loves me, I loved him more. Funny how that works.

Just a little over 5 months and he'll be home.

My mother, brother, and I volunteered in the community kitchen today. Brother and I both want to do more of it when we get back to Utah. Who's with us?