Skowhegan, my dearly beloved friends and family, is a little
town in the middle of Maine which happens to be my place of residence for the
next 5-11 weeks (at least).
Last time I wrote I was in the MTC. And even though that was
only 12 days ago it feels like a lifetime ago. So much has happened in the last
12 days!
I finished the MTC and flew out to Manchester, NH last
Monday morning at about 3am. Yuck. But the flights weren't too bad and I got to
call my parents during my layover in Chicago, so it was worth waking up that
early. :) When I arrived in Manchester it was around 5 pm. President and Sister
Stoker picked me and the rest of the missionaries up and took us to their home
in Bedford. We had dinner, had interviews with President Stoker, I had to fill
out a lot of forms since all of mine are in Australia, and then we practiced
teaching lessons with the Assistants to the President. After that, it was
bedtime!
Tuesday morning I got ready and we all got in the car and
headed to Transfer Meetings! There I met the one, the only... Sister Davis! My
new companion. She is from American Fork, UT and has been out on her mission
for 7 months. She's super rad. I honestly just adore her and I can't imagine my
mission without her. We get along great, and we're always having a blast. After
Transfer Meeting we hopped in our car and headed to Skowhegan, Maine, which is
not a short drive. Sister Davis and I cover Skowhegan and 15 other towns that
are in the general vicinity. If you drove from one end of our area to the other
nonstop, it would take 90 minutes. So we rarely knock on the same door twice
while tracting. haha. After we got to Skowhegan, we dropped my stuff off and
headed to teach Aaron R.! For our lessons with Aaron, we have to take a female
member over 18, so we took Lexie Bloom! Aaron is an Army Veteran and super
awesome. He's read the Book of Mormon, gone to church, prayed about it, and
knows it's all true! Unfortunately, he has really bad migraines. And the only
thing he has found that helps with them is drinking coffee. So we're working on
that right now.
Wednesday morning we woke up, got ready, and headed to
Dover, Maine for District Meeting. As we pull in, I look over and I think,
"Wow. That looks like Morgan Dellasilva from back home." And so I get
out of the car and I yell, "Hey Sister Dellasilva!" And she looked at
me, we ran to each other, we hugged, and it was super adorable. She's headed
back to Idaho Falls after this transfer. Aah, that's so weird that my friends
are started to head home. Anyways, after District Meeting we went back to our
area and we went to go read in the Book of Mormon with Nancy. Nancy is super
sweet and has two kids, Thomas and Jasmine. We read Alma 3 with her and talked
about it. She's already taken all of the discussions, but is waiting until
after her wedding in August to get baptized. So we're just reading with her for
now. :)
Thursday was a blast. Sister Davis and I walked to the
library to teach Aaron O. but he stood us up. So we walked back to our
apartment. It's not a terribly long walk, but it's not too fun in 35 degree
weather. We did some tracting that day and then we went and taught Brother
Steward and Sister White. They're brother and sister, and both super sweet.
They're less active, and working on coming back. We taught them 2 Nephi 32:
PRO: Pray, Read, Obey. After we taught them we went and volunteered at the Soup
Kitchen. Oh. My. Lanta. The Soup Kitchen is AWESOME. The people who run it and
the other volunteers are all hoots! After that, Sister Davis and I went and
taught Aaron R. again. He's such a good guy. This time we took sweet Sister
Kinney with us. Sister Kinney is the Relief Society president here and is such
a hoot!
Friday all of our plans fell apart. We had to spend like 5
hours of planning that day anyways, so I guess there weren't a ton of plans to
fall apart. We were going to volunteer at an animal shelter but when we got
there, it was closed! So we spent the day tracting and trying to visit Less
Actives. People in New England don't answer their doors. And if they do, they
don't let you in. So Sister Davis and I had plenty of bonding time running
through the streets of various towns. hahaha.
Saturday was also a very uneventful but interesting day. Our
neighbor, Dr. Ted, took us out to lunch. So we tried talking with him about why
we're here and he told us that Jesus Christ had nothing to do with Christianity
and that he was just a political radical. And that religion was just so society
could have some sort of rules. So we thanked him for lunch and went on our way.
Dr. Ted is a super awesome neighbor, not as awesome of an investigator. We
spent a lot of the day tracting and I probably saw my life flash before my eyes
a dozen times. New England has a plethora of three things: giant dogs,
cigarettes, and blizzards. Three things I was NOT prepared for. But that night
we taught Zante. Zante has three kids, Rogue, Payton, and Gidion. They are
ADORABLE. But the lesson went really well, and Zante is preparing to be
baptized in a few weeks. :)
Sunday we woke up to a blizzard! We drove to church (Aaron
R. and Nancy both showed up. Woo!), they held a 45 minute sacrament meeting,
and we all drove home before the blizzard got too bad. So after that, Sister
Davis and I went around scraping windows and shoveling sidewalks. It was quite
the adventure. We also went around and visited some of the widows in the ward
that didn't make it to church because of the weather. That night we ate dinner
with the Cooks. Brother Cook is a member, his wife is a devout Christian, and
their four children are baptized but not necessarily active. They are all
AWESOME. Dinner with them was great, and we shared a message about the Gospel
of Jesus Christ. They're all so sweet. And then we had to go home because the
roads were too bad to be out any longer.
This all leads up to today! Well, today hasn't been too
exciting. We went grocery shopping, played ping pong with Lexie, and now I'm
here, writing this email. Sorry for that anti-climatic ending... Oh but Sister
Davis is half Japanese, so she pretty much destroyed me in Ping Pong. Which
isn't hard since I have no hand-eye coordination...
Skowhegan is honestly amazing. I love it so much. I am so
grateful for Sister Davis and the people that I have met here. It's not
Australia, but it's definitely what I need right now. I miss you and I'm
sending love your way. But not too much love, I have a set-apart heart.
;)
NEW ADDRESS FOR NOW
Sister Danielle Laree Stott
164 Madison Ave. Apt. 6
Skowhegan, ME
04976
Letters are greatly appreciated, and in fact encouraged.
:)
Sister Stott
Picture:
Me and Sister Davis
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