Sell that cabin

Haha...I'M GETTING TRANSFERRED.

Again!

This will be my fourth area and fourth companion. I will really miss Brockport. It's been a crazy up and down experience, but I have loved my time here. Packing this morning has been the weirdest experience...I feel like it really is time for me to go but I snuggled right into this area.


Where am I going, you ask? Into the city! I've predicted my whole mission that I would end up in Brighton and it looks to be true. Brighton is a Spanish sisters area and it's in the city of Rochester. Brockport was about 45 minutes from the inner city and now I'm maybe 5. I'm going with Sister Hausauer who is from Utah (3 out of 4 so far- what odds?) and she was actually my first friend in the mission so this...may or may not turn out to be a party! Pretty close to a dream. I expect to be in Brighton until the end of my mission which is 7 months from today. I'm actually the most nervous I've been on my mission to go into this area though because I am replacing Sister Torres- she was in Brighton for 9 transfers (a full year) and she is a native from Nicaragua. How in the world am I supposed to step in there?! I have never been more grateful for my study and experience with Spanish before my mission. Sheesh. I'm so used to starting fresh with an area that I'm really not sure what to expect. Here we go!


So with that exciting announcement, moving on.

It's cold again.

Which means...tights.

Ugh. Tights.

This week one morning as I was putting on my tights I had a vivid flashback of being a little girl and watching my dad put tights on me before church. I always wanted to stick my tiny feet in and pull them up like a pair of jeans, but Dad always bunched them up first and pulled them up like a slinky. I couldn't help but appreciate how much I've learned since I've been young. That might seem like an inconsequential thing, but so much that I've picked up over the years has built into whatever strengths and weaknesses I carry around now. Things like how to put on tights or how to do the dishes have helped me as an adult and missionary in obvious ways. When I was in elementary school we moved almost every year. Now I've hopped around the Rochester Mission like it's a snack bar! I wonder if the skills I've needed to move so often started being developed in that early experience. Behaviors like selfishness and intolerance (picked up pretty naturally I would think) are patterns that I continually have to put aside. Not having sisters has made living with a girl 24/7 a little interesting and it's something I'm still adapting to. There are so many things that have prepped me for what I'm doing now. I assume it'll continue that way- one day when I'm a grandma I'll look back on my time as a missionary and see how I was being prepped for my reponsibilities and trials in the future. Little did my dad know when he helped me put on tights before church on Sundays that he was preparing me to be a missionary! I'm grateful for who I am becoming.


This week...definitely let me know that I was moving. Often when it's time for a missionary to move, the people who you were working with that particularly connected to you make their choice. Too busy, too comfortable, too smart for their own good. Satisfied not learning anything else. When I've done what I needed to do, it's time for me to go. It was like that in Shortsville and Buffalo, too. It's a hard feeling, but at least there is closure. I'm grateful for how many people I have come to love so quickly.


I'd upload photos but these computers really hate me, so maybe in my next area I'll have a way to do it. I hope everyone is doing well! Sorry that this week's email is a little short. All is well with me. I am happy. Next week, you'll hear from the city of Rochester. WHATS UP.

Love you all :)

Sister Raines