Pronunciation

This week was so crazy! I might do a bullet-point summary, then touch up on more details later down.

Summary:

- Ew, metric system

- PrOnUnCiAtIoN

- Did you know that Canadians spell words like honor and color with a 'u'? Honour, colour. It bugs me. XD

- Apparently we don't use the mission cars on Tuesdays... XD

- I might get transferred this Thursday. :'(

- I got my last suitcase! Somehow it went to London for a day! XD

- I figured out what the berry trees that grow all over are called! Rowan/mountain ash trees have the reddish-orange berries, and the black-berried trees are chokecherries. *Satisfaction*

- I've cried a lot this week... *nervous laugher*

- We had to drop some people that we were teaching. :'(

- No new people this week; contacting was rough. -_-

- Near-death experience, yay! :D

- Have you ever felt your spirit clash with someone? :/ Or had them refuse help when you can see that they clearly need it?

- We have food again because today is P-Day! :D

- Sister LaFrance is a soul-reader! She just asks me one question, then I'll spend an hour telling her my deepest, darkest feelings. 0.0  I don't know how she does it.

- Also, since I hate computer emojis, I'm experimenting with more keyboard faces. XD 

Longer stuff:

Okay, I didn't think the metric system would bother me so bad. XD Kilometers, meters, centimeters... urgh. The speed limits seem insane to me because it's common for roads to be 70-100, but it's in kilometers, so I have no idea how fast it actually is in comparison. People always tell me the temperature in Celsius, so that's incredibly helpful. -_-  Also, I'm so bothered by all the things that I consider grammatical errors! XD Honour, colour, utencils, centre... AAAAAGGGGHHH! It's killing my editor brain. But Sister LaFrance thinks it's hilarious.

Pronunciation is funny. XD I say the word 'both' like bulth while Sister La-France says it more like boath, if that makes sense. And she says behg while I say bahg. I tell her it sounds like she's asking me to beg every time she wants me to grab her bag, then she'll be like, "Grab bulth of our behgs" to make fun of my Utah accent. XD It's all in good fun, though. We keep finding minor cultural differences that are hilarious. 

Tuesdays are called 'tireless Tuesdays'. Personally, I prefer tiring Tuesdays. I've only experienced one so far (haha, tomorrow's another one). We had to take all of our food with us to the church because it's only a ten-minute drive but nearly an hour-long walk. It was cold and drizzly the whole day while most of the week has been sunny. -_-  Life is like that sometimes. So we spent most of the day at the church (not like we don't every other day, haha), but we just couldn't drive back to the apartment for meals and stuff. We also had to walk back home in the dark, and I got scared to death because a giant mountain hare ran past us and it looked like a mutated dog before I realized what it was. XD

Welp, I might get transferred this Tuesday after only spending a week with my companions. :/ The only reason I'm in Fort Saskatchewan (Don't know if I mentioned that in my last email) is because we were waiting on my luggage and a phone. My phone still hasn't gotten here, but the case has. My companions and I are hoping that I can stay longer, but if the Lord needs me in another area, then I'll go. Also, like I said, my final suitcase somehow went on a crazy journey from Salt Lake, to Denver, to Vancouver, then all the way to LONDON, and finally wound up in Edmonton. If it could talk, I'm sure it would tell me one amazing story. XD A couple things inside of it were a bit squished or broken, but my glasses survived, so I'm happy about that. :D

The berry trees were bothering me so much! Just about every yard we drive past has a rowan/ash tree, and/or chokecherries. But no one knew what they were! My companions kept laughing every time I'd ask someone, "Hey, do you happen to know what these berries are?" and people would be like, "Um... the red kind?" or "I don't know, I just know you shouldn't eat them." To be fair, I want to try eating them. XD They're non-toxic, but apparently ash/rowan berries taste bitter, and chokecherries have a big pit, hence the name.

I was rather sad and out of it for part of this week. I was told by a friend that my favorite bird at SeaQuest passed away due to unknown reasons. That was hard for me. I searched the scriptures for answers to questions like, "Do animals get resurrected?" and other things. I was able to find a couple of scriptures that comforted me, but no straight answers. My companions had some excellent advice that wasn't exactly doctrine, but that did wonders for me. 

Sister LaFrance was able to find a note from the First Presidency (okay, maybe not the First Presidency) but it was somewhere on gospel library, I think. It explained a verse from Isaiah (I think, I forgot to check the reference) and said that the interpretation was that all animals are resurrected because of Christ's atonement. She also told me that their only commandment is to multiply and replenish the Earth and basically just to live their lives. As my dad always tells me, they fulfil the measure of their creation. Sister Spackman said that she doesn't believe that animals can sin or commit wrong. I honestly don't either. I know I joke sometimes that certain SeaQuest animals had it out for me, but really, they don't have the capacity for sin. Animals don't know good from evil, so they can't deliberately do wrong. They're like children, incapable of sin.

I also found a scripture that stuck out to me in my personal study the other day. I do want to look more to see if I can find other scriptures about the resurrection of animals, but I'm still just reading the Book of Mormon for now because my Mission President wants me to finish it. The scripture is 2nd Nephi 9:21.  "And he cometh into the world that he may save all men if they will hearken unto his voice; for behold, he suffereth the pains of all men, yea, the pains of every living creature, both men, women, and children, who belong to the family of Adam." (I bolded the part that stood out to me.) I know that a lot of scriptures about animal resurrection are a bit vague, and this one did mostly mean that all humans benefit from the atonement, but as I said, I feel that animals also will receive the effects of the atonement because of what my companions told me and what I believe about their lack of knowledge of good and evil.

Another thing that Sister Spackman pointed out is that we all existed before the creation of the Earth. Our spirits were all unique. She said that intelligence and personality, like matter, can't be created or destroyed. I believe that since animals have personalities too--especially very intelligent ones like birds--they will continue to exist beyond this life. 

I literally just copied and pasted the last three paragraphs (with a bit of editing) from the email to my friend because I'm too lazy to type them again. XD But I know that some people do have lots of questions about animals getting resurrected and what happens to them after they pass away. I love animals and I know that the Lord cares about all his creations, so I hope that I'll be able to see pets and other animals again someday. I'm not sure if I believe that yet, but my testimony is constantly growing, so I'm sure I'll have a better understanding eventually. Hope can turn to belief, which can turn to knowledge with time.

This week was a bit hard for teaching. We weren't able to do as many lessons as we would have liked, and we had to drop a few people. It was super sad, even though I've only known some of them for a few days. That means we'll just have to try harder this week, though! I'm determined to find new people to teach.

On the plus side, we have two people on date for baptism! :D One of them is a super sweet 17-year-old that never fails to make me laugh. She's very receptive and soaks up gospel knowledge like a sponge. The other baptismal candidate is a sweet mom whose daughter was baptised a couple of months ago. She loves the Plan of Salvation and hopes that her other children and her husband will eventually listen to the gospel. I'm super excited for both of them! I'd love to share names and more details, but... Canada has rather strict privacy laws, if I haven't already mentioned that. I'm a bit nervous that some sort of computer system might scan my emails for violations, so I'm going to play it on the safe side.

We almost got hit by a car the other day. 0.0  Just a little bit freaky. It really rattled all of us, especially Sister LaFrance. We've been making sure to always say prayers when we leave the apartment and when we drive to and from other places. 

I had an interesting experience a couple of days ago where I felt that my spirit was clashing with someone. She'd just say some things that didn't sit right with me. I felt like she was telling a lot of white lies and half-truths. She seems to see missionaries as sources of free service--which we are, of course--but she only focuses on the physical aspect. She loves to talk and asks us to walk her dogs, but then she doesn't read scriptures, come to church, or keep other commitments. :( It's sad to see someone who needs spiritual help just... not accept it. I wish we could teach her, but it's a serious case of 'you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink.' 

We sort of ran out of food last week, haha. I mean, we didn't starve, but we had to get pretty creative. We had peanut butter and jelly, but no bread. We had sugar and flour, but no idea what to make with it. XD  We had some frozen veggies, but they weren't very filling. We ran out of fruit, juice, milk, and cereal. We also had no butter, and since we ran out of milk, we couldn't even make Mac and Cheese. XD  Sister LaFrance just ate a lot of pasta and cheese, Sister Spackman survived mostly on salads, and I got to the point where I put canned tuna in ramen noodles. XD It wasn't too good. I'm glad we were able to go shopping today and get some more palatable things. We made sure to get more bread and eggs than last week, so hopefully we won't run out.

Okay, Sister LaFrance is like... almost psychic! I swear she can read my mind! Not my exact thoughts, but more like my emotions. She can tell when I fall silent because I have nothing more to say versus when I fall silent because I'm feeling sad or uncomfortable. She's an incredible listener too. We've had some super deep conversations and she never interrupts, she'll just let Sister Spackman and I babble on. 

Well, my companions are amazing and I'm enjoying myself out here. It's getting a bit chilly in the mornings and evenings, but afternoons are still sunny and bright, so that's nice. It's been rainy for a couple of days, but mostly just sunny, breezy days that remind me of Utah springs and falls. I'm a bit worried for winter, but I'm sure I'll be okay. 

Also, to everyone that's responded to my emails, I haven't figured out how to reply to just one person and not replying to everyone. XD I really appreciate the responses you give me, though. :)

Hoping everyone's well,

Sister Howard