Cold to Serve

This week has ups and downs, but what is mission life, or life in general, without them? We got dropped by the family we taught the week before. I went to a training meeting at the mission office where the president spoke to us. I realized that after having limited people to talk to, I had begun to lose my complete faith in the area that I had when I first started out. It’s winter, and that means something completely different here than it does in California. In California winter is when the girls wear short-shorts with Uggs instead of Converse, but here no one goes outside, and it is difficult to talk with those Eskimos who are outside.

One thing that always brings me up is church. I was sitting in sacrament meeting, and I just felt like I belonged. I’ve never felt more like I was needed in one place at one time, and I’ve never felt more love for a group of people. It’s freezing (as in, actually below freezing level) outside, and I have had to pound on the car to break the thick layer of ice congealed on it, but I love this place!

We had one lesson this week with a rather interesting man named Thomas. He tried to convince us he was one of the Twelve Apostles in a former life. It was sad, because he is an elderly man living alone, and we were the only ones who would listen to him.

It was so fun seeing my friends from my MTC district at the training meeting. I almost cried when I saw Hermanas Fox and Meldrum, I had missed them so much! They always make me feel so much better about what I’m going through, something I always needed in the MTC.

We’re going to try and teach missionary lessons to members in an effort to get to know them and practice our French, so that will start this week with a part-member family.

I love you all so much and hope you are all doing well!

Bises!

Meredith

Dear friends and family, in Meredith’s mission farewell talk, she talked about miracles and that they still exist today.  Please join our family in praying that Meredith and her companion will experience miracles in being able to find the people in her area who are ready to accept the gospel.

FYI, tomorrow the forecast for Montreal lists a high of 0 degrees fahrenheit and a low of -11 degrees F.

In letters Meredith sent to her family this week, I gleaned these little tidbits that I don’t think she would mind me sharing with everybody:

  • Yes my companion and I devoured the holly clusters (thank you Grandma Barbara)!
  • I think I might actually be transitioning to a Quebecois accent. I can understand most everyone and all of church and videos!
  • In Canada, everybody buys their milk in a bag, and they put it in a pitcher and snip off a part of the bag so they can pour out the milk.
  • Members have told us it’s the culture to sort of hibernate from December to March.
  • There are a lot of Swiss and French immigrants here, so I still hear a lot of fancy French! Also there is a family and the dad was a bishop in Neuchatel Switzerland while you were on your mission there! His name is Bishop Groux, he was so interested that you served in Suisse!
  • We do live in our coats! We are cold all the time, I don’t even notice it most of the time, and then I realize I’ve lost feeling in the majority of my body and we have to go back inside!
  • My toes have actually frozen together on a couple occasions, but it’s not because I had bad gear, it’ what happens to everyone. We can only spend like 2 hours outside at a time.
  • Here’s a cartoon Meredith drew in a letter to her brother Spencer (she wrote “Frostbited” referring to an online video we’ve all seen).  Double click on this link to enlarge the cartoon.
  • frostbite