You really know how to dance

It was a good week. Things are different here now with all the changes in companions and branch leadership and stuff. Anyways, on Monday night we left to St. Petersburg to get to my companion's dentist appointment on Tuesday morning. We stayed with my friends the assistants that night. Tuesday morning we went to the dentist and man oh man... it's not pretty. The dentist looked at his teeth for 2 seconds, said 'awful' a bunch of times, then made him go get some x-rays of them. One of his teeth is dead from the gum up, and so all they did was work on that one. The roots are still kinda living, but the rest is dead. So they did a little mini root canal thing and stuck some medicine in his tooth to see if it would wake up his nerves. If it hasn't worked by this week when they go in again, they'll just pull out his tooth then move onto the ten plus other cavities and things. So yeah, not pretty at all. Sorry I had to tell you about that, Grandpa Gwilliam. I brush every day, just like you said. After that he wanted to go get a new belt because his old one is breaking. So we did that. Then we ate some fancy hamburgers (that had bacon and were really good) and then met one of our investigators that moved to St. Petersburg a few months ago. We went with him to Avtovo where they were having a ward activity and my companion wanted to go see all of his old friends there. So that was the night. Oh yeah, a recently returned missionary was there... he came back from America with his parents and they heard about this activity and stopped by. It was weird but fun. Wednesday... "Behold, I say unto you, I cannot say the smallest part which I feel." That's what I felt like. It was a crazy experience. We had a meeting in the morning with the Glausers to kinda send off the old missionaries and to make them start thinking about what they're going to do when they get home... about 12 hours before they got sent home. We are leaving as you know a little sooner than the next group, so we got thrown in there too. That honestly didn't phase me that much. It was fun to be there. Then transfer meeting happened... my last one... I just was having a good time seeing my missionary friends and then I sat down in the chapel and it hit me like a "lightning strike in a summer storm" that I have 4 weeks left.... I didn't know what to think. I was called upon (as were all the others) to testify in front of all the missionaries... no topic, just a testimony. Everybody did a really good job. I have had this little gift or tender mercy if you will to be able to share my testimony here and cry but be able to talk through the tears. Well, the spirit was so strong and I was so grateful for my mission and I was so sad to be leaving and I was so determined to keep working and I was such an emotional wreck that I bawled and bawled and got out a few sentences and that was it.  I read Mosiah 5:13 I think and just bore my testimony really briefly then sat down. After that, I was totally fine and totally calm. I am grateful for that experience because the other missionaries that felt that urgency like I did got on a plane a few days ago, but I have four more weeks to get some work done! I'm grateful for that. That night we got on a bus and went to Pskov, my new companion and I. Elder Mullen is great. I'm going to have a really good time with him. Thursday morning we tried to get him all registered up and it was hard. The visa worker in the office misinformed some of us and made it hard for us to get it done. But we got it done. During studies, Elder Mullen said some wise things. He asked my what I wanted to accomplish in these 4 weeks. I had never really thought of specific things to accomplish during this last time other than keep up what we've been doing. So we set some goals and we'll get on it. We had a fun time contacting that night and it rained pretty hard. This was a bad week to decide "I don't need my umbrella today". Friday we cleaned the branch and had a good time. Then we did some weekly planning. Saturday the assistants and President came to Pskov and just changed up the branch presidency. I'm now the first counselor. Hooray. We had a good dinner with them on Sunday night. We just talked about Pskov and what needs to happen here. I made a push for another companionship or at least one more missionary to have the ability to help out women. Last night we had a lesson with an investigator that I knew here before that hasn't been met with in a long time. He's doing ok, he's in a depression but he quit smoking. That's kinda weird. I thought that he would be super excited about that because that was always the hardest thing for him, and he's done it and now he's in depression. He was actually depressed before he quit smoking, that started while I was here before. It rained like I've never seen before in my life. It was calm then suddenly BAM rain. Heavy heavy rain. My suit is still wet, my shoes are still soaked. My shoes were filled with water. Again, the worst day on my mission to not grab an umbrella. Anyways, it was a good week. Have a good one yourselves!

Elder Gwilliam

The transfer meeting lunch

the Butters, Elder Jacob Carter

The last planner