Such great emails family! Thank you so much, I appreciated all of your stories and pictures. Chandler.....I’ll let it slide this week :) But just this week! Haha, man I loved Alex’s story about Bart! That’s super funny. It brought back memories of Bailey sleeping out on that Lazy Boy. And I’m glad that Mom and Dad and the Rammells had fun in Sun Valley! I got your post cards and I loved them. Especially Renee’s horse joke. haha We all laughed pretty hard. And Addi’s letter was so sweet! Thanks hunny!
So on Friday we got transfer calls. I was shocked and felt like I got my heart ripped in half when I heard that I would not be finishing training Elder Hill or staying. Tomorrow I am being transferred to San Benito. It’s about 20 minutes north of Brownsville. I couldn’t believe it! We were all shocked because we thought for sure I would be staying. But I guess the Lord has other plans. Even though I feel like the kid that had the fire cracker blow up prematurely in his hand. It has been a tough couple of days. A lot of tears already...and I’m not looking forward to tonight. Tonight the branch is throwing a little party in the church for my going away so it will be tough to say goodbye. Now I know what Chan meant when he said it’s almost worse than leaving home. (I put the "almost" in just for you Mom :)) But I have had a pretty hard time with it. I love this area and these people so much that it won’t be easy. But I’m gonna be positive because I know the Lord has someone else waiting for me. But Brownsville has a big piece of my heart.
So this week was a pretty great week. We found a lot and taught a lot. Probably one of the best weeks here, of course right when I’m about to leave. But there are a lot of great people that will be baptized in September that hopefully I can come back to see. We had quite a freaky incident with the Hernandez family because we went out there for a lesson and Lizbeth had just cut her foot open really bad, and it was pretty gruesome. But there’s no one else that lives out by them because they are in the middle of nowhere so we kinda had to scramble and play doctor and get it closed up. I was pretty woozy by the end because you know I don’t like blood much. But we got it taken care of finally and got Presidente de la Llata out there and a doctor in our branch as well. It was bad enough to go to the hospital but she couldn’t go, so the branch was taking care of her. Luckily we’ve got some doctors in the branch. But that took up almost all of our night being there with her and keeping her calm until we got some help out there. But that night we had half the branch there with my injured recent convert, and I saw how protected she felt and it was just amazing. They couldn’t even fit half that branch in their little house. But I could tell it was the first time that she just felt like they all had her back.
But I kinda realized that night, I reached the pinnacle of just LOVE. Just so much love for all those people there and for the Hernandez family. And realizing how hard it would be to leave haha. And having to write out "I’m leaving" on the white board for Andrea. She just shook her head and said “nope”! That’s what I felt like saying when I was told, but I didn’t! But that family is in such good hands with the branch and with Elder Hill. So I’m not worrying too much.
As well we had a super fun service project on Saturday where we gave out 900 free backpacks and it was super fun. We had all the branches and wards in Brownsville together and it was a huge project and huge success. I put a picture on my email of it. But a great way to end my week here.
But other than that, not too much happened this week. I am just so grateful and humbled to have been able to serve here and I have learned so so much. I hope that you will all be able to be with me for a Sunday in the Casa Linda Branch someday. It’s quite a treat:) haha! So family I hope all is well and that you enjoy these last few weeks of summer. Live it up. Be safe. And remember that I love you! And you can wait for my email from San BENITO Next week! Love you!
Love Elder Smith
