Дорогая Элизабеть,

17 июня 2006
Дорогая Элизабеть,

I got your letter yesterday during lunch at our Zone Conference. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that you had written a nice length of a letter.
That must be really fun having Bro. and Sis. Miller for the Young Single Adult Leaders. It is also good that you go. How many people came to the activity? Sounds to me like you will have a lot of fun this summer with the YSA.
You know, there is a little something called Murphy’s Law: Whatever can go wrong, will go wrong and at the worst possible time. Generally I don’t believe it because I’m not a pessimist, but there are times when I believe it to be true. Maybe that’s what happened w/ I Dream of Jeannie. Which episode did you want to see?
Well, I don’t know when someone will be going to Самара next, probably at transfers in a month, so I’ll probably write more before then.

24 июня 2006
So, here I am, sitting in a hotel while my companion interviews w/ our Mission President. I just had mine and he asked me if sisters are needed here in Пенза. I didn’t know what to say. Sometimes I think we are and sometimes think we aren’t. It looks like we aren’t getting any new sisters anytime soon. That means that two cities will be closing for sisters. We already know where one is, but maybe Пенза will end up closing again. Who really knows? It’s also possible that an old city will close or the other city that was opened when I came to Пенза will be closed. That’s too bad. Right now we have 13 sisters and three are leaving the beginning of July. Then we will have only 10. If no one else comes, 3 months later 2 more leave, 3 months after that another 2, and it just gets worse. Hopefully we will get more sisters before I leave.
So, if Пенза closes, I don’t know where I’ll be headed. Maybe to Энгельс, maybe to Самара, but those are probably the only two options for me. If Пенза doesn’t close, I may still end up getting transferred because of how things will end up, maybe one of the sisters in the city that closes may come here. I can’t help hoping that that is the case. Even though I love Пенза and the people here, I am rather tired of the way things are going here, but I’m even more tired of having to do everything myself. What can you do, though? I guess just say, the Lord knows best, пусть His will be done.

09 июля 2006
Well, it has been a while since I wrote, but some big news has arrived. Of course, you will hear about this already before you get this letter, but I’ll just briefly mention it here. I got transferred. In less than a week I am going to Самара and from there I go to a little city near Саратов, just across the river Волга (Volga) called Энгельс (Engels). It will be interesting, but it is sad because Пенза is closing for sisters. The funny thing is that Тольятти also closes for sisters this transfer. That means every branch where I have served remains without sisters. The even weirder thing is that I will be serving with Sister Silva, my first American companion in 8 months. That means that all of my companions have served w/ Sister Гугельская (she is from Ukraine). Weird, huh?
My companion has a similar situation. She is going to Самара to serve with Sister Kuligowski and then every companion that she has had has served with Сестра Вернон, my first companion. Then again, there are few sisters and that makes a big difference.
Well, that’s pretty much all I have to say for now. I am passing along a letter for Christ Dennison. I hope it helps him. You can either give it to him yourself or give it to mom or dad and pass it along through them.

С любовью,
Сестра Атвуд