Fear

One of the biggest things I fear is death.  I know that it is something I shouldn’t fear; I should be able to stare at the Grim Reaper straight in his cold, soulless eyes and say, “Bring it on!  I’m going straight to the top, and there isn’t anything you can do to stop me!”  But sometimes my “unshakable faith” can get pretty shakable.  So many “what ifs” start to pop up, like those weeds in your flower garden that never seem to go away, no matter how many times you try to kill them.  They can choke you, squeezing and squeezing, wrapping tighter and tighter around you...until there’s no air to breath, and hope seems lost.  “What if I go blind, deaf, or lose a limb?” “I could lose my hair, my mind, or my life.” “What if I get in a car accident, get mugged, raped, shot?”  Sometimes my brain feels like it will explode under the pressure of these bottled up fears that are swirling around faster and faster, and growing in size and force.
            I fear the uncertainty and defenselessness that comes from not knowing what could happen with my life.  I’m not ready to die.  I’m not ready to tell my family, bald from the chemotherapy, weak from the drugs in my last moments of life, that I love them, and to never give up; never lose hope or faith.  Will I be able to laugh when I lose a husband, child, parent or friend?  Am I ready for that despair, that empty black nothingness that threatens to swallow me and never release?  I don’t know.  Every day, change happens, both good and bad.  And while some people just live life with a “come what may” attitude, I live by creating scenarios.
             Scenario #1: A baby enters the world; it’s a girl!  The parents are overjoyed, so in love with this bundle of life that has been given to them.  Already the mother can see her taking her first steps across the living room, up the stairs, into school, across the stage and down the aisle.  For a moment, the future flashes before her eyes; a short film recap of the wonderful events to come in this family and infant’s life.
            Scenario #2: Across the hall, a couple waits for someone to come with news, something, anything but this overwhelming silence and the ticking of the clock on the opposite wall.  Tick Tick Tick.  The clock itself seems to represent a time bomb that is bound to go off any minute, and the contents of it will explode, each piece of shrapnel flying off in every which way to plant its destructive contents deep into the lives of the unsuspecting.  The husband’s eyes are sunken, and one look into his face will tell a story of many sleepless nights, and numerous trips to the hospital in the back of an ambulance with his wife sobbing at his side.  And now here he is, in this waiting room that feels more like a holding cell, a prison for all his fear and doubts, waiting with his wife to hear the news of their premature baby girl, born with heart, lung and brain complications.  Doctors don’t know if she’ll make it through the next night, the next surgery, or even the next hour.  And as their daughter fights for a life she may not keep, the father calculates the figures: Three jobs should keep them above ground, and will pay for the diapers, bottles, formula, clothes, and surgeries.  More and more surgeries.  But all he can do is sit waiting in that room with the nurse and her sad smile, his wife, and watch the clock on the opposite wall, living every second in fear that that knob will turn, praying it does yet hoping it doesn’t.
            I fear having the inability to move on, to pick myself up off the floor, dust my hands and keep on walking, moving forward and further down the path that I have chosen for myself.  Sometimes life feels like a moonlit drive, cruising down a back road with the scent of honeysuckle in your nose.  Everything is as it should be.  The stars are out, and the night air caresses your skin, when suddenly you hit a roadblock, a deer perhaps, throwing a wrench in your plans, the perfect blueprints that you spent so much time and effort creating.  As you stare down at the wreckage that you call your life, sometimes it feels impossible to keep going onward, to not retreat and back up into a hole and stay there forever in a hibernation that will last through this never ending winter.  And you get so sleepy, so tired of all this noise and hurt and anger.  Why wake up?  Just sleep, sleep and forget all these problems, all these roadblocks with their bright signs, urging you to pick up your shattered self and move along down some road, some path that’s anywhere but here.
            Everywhere, everyday, all the time, change is happening.  And that frightens me.  And sometimes it’s hard to take that gamble, to trust in someone that you cannot see.  Because this time you’re going to have to put your heart on the line, lead with your faith and leap.  Leap into the vast unknown, a place where many voyagers seem to never return from.  Some people shipwreck, you see, and start to drown in the turmoil of their sorrows that is brought from this change.  They sink deeper and deeper, not having the faith, the courage, or the guts to reach out and take His hand.
            But just when it seems that nothing can change, that you can never reassemble the shards of yourself scattered in every direction, that is when you get down on your knees.  You pray to God, to Allah, to the creator of the universe for the strength needed to go on, and change that fear to faith.  And slowly, so slowly, that faith will move the mountains of fear looming over you from all sides, stone after stone, pebble after pebble, until you will again see that path, straight and narrow, leading you back to the one place you long to be: home.

Oh those days when we were young

It's nice days like these that have me reminiscing on my childhood years.  I lived outside when I was a kid.  I drank out of the hose, climbed the one tree that the mean old neighbors didn't want us to, and even got dragged around by my Lab/Shephard mix of a dog as he pursued a squirrel. Like I said, I lived.  And I even have a scar on my forehead to prove it.  Turns out climbing and falling off a cinder block wall the day before the family move isn't the best thing to do.  But I was a little adventurer. 

When we moved, I think my mother breathed a sigh of relief when we ended up having kids next door that were our same ages. And their mom and mine had the same philophosy: Shove 'em outside and don't let them in till dinnertime.  Don't worry, we didn't have to go pee in the bushes, she would let us in, but we rarely watched that much T.V. growing up.  Instead we would play baseball, kickball, freeze tag, cereal tag, toilet tag, tunnel tag, seriously any form of tag known to man, in the field behind our houses.  We packed little picnic lunches and would ride our bikes down to the park and climb on top of the playground equipment, because we were legit like that. We had lemonade stands that would go toward funding our club, The Boys and Girls Club.  Such an original title, I know. And we would call each others houses pretending to order pizza.  And we would make hopscotches that would stretch all the way around the block.  We would have epic water fights that included 4 different houses.  We would go "snorkeling" in our plastic kiddy pool on the driveway.  We would wash the cars.  We made squirrel traps. We found a sparkely rock and made it our club mascot.  We would have the most epic Easter Egg hunts months after Easter was gone.  To this day I'm sure there are some in my backyard. We played in the rainstorms till we were soaked, and we did cool tricks with our bikes.  Don't tell the parents, but we would ditch our helmets once we were out of view because we were "cool", with our shirts tucked into our waist high shorts, our bangs and bowlcuts. And we would have contests of all kinds; Skip-It, Bop-It, Jump roping, Bike tricks, who could find the coolest rock....we played.  We had fun.  We used our imagination.  We were kids.

And it was great, those springs and summers when we didn't have a care in the world except for the adventures we were going to go on that day.  We did stupid things.  But they were awesome.  Sometimes I think that we underestimate how much just being a kid is important.  As we grow up into adulthood, we can forget about the things in our lives that really matter and the joys that come from it.  We forget how to live and to find that joy.  How do we view the world?  How easily we forget the tender mercies in our lives.  President Gordon B. Hinckley said, "Life is to be enjoyed, not endured". Now I'm not saying that we all need to start looking for the sparkley rocks in the flower bed or play a mean game of "Find the Easter Eggs", but we do need to find things that bring us that simple joy.  As we do, we may find ourselves a little bit more heading in the right direction.

Miracles

Mighty miracles were wrought  by God in the times of the scriptures.  Where are these miracles today?

Miracles today come in the form of other people, through service, mighty changes of heart, the birth of a child, the eternal union of husband and wife...The miracles have always come, but the real miracle is when we see them as such.

So find joy in the journey, and always remember the blessings that Heavenly Father has blessed you with in your life.  Let the laughter of a child, the brilliance of a sunrise, a smile from a stranger become a blessed and joyous part of your day.  Find those little pieces of light, and you will find your miracles.

Moments That Matter Most

Happy Birfday to my Mama!

Only like three days in and I've already missed a day.  Oh well.  This post is dedicated to my one and only mother, who not only bore me, but has also put up with me for 21 years.

So here's to my mommy:

She really has done so much for me.  I remember her making every Halloween costume I wore (she even made one for Lorin, my brother, who's 22 this last Halloween), and taking us on field trips to the zoo and other fun places.  We ate out on rare occasion, and she would always have something on the table for dinner.  We always ate as a family, and the reason I stuck with piano all these years is because of her gentle reminders (force).  But I'm grateful.  Because she loved to read so did I, although I think she started regretting it when she had to start taking my books away so I would do my chores. And ohhh the times I was weird and looked hideously awkward.....observe:

 

And she still loved me.  Bless her. :)  Because she's the bestest!

Playing UNO the five year old way.

So, I suppose I should give a little background before I get into this story. I am home from BYU-Idaho on my off semester working at a daycare close to my house.  Towards the end of the day we start to combine classes and just play games for the last hour.  And management has encouraged us to be more interactive with the kids.  Well, some of the Pre-K kids wanted to play UNO, so we did.  They picked up on the rules real quick and understood that.  What really got me was how they played the game.  The following conversation ensued:

(By this point, their hands had grown to like 15 cards in each of their hands)

Me: "Okay, do you have a yellow card?"

Lilly: (Name has been changed): "I dunno.  Let me look".  (Proceeds to spread out cards on table like so)

"Nope"

Me: "Well what about a 6?  Do you have that?"

Lilly: "Just a second. (Proceeds to re-spread out cards) Yes!"

Me: "Okay. (Turning to Alex) Now you can play any blue card or with another 6."

Alex (Name has been changed): "Well it's hard for me to look through with all my cards"

....Lightbulb

Lilly: "Here Alex.  Just do this."  She proceeds to assist him in spreading his cards out all across the table until they do indeed find a blue card.

And that's how the game proceeded. And I didn't cheat. But I had to suppress a laugh once or twice.

They would be so good at poker.

This is Me

I am short.
I have curly brown hair.
I sing.
I have never broken a bone.

This is me.

I can change a kid's diaper with them standing up.
I scrapbook.
I have blue eyes.
I am the oldest girl.


I am the fourth child.
I don't have a favorite color.
I hated dresses from elementary-middle school.
I am loud.

I have a good cry every now and again.
I love children.
I want to go skydiving.
I love fourwheeling (and I didn't almost kill my roommate).

I didn't get my driver's license until I was 17.
I play the saxophone.
I never practiced.
I love jazz.

I think Neville Longbottom is attractive.
I have never held hands.
I am the shortest person in my family.
I love the spring.

I play the piano.
I was born in Utah.
I fell off a brick wall and got stitches on my forehead the day before we moved.
I cried when my first dog died.

I am a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
I love playing board games.
I like making up songs on the piano.
I can sing like a black woman.

I had braces.
I donated my hair to Locks of Love.
I am legally blind.
I have never had a boyfriend.

I read books for fun.
I like finding a good deal.
I love my family.
I do not enjoy exercise.

I love the outdoors.
I prefer tents to cabins.
I can leave the house without makeup and be okay.
I love the temple.

I write stories.
I climb trees.
I am semi-good at volleyball.
I went to State with a speech about yawning.

I have no living grandparents.
I stink at keeping a journal.
I am a spaz.
I like to chill sometimes.

I am not good at homemaking.
I want to have six children.
I want to be a wife.
I want to be a mother.

I am a daughter.
I am a sister.
I am an aunt.
I am a friend.
I am a niece.
I am a teacher.
I am a roommate.
I am a co-worker.
I am a child of God.


This is me.