36. DANCING ON BLOSSOMS - THE VALUE OF ART

Beth & Tess dancing on cherry blossoms.

Tonight we hopped in the car and headed to Salt Lake City on a whim. I'd read about an art installation at Memory Grove that is only here for a week. I looked intriguing. An Icelandic-Danish artist named Olafur Eliasson has created a visual and auditory experience that uses disappearing sounds from the Great Salt Lake. Our tired old salty lake is on hospice, caught in a drought for years. She is losing her lifeblood that flows from the mountains every spring. Our winter decided to head east this year and leave us here in the west high and dry. Literally.

Our daughter Annie and her two girls Beth and Tess joined us. We unfolded our camp chairs under a fully blossomed cherry tree; her fallen petals formed a white blanket under our feet. The snow-white branches above us sheltered us from most of the rain that fell.

The exhibit was a massive sphere in the middle of the park, surrounded by large speakers. We humans clustered ourselves around it. The artist had created a visual that projects inside the globe while a symphony of disappearing sounds from the Great Salt Lake pulsed through the speakers. The piece lasts a half hour. By 10 pm we were on our way home. The objective of the exhibit, sponsored by the Salt Lake Arts Council, is to give folks a visual and auditory experience to connect them to the vanishing lake to the west of us. Perhaps the symphony is a lament. I found it symbolic that waves were the vehicle for expression: Sound waves and light waves testifying for their sister water , whose waves are wilting.

My tiny phone camera couldn't capture the magic

Because it was a rainy night I anticipated a sparse gathering for this outdoor show. I was wrong. I love being wrong sometimes. A large crowd had gathered, sitting on blankets under umbrellas. It thrilled my frumpy spirit to see unknown neighbors in our community flocking to experience art.

I am reminded tonight of the power of artistic expression to feed my soul. I've been residing in my left brain, trying to figure out how to deal with the rapidly falling state of affairs in our country and in our world. It feels like we are spiraling fast. Art gently lifted me from my panic. It was refreshing and heart warming for me to join a crowd of people to engage in artistic expression, not as a political statement or intellectual exchange, but simply to inhale and exhale without having to justify ourselves... to be connected by our mere presence, regardless of race, color, religion or political alignment. Art, like nature, is the great unifier. Art about nature doubles that.

Stripping art from our culture is going to do us in! We must not let that happen. Partaking of art opens capillaries in our spirits, enriching our energies and nourishing our overtaxed souls. I realized  tonight that I often don't realize  how much I need to immerse myself in art until I experience it and feel new life flowing rapidly into me. I hadn't realized how thirsty I was.

So here's your reminder: Go swim in art for a good solid hour or so. It's good to create it, of course, but partaking without creating has its own merits. Then pause for a moment and see how you feel.

I'd usually rather look like art than look pretty.

Art is an expression of presence.

Art keeps science afloat in the ocean of life.

Be purposeful as you walk off the beaten path.

 

35. NO MERE MORTALS - MEASURING LOVE

Today, Holy Monday, also happens to he the birthday of the finest human I know. I remain stunned and humbled that he has aligned his heart with mine. Because his heart is also so firmly stitched to his Lord's, I am gratefully connected to my Lord with him and through him.

David is an early riser. I am not. We still get along.

Most nights, when I come to bed, I find him sleeping peacefully. I tiptoe to my side of the bed and every single time thank the Lord for this man in my life. I literally whisper, "I love him so deeply." The utterance of those words is part of my nightly prayer.

I used to say "I love him so much," but I've changed. In a personal attempt to understand the concept of love, I'm at a point where I don't see it as measurable. Love itself might be a force whole unto itself, unaffected my our influence or desires. I take what it is and place it in myself, using it as guided. It neither increases nor decreases, it just... is.

What is measurable is its placement in me.  I can adjust the vessel of love, but not love itself. When I invite the energy of love to participate in a relationship, it is me who might restrict the portion I use. I become my own limitation. I can love deeply, or shallowly, but I cannot alter the love itself. Like a recipe, I can change how much I use, but the ingredient is constant.

So I love deeply, as deeply as I know how in this mortal state, the man I married. I recognize how rare this is.  I'm grateful to like the person I am married to, and to know he likes me. How hard it would to be married to someone you don't particularly like. I like him, and I love him.

I encourage all of us to move in directions of love and respect for self and others in our relationships. There are many ways to use the energy of love: to build, maintain, or let go. All of these can be manifestations of love.

Respect for fellow beings is probably one of my most deeply held longings, for myself and mankind. This is what troubles me most about our current national leadership.The level of disrespect for the divinity of fellow human beings is shocking to me. I have to catch myself from lowering my standards to meet theirs. When anger bubbles up I remind myself of this quote from CS Lewis. Here's a portion of it. You can read his deeper thoughts on it in his book, The Weight of Glory:

It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship….

There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal.… Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses.

 I remind myself that I am not dealing with mere mortals. I'm interfacing with souls who are ancient, to whom bodies are relatively new, and to whom I have a divine stewardship to aid in our journeys. I get tired, and emotional, and overwhelmed with frustration. But when I step back and remember we are all just down here trying, I'm able to calm my nerves a bit. I'm not good at always showing respect, like David usually is. I get a little too emotional. But knowing I get emotional, I am trying to train myself to pause, take inventory and let the Lord of Lords be the judge. I can speak up against abuse and injustice, and reason with those who would be willing to reason. I am trying to understand why things are happening as they are in many areas of civilization. But even if I don't understand, I am obligated by my own integrity to open myself up to allowing love for those who would present as enemies as well as those who are easy to love. Its a big learning curve for me.

Look at the people you encounter today. Try to see them with the eyes of Jesus. That's a good way to start this holy week, and its how I will the celebrate the existence on this earth of the person I trust just as much as I trust Jesus. They both remain holy to me.

at the cottage in Michigan

with his only son, John

as a Federal Appellate Court law clerk
with Jay Powell, now Chair of the Federal Reserve for the US,
and Judge Van Graafieland, Second Circuit Court of Appeals

our posterity

willing to speak up,
(now that he's retired from the bench)

in his Judicial chambers, before retirement

when his robes were new

preparing to fight poison ivy at the cottage

the Joesph to my Mary

his shoulders support so many

catching dinner

Beloved friends from his days at Yale:
Katrina Lantos-Swett, Jeffrey R Holland, Dr. Bob Christensen

Grow old along with me.

I love him.

34. SERENITY

When the wound of co-dependency was deep enough that Mom figured out she needed help, she took us all to the Methodist Church near South Hills Village where folks learned how to rise from the dregs of alcoholism. 

I'd heard of AA - Alcoholics Anonymous. But as an eleven or twelve-year-old I had not heard about Ala-Teen, a place of healing for the children of alcoholics.

We pulled up to that unfamiliar church, nervous and hesitant. Mom took us to the room where other kids had gathered, then took herself to the space where the spouses of alcoholics met.

Thinking back on it, it must have taken a big old wad of courage for her to walk into that room alone. First of all, to admit that she should even be there, and that we needed to be there as well. Frankly, I don't know if there was someone Mom knew who took her to that first meeting. I hope there was. Knowing the nature of that group of people, I suspect there was someone walking her through this foggy space, I just don't remember.

There is so much I can say, too much for now, about the power of that sacred space. What bubbles up right now is the memory of sitting on folding chairs in a circle with other kids, none of whom we knew. There was an adult leading us, a gentle natured person. I can't remember anything about them, even if it was a man or a woman, old or relatively young. I just remember they made me feel safe. I also remember listening to the stories of the other kids sitting in the circle.

"Hi, my name is so-and-so, and I am the child of an alcoholic."

Everyone responded instantly with a "hello so-and-so." 

Around the circle we went, each kid telling their story. There is something kind of mind-blowing when you hear your own story, with different names and places, repeated over and over again. For a cluster of Mormon girls who thought their little world was wholly unique, shameful, and heavy on the secret vibes, this was new and refreshing.  

In each meeting, during the following weeks and months of Thursday nights, we stood together and recited the Serenity Prayer:

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I 

cannot change,

The courage to change the things I can,

And the wisdom to know the difference.

Serenity. Courage. Wisdom.

These words became as holy as the ten commandments to me. They remain so.

The part that's the hardest, for me at least, is the wisdom to know the difference. This is why I am such a fan of the Holy Spirit.

Ala-Teen gave ma a powerful set of tools. The most life changing were these:

I did not, and do not, get to own my father's addictions.

Nor do I get to hold the burden for the others affected by those addictions.

When you are, by nature, a fixer, the next mantra we recited became a commandment as well:

Let go, and let God.

Let God hold it. Let Jesus take the figurative wheel.

Let him figure out what part is mine, and what is not. I do not need to fix everything. 

'Thank you Bill W, the 12 step programs that still save souls from internal combustion, and the King of Kings, who said He would untangle the mess of humanness when we've grown enough to go Home.

He remains my one and only King, and I stumble at His holy feet.

This afternoon we marched in protest to 
a leader who takes his position as if he were king.
This is one of the signs we carried.

My people.

33. EVEN IF YOUR VOICE SHAKES

Years ago, before a worldwide pandemic shook civilization to a state of vulnerability, our daughter Kate was home for a bit. She had completed half a dozen years of teaching adolescents at inner city schools in Texas. Altered from the awareness earned in that perpetual state of crisis, inequality, and hopelessness that comes from certain demographics being repeatedly beat down, she was creating curriculum here in Utah while she applied for Doctoral programs. It was 2016.

One evening I came out of my room to find Kate lying on the couch crying. This is not at all typical of Kate. Shocked and concerned I asked her what was wrong.

"I'm worried DT might win the upcoming election."

I shook my head and reassured her that our country was not going to let a reality show bully who liked to purse his lips as he announced "You're fired!" become the President of the United States. 

Kate lamented: "I don't think people see him clearly. They just want change. Any change. They'll dive headfirst into shark infested water just to get out of the boat."

"I have more confidence in the American people, Kate. The basic morals of our people value character more than worldly success. This can't possibly be the change we want. I don't think you need to worry."

I was wrong.

Twice.

And so when the sun rises on tomorrow, Saturday March 28, 2026 I will march, for the America I loved...

the country my grandchildren will inherit...

for the America that supports my Constitutional right to protest.

My poor grandkids, when their mom asked them if they wanted to join the protest, answered:

"We do, but we don't want to get shot."

What child should have to consider these things? 

Our family, two months ago.
We are refusing to become complacent or complicit.

So their mom, their aunties and uncles, their grandpa and great Aunties will all go speak for them with our signs and our presence. Many hands make light work. 

I have one King.

Only one.

And He is filled with compassion, mercy, intelligence and love.

Here's the thing though: While I am willing to stand up and declare my distrust and even disdain for the character, actions, and philosophies of our current president and his administration, I have to keep reminding myself that the one true King has commanded me to love them. That turns the heat down in my brain, and softens my heart. I hear my Savior whisper from the cross:

"Forgive them, for they know not what they do."

I make my heart go there. I can keep myself from lowering my standards to the level of wishing someone dead. And, equally important, it is not my right to make them feel the same.

But it is my right to protest their leadership, their policies, their overreach and lack of compassion and human decency. I can do this even if my voice shakes.

Tonight I literally ask my Lord to bless DT, right after I ask Him to bless my family. We all need forgiveness, because truth be known, all of us truly know not what we do.  

32. ANGRIEF

Thursday afternoons I drive down to Farmington Elementary School and pick up my grand daughters, Beth and Tess, after school. I cherish the chance to be with them. I pull up next to Forbush Rock between the school, the pool and the Arts Center. Today they sat with their friend Junie flipping trading cards on the sidewalk as I pulled up. Usually Beth is sitting on the bench reading while Tess is climbing or pretending with whichever stuffy she carried to school that day.

All three girls hopped in the car. I dropped Junie off at her house near the school, then rounded the corner to Main Street.

"I'm a grump today," I said, for no reason at all. My girls make me feel safe talking.

"I'm sorry," Tess said.

"I hate feeling grumpy." Beth lamented. "Do you know what's causing the grumps?"

I thought a second, then replied "Nah, not really. Just... you know..."

They both said "Yeah."

I love that neither of them felt like they had to fix me. 

When I dropped them off they flung their backpacks over their shoulders and thrust their little hands toward me, their fingers forming the ASL symbol for I love you.

My old lady fingers lifted from the steering wheel before I backed up..."Back atcha!"

On the way home, stuck in the traffic of construction on Main Street, I found my eyes watering. The angels that hang out on my right and left shoulders had a conversation, trying to figure out what to do with me. I listened, caught between the two of them.

"Wow, she's really a mess lately!"

"I know. Poor girl. "

"Wadda you mean, poor girl? She has absolutely nothing to worry about! I could show her what real trouble is!"

"How can you say that? You know her. She's trying. It just feels overwhelming to her."

I listened to the two sides of my conscience arguing. It made my head hurt, and the tears multiply.

At some point one of them suggested we turn off the news on the radio. I reached my hand forward and hit the button. Silence was instant. In the relative quiet I heard the voices whispering shoulder to shoulder. One of them commented on what a rough week it's been. She recounted little brain bubbles that constantly fizz in my imagination. Personal stuff, hurtful stuff, on top of the chaos that has become our nation. The frightening weather patterns everywhere, a war that feels like it popped up out of nowhere, leadership that misrepresents so much that I hold dear, death in the family, illnesses, job losses, shaken faith and trust... heartaches everywhere. Heavy-heart overwhelm. 

A few nights ago I laid in my bed, tears wetting my pillow. I couldn't sleep, feeling the weight of personal and societal injustices recently presenting themselves. Heeding my mother's old advice to write things down that worry or distress me, I jotted a rather lengthy list.  People who I have historically felt a kinship with are falling from their pedestals. And I feel myself falling from theirs. I am confused and baffled by how good people can take such unkind stances. My nature is not to think ill of people. It breaks my heart to feel a loss of respect. Reading and re-reading that list of frustrations, I could hear the peculiar voice of Mr. Rogers in my head... "What do you do with the mad that you feel... when you're mad, mad, mad, mad, mad?"

Mad, in a person uncomfortable with mad, turns into sad.

I asked the Lord to hold the mad for me so I could sleep. Sleep restores strength. 

"Let me wake with strength and guide me to know how to handle all the mounding feels," I prayed.

At some point blessed sleep tucked me in.

Angrief is that middle ground when anger doesn't yet realize her divine nature. I am reminded of the words or CS Lewis recorded in his his book, A Grief Observed. As background, Lewis had finally allowed himself to love and be loved, then, when his Joy died, he was angry with  God... mad at the world... mad at everything. Like I feel... sort of mad at everything. 

Lewis, exhausted by anger, gave us these words:

I sat with my anger long enough until she told me her real name was grief.

Grief feels like anger that's been humbled.

Grief, while maybe more piercing than anger,  carries innate cracks that let in light. Grief promises the presence of the Comforter, if we'll have her. And the Comforter is the source for true healing...scarless healing...the kind human bodies can't do by themselves.

Loss, the father of grief, puts us down in our crib and lets us cry because he cannot feed us. The Divine Comforter lifts us, wraps us warm and places us to her throbbing breast. Her tender care holds us confidently until we are able to feed ourselves.

It conjures the 26th chapter in "The Little Prince", when the dying prince tells his friend, the pilot:

"And when your sorrow if comforted (for time soothes all sorrows) 

you will be content to have known me."

Antoine de Saint-Exupery, The Little Prince

In that place between anger and grief,  make me quiet enough to let the Comforter come in. When her task is complete, if it ever is, I promise to stretch my arm toward her as she backs away, my human fingers forming the sign I Love You.

Beth and Tessa

 

31. SISTERS

Well written words were most happy rolling off my mother's tongue. I am comforted by the memory of her voice offering tasty words wrapped in the musicality of her voice. She was gentle with poetic words. Not compelled to rush through them, she let them pace themselves, rolling out as they were designed, or as she saw them. I savored well written poetry floating from her lips.

When I was quite young and started putting my own thoughts in the boiled-down structure of poetry, I would hand her what I had written as I crawled up on her bed. She would sit up and clear her throat, holding the paper respectfully in her lap. When she read my writing aloud I believed I was a true writer. She made it sound so beautiful, even if it wasn't. The auditory memory of her reading my words aloud compelled me to write more. Years later, when I was grown with kids of my own, I used the same method to assure them that they too, were writers. And truthfully, they are... every one of them. Beautiful, thoughtful writers, all.

Mom introduced the epic poem, The Goblin Market to us when we were teenagers. It was written in the mid 19th Century by Christina Rossetti. In my bookcase is an early edition, illustrated by Rossetti's brother, Dante Rossetti. It's a tale of humanness, of temptation and frailty, of a fall from grace and the redemptive love of a sister. The last stanza attests that sisters, Laura and Lizzie live to tell their children of the evils of the goblins' fruits, and the power of a bond between sisters.

“For there is no friend like a sister

In calm or stormy weather;

To cheer one on the tedious way,

To fetch one if one goes astray,

To lift one if one totters down,

To strengthen whilst one stands”

Lizzie & Laura
Illustration by Dante Rossetti

It took some maturity for me to fully understand the depth of love between the sisters Lizzie and Laura. It's the love I feel for my sisters. It's the love I feel from my sisters.

Tonight, in a church Relief Society gathering, our President Lisa asked us to turn to the person beside us and tell them a favorite birthday memory. I've had five dozen birthdays with lots of great memories, and some not so great. The person next to me was my sister Ann Marie.

Eighteen months older than me, Ann Marie has always been a nurturer. Libby is fifteen months younger than I am, and since we were prone to childish mischief, Ann Marie took it upon herself to help us make better decisions than our instincts may have led us to. Don't get me wrong, the three of us were mostly inseparable. Our three matching blue Schwinn bikes rode one behind the other up and down the sidewalks of Pleasant Hills, PA. But Ann Marie was such a peacemaker that she did whatever she could to keep the rest of us calm, especially when Dad drank too much and mom was on edge. Ann Marie was timid, quiet and studious. She wore round black rimmed glasses. She let her beautiful, thick dark hair fall to the sides of her bowed head as she walked the halls of school. She had the nature of Beth, from Little Women, perfectly content to be home with her family and not have to interact with the outside world.

Tonight I faced my grown sister and reminded her of my 12th birthday. 

"You pushed yourself into uncomfortable territory, just to make my birthday special." I reminded her.

"I did?" she responded.

"Remember? You saved your babysitting money... for...I don't know how long... to go down to Bob's Dist. and buy a full case of soda pop. You rode your bike to Foodland and bought chips, and some candy and some balloons and crepe paper streamers. Remember?"

"Oh yes!" she smiled. That was so fun for me!"

"You somehow contacted people in my grade, some of whom I didn't even know liked me. You gathered them quietly in the basement. I walked down to a stunning "SURPRISE!" It was the most unexpected gift, and even then, as a kid, I felt tears well up in my eyes because of the love that poured out of you when you did this for your little sister."

My old-lady-eyes grew misty as I recalled it there in the Relief Society Room at church. Ann Marie was only thirteen years old at the time. What thirteen year old do you know who would take it upon herself to go out of her comfort zone, use her hard earned money to fund a party, invite people she did not know, all for her little sister? A whole case of pop! We could not afford a single bottle unless we had gathered enough empty bottles on the side of the road to turn them in for the two cent refund. My sister purchased a full case... a full case... just for my birthday party guests.

"I remember how surprised I was, how sweet you were. That was the birthday when I got my very first vinyl record. It was a 45 rpm of "Build Me Up Buttercup" by the Archies. I can't remember which friend gave it to me, but it made me feel so...I don't know... normal? John let me play it on his hi-fi. Every time I hear that song I think of you, Ann Marie. Did I ever tell you how much your gracious gift meant to me?"

"It made me so happy, Cori! These things always make me so happy."

And it's true, Ann Marie finds her joy nurturing God's children. All of them, not just the ones in her bloodline. She is well loved because she loves well.

God blessed me with 4 sisters. We are comfortably devoted to each other. We love each other. And we like each other. Any one of us would go down into the hollow among the goblins, sacrificing our own comfort to rescue and revive... for there is no friend like a sister.

30. LIGHT WORK

 

Last night I spoke and sang for a group of Empty Nesters, folks whose kids have grown and flown, who gather together one Monday night a month. They had shared a meal and I was the after dinner guest. When I was done the host, my friend Wynn, thanked me, then invited anyone able to stay and help clean up. He used one of my mom's most common slogans in the invitation:

Many hands make light work.

Within 20 minutes the food was cleared off the tables, chairs and tables were stacked and put away, and the floor was vacuumed. People visited as they worked. These people are used to helping each other.

A few years back, during the Covid Pandemic, I served as Relief Society President in our church congregation. The RS President oversees the women's organization in our church, a beautiful and mighty collection of women devoted to Christ and his teachings. Its one of the oldest and largest women's organizations in the world, with over 7 million members. 

While I served as president  in our Ward unit we had 19 funerals from within our congregation. The RS works to provide assistance, comfort and a meal after each funeral for the family of the deceased. Some of those luncheons served well over 100 people. I saw firsthand these words evidenced by the members of our church group. They not only emotionally nurtured the family who had lost a loved one, they planned, arranged, created, cooked, served, cleaned, and delivered... each person pitching in so that no one person was overwhelmed with any task. It was a beautiful sight to see, and served as a repeated witness to the innate goodness of mankind.  its part of how we mourn with those who mourn.

I got thinking about the term light in this adage. It serves as a double entendre', working on multiple levels. Yes, many people pitching in make jobs that seem overwhelming doable. Like in the Bible, in the book of Nehemiah chapter 3 where the walls of Jerusalem are deteriorating. Nehemiah first motivates his people to recognize the need and visualize the possibility of repairing the many gates surrounding the city. Then he organizes the people, giving them responsibility for the gates nearest their own homes. Religious leaders work beside shop owners who work beside perfume makers. It's a lovely story, telling us that things that seem impossible at first are made possible when people work together. It also tells how every person, regardless of their place in society or notable skill set, has a place in the band.

We are also reminded in scripture that the task at hand, while the impetus for the organization, can become secondary in importance. Nehemiah achieved the repair of the gates, yes... but he also rebuilt the community that was central to the city as well. 

In the process of researching the origins of the phrase "Many hands make light work" I shifted my thoughts to wanting to know the nature of light. I understand the concept of many people helping make the burden lighter, but the concept of Light itself started buzzing in my thoughts and I began a deep dive into the study of light, how it's made. Then, diving even deeper, because my ADHD brain gets a thrill out of this kind of stuff, I started pondering the creation of the world as told in Holy Scripture. 

In the simplest of terms from my unscientific brain, I understand light as the residual outcome of an energy exchange. The word photons floats to the top of this analysis, and the works of Newton, Huygens, Maxwell and Einstein explain how it works. If you don't want to get anything else done in a day, give yourself to light.

Then, because we have the capacity these days to get information at the speed of light I began a little research on the Biblical text explaining God's creation of our earth. 

And God said, let there be light. 

And it was so.

There were two days in the symbolic week of creation when God focused on light. Day one, the first light. And Day 4, the bearers of light: the sun, moon and stars. What was that basic light of the first day of creation? If it was the establishment of 24 hour cycles creating a day, then perhaps the light of the first day was time itself. Light = time. 

Whenever I visit an airport and take the moving sidewalk I imagine I'm a spirit moving along with ease at an escalated pace. Then, BAM, the escalator stops and I'm on my own, needing to use my own willpower and personal energy to get myself moving. I whisper to myself as I take that first step off a moving sidewalk onto solid, heavy ground; "I am born." No wonder we're all tired. We aren't used to all this heavy humanness.

I've long thought that the concept of time is an earthly matter.  People near and dear to me, one of whom looks and sounds an awful lot like me, suffer from some measure of time blindness. (It's a thing... ask AI to give you a synopsis.) Our souls come into our bodies unfamiliar with the concept of time. We who have nursed and nurtured babies through the wee hours of the night are fully aware of this. Some people adapt to the concept of time more easily than others, and we sadly punish those who don't. We should do better at celebrating our diversity. Not long from now we will all die and time will lose its power anyway.

The idea of many hands making light work can not only be interpreted to mean that many people working together can make a hard job easier, it can also mean that our diversity, our uniqueness and personal perspective combines with that of others to create the power source that fuels our very existence. We will dim into nothingness if we allow isolation. It is apparent that the Opposer to all good things is trying to make that happen. Just watch a group of people who used to interface with each other in a room these days. See their heads bent over their devices, their thumbs tapping the glass on their tiny fake Urim and Thumims. I am guilty as well. But awareness is the first step toward change. We need each other.

So here I am now, a whole day of not much else done behind me, but a lot of new information swirling in my brain. It's ok. When I leave this realm, with its strange fixation on time, I will take this new knowledge with me, and a clean kitchen counter will be of no consequence at all.

29.CRITICISM

 

As a teenager I fancied myself a poet. As a winner in the LDS Church New Era Magazine Poetry Contest I received a talent & leadership award that paid for half my college tuition. Naturally, I enrolled in a poetry class my first year at BYU. As the semester evolved I found myself disheartened, right on the edge of broken-hearted actually, because much of my self-definition included the word "poet", and the class wasn't going well.

One Sunday, on the phone to my mom who lived 2,000 miles away, I told her I was no longer a writer.

"What makes you say that?" she responded.

"My professor just doesn't like my work," I said, my voice breaking.

Mom paused.

"Do you like his work?"she asked.

I paused.

"Not really," I answered. "I don't really care for his style."

"Then take what he has to offer, chew it up, swallow what you should and spit the rest out."

I can hear the echo of her words through the tiny speaker in the telephone headset. I recall the timbre of her voice, the familiar combination of conviction and tenderness. This was the same woman who regularly asked "Want me to hit 'em?" when anyone did anything that hurt her grandkids. She championed for the people she loved. 

This piece of advice was different. She needed to do more than cheer for me. She wanted me to trust the foundation of my sense of self, and that required solid truth, with all the scum of the world scrubbed away. Her advice carried additional wisdom, and I rehearse it regularly. Mom was telling me that while our feelings may be hurt by what someone says, there also may be legitimate growth opportunity in a good critique. 

Step 1: Consider the source. Do you respect the person giving the criticism? Do you admire their work? And do you think they see your work clearly?

Step 2: Lick your wounds until the pain subsides. Careful to not jump to final conclusions when a wound is raw. The pain interferes with the ability to think clearly.

Step 3: When the pain no longer blinds you, step back and look objectively at what has been said or done. This step is best achieved with the guidance of Holy Angels who are often beckoned through prayer.

Step 4: Mentally chew on what was offered. This is a tough one, because we don't always see clearly and our perspective is often skewed. You might want to ask the Holy Spirit to lead you to someone to talk to about it, carefully. And over chewing can lead to lockjaw, so be aware of that.

Step 5: Write it down if it gets jumbled in your head.

Step 6: Separate the gristle from the meat. Find what is valuable and helpful, swallow that, then spit out what is not helpful. Again, the Holy Spirit is a dandy separator. Use it. 

Step 7: Move on. One of the first and finest gifts given to all humans is the right to choose and change. If you want to make changes, usually subtle shifts that come from self awareness, do it. This is how we get beauty from ashes.

Mom's advice saved me from trying to be someone I'm not supposed to be. My poetry evolved into lyric writing. And while I can't tell you a single concrete concept I learned in that college poetry class, I can vividly recall, own and cherish the words my mother left me.

28. SCARS

 

Everything will be OK in the end. If it's not ok then it's not the end.

Before one can believe such a thing I suppose there has to be an underlying trust that there is something more to life than life as we know it. 

This comforts me. Because it comforts me I am confirmed that I do feel like my personal existence is greater than this moment on earth. So much feels uncertain. But I will be surprised if I die and find out I no longer exist at all. And if that's the case... that I no longer exist... then being disappointed in the fallacy of this belief is a moot point anyway.

Little things bubble up to the surface of my life journey, witnessing to the concept of eternal existence. Small, seemingly insignificant occurrences that testify. For instance, last Sunday for family dinner I was making two big pans of Chicken in a Pot, one of our favorite family recipes. One pot with onions and one without. Every other Sunday I cook for between 20 and 30 people, so I'm used to big pots. But at this moment there was too much going on at once. Bread dough was risen and ready to go in the oven at the same time as the chicken needed to be browned. One pot had already saute'd the onions. Both pots had hot butter ready to brown cleaned chicken pieces. The thing about cooking in hot butter is its less forgiving than oil. There are just a few degrees between hot enough and burnt. I noticed the back burner was too hot, so I hurried to add the cool chicken and SPLASH, the hot butter splattered up out of the pot and onto my hands, arms, neck and face. I knew immediately it was a bad one. I am very familiar with kitchen cuts and burns. I immediately turned down the burner, drenched a couple dish towels in cold water, applied them to my face and neck, filled a red solo cup with ice water and plunged my burnt fingers into it. I wrapped another cold dish towel around my wrists, held the solo cut between my uninjured thumb and forefinger while the rest of the hand dangled in the water, turned up the heat and kept cooking. In analyzing it from this end, it really isn't a sense of martyrdom that compels me to keep cooking when I'm singed or bleeding, it's just that things feel better to me to not have the attention on my tribulation. If it's so bad I think it will be permanent, I stop and get help. But I usually move forward, because my God is a miraculous God and he made my body capable of healing itself. Seriously, every single time I am injured I get an increased sense of confidence in my God, because so far he hasn't failed me. At least in the little scratches, scrapes and burns. I anticipate the following week He will manifest his power by showing me how he made me to heal. 

I am always... always... stunned by the way my wrinkled old skin still heals. How bruises morph like murky sunsets in slow motion, colors becoming deeper and richer, then fading into pastels and then disappearing altogether. 

Tomorrow is one week since the big burn. It was a pretty bad one this time. It hurt nearly all night. Every time I removed the cool cloths from the flesh the pain woke like a baby whose belly reminded him it was time for feeding. Libby brought down her electric icing machine at midnight. I thought, again, how blessed I am to have my sisters living steps away from me. By morning the singeing pain was mostly gone, and the blisters started rising. One large one on my neck had already burst. I treated them gently with oils and ointments that have proved themselves in the past. 

At the neighborhood caucus on Tuesday night my neighbors thought maybe I had shingles because the blisters were on one side of my face and neck. Now it's Saturday. Tonight, when we went to see Annie sing in her Utah Voices Broadway Bingo concert, I was even able to put some tinted moisturizer over the wounds and you could hardly tell I was anything other than an old lady who may still be dealing with hormonal acne.

As strange as it sounds, I thank the Lord for my small wounds. They remind me that I was made to heal. My flesh was made to be renewed, almost completely on its own. It is so miraculous to me! 

Even the scars are testaments. I have a scar on one of my breasts where a doctor removed a mole that may have been cancerous. I tell myself how amazing it is that I live in a place where I can see a doctor, and that I can afford one even, and that someone put themselves through so much schooling and training and 20 hour residency shifts to even know that the little brown mole could have turned into something devastating. So when I see that little scar that no one else sees, I am amazed by my God. A couple years ago I was washing the casement windows in our kitchen. In the process of trying to reach my hand out to clean the outside of the window pane I scraped my arm on the hinge. It was just a thin scrape, but because my skin is so thin it left a scab that surprisingly turned into a white scar. When the summer darkens my skin, the scar reappears, and I am reminded of that day when Dave was blowing the leaves off the back deck and the Spring air was fresh and new and I was able to wash the winter off our kitchen windows. That beautiful ordinary day is written on my forearm, a page in the story of my life. When I see this white scar above my wrist I am reminded of the beauty in ordinary. 

And in the morning, when my dreams sift into reality and I feel the electricity in my lower legs and feet, I realize I must still be alive because my neuropathy is still here. If it is gone, I must not be alive, and I'm not ready yet to be not-alive. Then I immediately remind myself how grateful I am that I am able to walk on feet that hurt. I repeat my daily mantra, started years ago when my paralysis sifted into plain old electric-worm-burning-cold neuropathy... that my friend Joan, who had lost her legs in an illness would be so grateful to be able to walk on feet that hurt.  I am truly grateful to be able to walk on feet that hurt.

I am grateful that, so far, my hurts have all been bearable. I have scars, and I have some measure of pain, but nothing so far has been unbearable long-term. I thank the God of Eternity for that. I trust that in the end... which, ironically, if you believe in eternity never will be the end... everything will be ok. That trust is based on my ability to believe there is a God.  I thank God that I am able to believe that there even is such a thing as God in the first place. And in the second place, that he has all of us in the palm of his mighty hand.

I am a believer, and my scars are witness.