CROSSROADS

March 21, 2009 crossroads

Heaven blessed us with crossroads. Meeting places; where strangers become friends, where future meets past, where fortunes come and depart. The thing about it, though, is that in order for one to reach a crossroad she must be moving. Motion. You think a crossroad is a place, but really it is a communion.
Yesterday we walked from this lovely house on the corner of Mulholland and Wells in Nauvoo IL, across the street and past the glistening temple, down the hill to old Nauvoo where we visited the blacksmith shop and the wheelwright; the printer and the post office and the general mercantile shops. For a couple hours we pretended we lived here, over 150 years ago. I was lean and able and devoted, sweating and smiling as I went about my chores, singing the hymns of the saints as I punched down the dough in the dough box and beat the rugs on the back porch. I knew the postmaster, I knew the newspaper editor, I knew each neighbor and they knew me. And we all knew our prophet. So in my mind, when that fateful day came that found him lifeless and twisted under the broken window at the jail in Carthage, I sensed the crossing of the road we were on. We shifted our weight on our unsteady legs, then made ourselves move. Tables were slid against the wall and we began shaving wood in the dining room, doing our part toward the building of 3000 wagons. Heads bowed in the labor, we prepared to leave this heaven of a place we had finally established after years of wandering.
I have no problem pretending. In this regard I suppose I never grew up. So it was natural that we pretended as we walked, arm in arm, down Parleys Street toward the Mississippi and beyond. Pretended we had left our cherished earth-things. Our tokens of memory and tenderness. Our dolls and our china and our instruments and books. We met where the road crossed the river and wept together for a moment. Then someone started up a song and soon we were all singing, united in our suffering and comforted in our sorrow.
Crossroads. Where one path, one road, one vein meets another. I am reminded of another crossing, the place where horizontal arms met vertical body. Where lungs were pressed flat from the weight of hanging. Where blood spilt and agony was laid finally to rest with these words..."It is finished." The crossroads for all mankind, there where His heart was stilled.

IDENTITY

We all of us wear words upon our sleeves. Like editors in the printer's shop down the road here in Old Nauvoo, we set the the type according to importance. Headlines in bold uppercase, shouting our identity to be seen at a distance. Captions under pictures in tiny fonts almost indecipherable without a looking glass, little phrases used in passing that describe moments in time. Dingbats filling the spaces where nothing, really, is happening. Even if the words do not come easily, the spaces say enough. They all add up to our stories.
Identity.
I have felt my hand lift the letters to a word I would rather avoid, and others I thought I might try to get away with. But truth ekes out there on the heart sleeve and whatever we are reveals itself sooner or later. Once I chose to make the headline say BEAUTIFUL and the letters jammed the press. We had to change it to NICE. That's OK I suppose, though I had to fill the room left over with empty spacers and it threw off the design balance. Interestingly, however, there was much more to write about NICE than BEAUTIFUL. I have edited this paper for so long now it is getting a bit stale. I think I'll bring back the comic section. And though it breaks my heart to increase the columns for obituaries, I am finding I have to cut some of the neighborhood happenings to accommodate the increasing death notices. Nonetheless, I believe these are the most meaningful words of the issue. I enjoy the travel section, and the news from the field; the almanac and personal interest stories. There is also a small sports section, used for little league or high school ball games and occasional Superbowl Sundays, but it is relatively small and would disappoint my husband. I would apologize maybe, except that this is my paper, my identity, and if I only have one anecdotal article covering Sophie's Blue Unicorns soccer game and nothing about the NCAA tournament he will just have to forgive me. He probably will, because in general I am....extra -extra-read-all-about-it... NICE. (usually)

In response to Ashley and Charmaine's questions in yesterdays post:

Yup, a promise is a promise. I am writing on vacation with a crowd of people and little kid noises and temptations like ice cream in the freezer instead of focusing on writing. I am so sorry for the disjointedness and the incomplete thought processes. To answer Charmaine and Ash, I allow myself to look at three words in the Random Word Generator and then I select one. As you can see I rarely remain focused on the word. Sometimes one would have to search needle-in-a-haystack style for the word to appear at all in what I write. As you can see, the word is mostly a jumping off spot. And Ash, this Blog is usually the place where I simply journalize, and it will return to that after my 40 days. For now the pattern is to write knowing I will publish (at least to my closest friends and family) SOMETHING based on that word. It applies a pressure to my writing that I think in the long run will have been a healthy exercise. As you can see in some pieces, however, what I do each day often creeps into that random word space.

FLOUR

March 14, 2009 flour
On good, good days there is flour on my counter top. Flour and some sprinkles of sugar and the aroma of gingerbread. Flour with little hand prints angled like angel wings, the swirl of deep green granite underneath: Joy taking flight. There will be one big apron and two…or if I am REALLY lucky: four… little aprons hanging from the hook on the back of the pantry door when we are done. The little dancing ginger fellows we frost and anoint with raisins taste so yummy, but the most delicious of all life’s delicacies is the moment with my little ones. One generation down from the last batch I made.
My great- grandmother, a number of greats ago, was named Rebecca Rhodes. “Sister Rhodes” to the Brethren who had come to visit that night in their home near the water of the Mississippi. A hard, cold Nauvoo winter had left her cupboards nearly bare. No more bare than her neighbors, though. So when she heard that the children down the road were crying with hunger she threw her cloak around her shoulders and excused herself while the Priesthood huddled with her husband, discussing matters of survival in a hostile environment. She lowered her head as she approached the door, preparing for the wind that hurled itself against the house. Joseph stood and walked to her, leaving his conversation mid sentence. “Sister Rebecca, what do you carry under your coat tonight?” She kept her eyes fixed on the floor, her hands crossed around her belly, and paused just a moment. He had asked her a simple question, but the suddenness of it and the secrecy of her act caused the emotions in her to bump against each other and she needed a moment to think.
“Just a bit of flour, Brother Joseph.”
She unfolded her woolen wrap to reveal the last of their measure of grain. Her eyes scanned the floor, rose to the cluster of men gathered near the fire, then met straight-on the eyes of her prophet. He smiled when he saw it, and her cheeks flushed with heat. He opened the door for her and watched her push her way through the deep winter to the neighbor’s place. When she returned, Joseph Smith asked if he might pronounce a blessing on Sister Rhodes. Family records give the gist of that blessing as this; that the Lord was aware of the goodness and selflessness of Sister Rebecca Rhodes, and He cherished her as His daughter. It was promised that as long as Rebecca, and her posterity, remained faithful to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, they would not want for the necessities of the earth.
That same blessing was pronounced again to my mother’s generation when Uncle Fred was called on his mission to the Eastern United States in the first half of the last century. From what I can tell this is truth. I feel it in my own life. Not that the Lord thinks any more of me or my family than he does any other of His children. It’s just this little promise helps my faith reign over fear. I feel the goodness of Rebecca Rhodes coursing through my veins, like I feel similar traits of other ancestors alive in me and my family: the dedication of Henry Strong Parrish; the poetry of Elizabeth Mae Wood; the entrepreneurial spirit of George Parrish.
I lay the side of my hand in a scoop shape against the cold granite of my counter top. I sweep it across the layer of flour left over from our cookie making afternoon. I lift a paper bag to the edge and drop the dry dregs of our festivities into the garbage and realize I am tossing away more than she gave; a handful of flour on a winter night, so small, yet large enough to fill the bellies of her children, and her grandchildren and grandchildren’s grandchildren. I am the product of many good decisions made through the years by people whose names I share. I embrace the gospel, as they did, not because I want the prizes some people attribute to “being good”, but because it feels right to me; it makes me feel like I am being true to the me of many eons ago. I am the grand daughter of Rebecca Rhodes. How could I live otherwise?