"Today I Am Becoming" talk given in Church

Brent and I doing something that becomes part of who I am: a trip to Mayan Ruins in September 2010.

My most handsome boyfriend and I spend time at the beach together. Palm Beach Gardens 2010.

While growing up, I often my mother say:

Today I am becoming just who I want to be, at 6 or 16, 45 or even 83.

One of my favorite authors is Mary Ellen Edmunds. Trained as a nurse, she has served in the Church for many years. When I was in the MTC, 30 years ago, she had an office there. She has continued to serve and to write about her experiences. One of the things that I clearly remember is an essay in which she expressed the desire to be the kind of person that Heavenly Father could depend upon. She pictures the Lord and other important people meeting together in heaven when suddenly they become aware of someone who needs help. They don’t even stop. With confidence Heavenly Father reassures everyone: “We don’t have to worry. It’s OK. Everything’s taken care of. Mary Ellen is on the way and she will take care of it.”

Today I am becoming just who I want to be, at 6 or 16, 45 or even 83.

That is what I want to be—someone whom the Lord can depend upon. When I was a teenager, my mother once got upset. I was asked at the last minute to sing at a Fireside because the people assigned had failed to prepare anything. "Why don't they ask you to do it in the first place?" she asked indignantly out loud to no one in particular. It was a funny question coming from a woman who had taught her five children that we were given talents in order to be of use to others. As a teenager, she was asked to accompany someone singing at a Church meeting. Even though she practiced as much as possible, she couldn't "play all the notes" in the piano score. She got someone else to do it for her--and then her replacement didn't play all of the notes, either! Grandma Burton told her that she had been given an opportunity to develop her skills as a pianist so that she could help others--it didn't matter if it was note-perfect. The Lord wasn't listening to be sure that the music was performed perfectly--so Mom shouldn't be worried about it either--just to do the best that she could.

Today I am becoming just who I want to be, at 6 or 16, 45 or even 83.

One of my favorite Old Testament stories is found in 1^st Kings.

8 ¶ And the word of the Lord came unto [Elijah], saying,

9 Arise, get thee to Zarephath, which belongeth to Zidon, and dwell there: behold, I have commanded a ^widow woman there to sustain thee.

10 So he arose and went to Zarephath. And when he came to the gate of the city, behold, the widow woman was there gathering of sticks: and he called to her, and said, Fetch me, I pray thee, a little water in a vessel, that I may drink.

11 And as she was going to fetch it, he called to her, and said, Bring me, I pray thee, a morsel of ^abread in thine hand.

12 And she said, As the Lord thy God liveth, I have not a cake, but an handful of meal in a barrel, and a little oil in a cruse: and, behold, I am gathering two sticks, that I may go in and dress it for me and my son, that we may eat it, and die.

13 And Elijah said unto her, Fear not; go and do as thou hast said: but make me thereof a little cake first, and bring it unto me, and after make for thee and for thy son.

14 For thus saith the Lord God of Israel, The barrel of meal shall not waste, neither shall the cruse of oil fail, until the day that the Lord sendeth rain upon the earth.

15 And she ^awent and did according to the saying of Elijah: and she, and he, and her house, did eat many days.

In my minds eye I can see Heavenly Father in a meeting when, suddenly, the Savior tells him that they need someone to take care of his prophet Elijah. Heavenly Father immediately says,
“We don’t have to worry. It’s OK. Everything’s taken care of. The widow is there and we can depend upon her.”

Today I am becoming just who I want to be, at 6 or 16, 45 or even 83.

Over the past few years, you have had the opportunity to hear Brent talk quite a few times—and in those talks, he usually tells a story about me or one of our children. Tonight, I would like to tell you a story about Brent.

It happened several years ago while we were living in Texas. Our situation there was unusual. We belonged to a ward that covered a relatively small area—rare in Wards located out of Idaho and Utah. We were living in an unusually big house—about 4000 square feet—and because we lived very close to the chapel, we often hosted ward and missionary activities in our home. When we moved into our home, the previous owners had left their refrigerator behind—and we kept it in the garage, well stocked with food so that we could provide dinner or refreshments for a large group of people on short notice.

Now comes the part about Brent.

While sitting in Sacrament Meeting one Sunday morning, Brent was prompted to do something that made him feel very uncomfortable. As he looked around the chapel, he saw a man. Suddenly he felt that he needed to pack up a large amount of food and take it to the home of this member. This member was well-to-do and owned a large home in a very nice neighborhood. Why would this man need food? What if we arrived on his front door step that afternoon with arms full of frozen meat, vegetables, and other basic items like rice, flour, milk, and bread—and this man and his family didn’t need it? How embarrassing would that be? Brent wasn’t his Home Teacher—he didn’t even know this man all that well.

I lead the music during the meeting—so as soon as Sacrament Meeting was over, Brent found me and told me about this feeling he had experienced. It seemed like a simple thing to me—if that’s what he felt we needed to do, then we would do it.

When we got home from Church, we filled four or five paper shopping bags with basic foodstuffs and headed out to make our delivery. When we got the house, we walked up to the door and rang the doorbell. When the door was opened, it looked as if we were walking into a construction site. There were sheets of opaque white plastic stapled to the ceiling. In the living room, there were some pieces of 2 x 4 with the saw and sawhorses at the bottom of a ladder reaching into the ceiling.

We discovered that this gentleman had lost his job. Blessed with a rich and sufficient life up until then, he felt too embarrassed to ask for help. His two daughters and their families lived with him and both of his sons-in-law had lost their jobs. The house had plumbing problems and the roof had a leak in it. After a week of steady rain the ceiling of their living room had collapsed. The grandchildren living with him were eating the cheapest of MacDonald’s foods—purchased one item at a time. No one else was eating much at all. This member was about to lose his house to the bank and he had no money to repair it so that he could sell it and avoid bankruptcy.

This was a family in desperate need of just what we had brought with us—the most basic of foods. I went into the kitchen to help is daughters put away the food—each item was welcomed with the utmost joy and excitement. While I was in the kitchen, Brent went to find out what was needed so that he could call the Bishop and give him an accurate accounting of the situation. Before we left, Brent emptied his wallet and quietly gave what he had to the man—so that he would have money to get some of the materials he needed to repair his home.

The story has a happy ending—both for them and for us.

Another meeting in Heaven rescued. This time, by Brent.

Today I am becoming just who I want to be, at 6 or 16, 45 or even 83.

I’ve been asked tonight to speak about teaching our children to pay tithing.

I asked my son Nathan what he remembered about us teaching him and his sisters that we should pay tithing. Looking puzzled, he told me that it was like all of the other commandments—it was just something that we did. Like going to Church and keeping the Sabbath holy, it was just a thing that was never questioned—it just happened. It seemed to me that Nathan thought about paying tithing with the same attention he gave to breathing in and out every day—it was just something that happened.

My daughter Lauren emailed me:

“What I remember is that you encouraged us to take tithing out right away. Whenever we got allowance, I remember we always traded our money back to have the right amount to pay tithing with. I still do that. Whenever I put a check into the bank, I take tithing out in cash so we don't accidentally spend it.”

I called Megan and asked what she remembered about Brent and me teaching her to pay tithing. She told me that she remembered us talking about it sometimes when we paying bills. She remembered having a tithing “bank” and going to see the Bishop with the family for tithing settlement. She also remembers telling the Bishop that she was paying a full tithing when he asked her if she was. Like Nathan, she remembered that paying tithing was just something that we did as members of our family. She then complemented me when she told me that Brent and I were wonderful parents and always taught her and her brother and sister to obey the commandments during Family Home Evenings—and in the things she saw us doing every day.

There was a meeting in Heaven. The Lord needed someone to teach Megan, Lauren and Nathan about the law of tithing. “It’s OK. Everything’s taken care of. Brent and Carolyn can handle it.”

Our Heavenly Father needs someone to teach his children to obey his commandments. He needs people who are faithful examples. He needs people who pay their tithing with a cheerful heart as easily as if it were breathing in and out.

Our children see us. They watch us. They hear us. They love us and they want to be like us.

Today I am becoming just who I want to be, at 6 or 16, 45 or even 83.

I am the kind of person who can fill in for a musical number. The widow was the kind of person who could care for the Lord’s prophet. Brent was the kind of person who could bring food and money when it was needed. Brent and I are the kind of parents who were able to teach our children to love the Lord and to obey His commandments.

I am grateful for His many blessings and for the opportunity that I have had to become someone I can be happy with. I close with my testimony of the Lord’s love for us and of His desire for us to obey His commandments and to teach our children so that, together, we can return to Him.

Today I am becoming just who I want to be, at 6 or 16, 45 or even 83.

Who are you becoming?

Carolyn Hendry

Saturday evening Stake Conference

23 October 2010

Pizza and Pictures--and Sarah

A succulent flower photographed from farther to closer up views. Tiny to begin with anyway.

The flower in half--leaves, sepal, overy stamen in realtion to petals. Cool.

Close up of flower center. Brent has gotten me some REALLY AMAZING toys to play with as I have collected and photographed plants during this semester's Plant Identification class.

I have wanted to write for this blog for the last month, but there has been so much going on that I have felt overwhelmed. I’m in the car right now, with nothing to do but watch the trees go by and take pictures of the sky to use in my Photoshop 5 class. The class was listed as “Advanced Photography” but is actually just a graphics exercise using the newest edition of Photoshop. I am having a hard time because the “Basic Photography" class was all about getting the black and white shot composed and set—a tiny bit of the world in itself. Then there was the skill and art of developing and then printing just a few of the dozens of photos that I had taken over the last 3 months. This “advanced” class is about knowing how to add a false shadow and make the original picture into a word with letters that have the picture as a pattern in them. The final portfolio is composed of a few dozen solitary items (a single flower, a chair, a frog), a half a dozen “backgrounds” (a beach, a bench in a park, the window in a house) and then some kaleidoscopic graphics as well as a final “composition” that contains a few images melded together into a surrealistic mix. It is just a few weeks before I’m done with this semester—and I am getting to know Photoshop 5 a little bit. So—not a total waste of time and money.

{And I don’t have to count the seconds that a strip of film sits in each of the 5 bathes necessary to develop it.}

{No smell either.}

Since I last wrote, I’ve had knee surgery and another round of shots down the sides of my lower spine. I also finally had some planter’s warts lazared off the bottom of my left foot—no touching the bandages or getting it wet for a week. I take baths with my left leg hanging out of the tub. I have a stylish black boot thing with long Velcro straps that keep it on. It doesn’t hurt—or itch—HURRRAH! It does feel kind of squishy, though, when I walk on it too much. (That fact grosses Brent out . . . I don’t mention it to him now when he asks how my foot feels.)

It is raining right now—a light, steady stippling that would be great on my lawn and gardens. Yes! I have a garden again. Actually it is just a flat of two different kinds of lettuce that Sarah planted for me and has watered every day for the last week. I haven’t eaten any of it yet, but she told me that it’s ready to harvest. What I haven’t told her is that I would like it to go to seed and then in a few months find little “volunteer” lettuces in odd places about the yard.

Sarah—an incredible young woman who has, in her short lifetime, been a plumber, a construction worker, a gardener and an expert on grass watering systems. She is a tiny little woman—she looks like she’s 20 years old. Her face has a pixie/faerie look about it—as if she just sprang down from the branches of one of our cypress trees. When things don’t work, she fixes them. She is the best angel that Heaven could have sent. My knee and my foot (and my back) make it impossible for me to take care of my acre and a quarter. I was energetic when we first got here and put in all sorts of “islands” of bushes and flowers and palms and a live Christmas tree that we planted when Christmas was over. I have started half a dozen avocado trees and they are already taller than me (OK, that doesn’t take much) and in another year or so should begin to produce an avocado or two. Before she came, the whole front walkway was overgrown to the point that people had to fight their way through the branches to get to our front door. I hope that she finds this area a good place to stay for a while—she has single-handedly taken the most stressful (guilt-inducing) part of my life and turned it into a grand adventure. We went to Home Depot last week and picked out some annuals that she planted in all the little poky, empty places in the front of the house to add “colour”. It has been years since I have even thought about adding colour to anything—just hanging on has been more than I could handle for a long time now.

I got to speak in Stake Conference, Saturday night session and had a wonderful time. I focused my “remarks” around the couplet (I think that Mom said that Aunt Jannie first come up with it.):

Today I am becoming just who I want to be;

At six or sixteen, forty-eight or even eighty-three.

I was supposed to talk about how to teach our children the importance of paying tithing. I think that the Stake President was hoping for a 13-minute chat about making a Tithing Bank with/for a young child and then helping the child figure out how much tithing to pay from his/her allowance. Maybe some hints for Family Home Evening lessons on the importance of paying tithing and a frequent reminder of the verses in Malachi. I did mention tithing, but only about 11 minutes into my talk. Instead I spoke about being worthy to hear the promptings of the Spirit and obedient enough to obey those directions. I read my favorite Old Testament story about the widow who obeyed the Prophet Elisha when he told her to use the last bit of meal and oil that remained in her home and “make, I pray thee, first a little cake for me.” Anyway. I’ve included my talk here—you can see for yourself. At the end of my talk, I finished by telling what Meg, La and Nate remembered about Brent and me teaching them about the law of tithing. The crux of my talk was that if they wanted their children to pay tithing—they must also pay tithing. When they attended tithing settlement at the end of every year—each child could echo proudly their parents’ account to the Bishop—and the Lord—that they were full tithe-payers.

Today I am becoming just what I want to be: Brent’s best sweetheart (Meg and La and Nate are also in his heart—but I’m his BEST love); a better friend and mother to Meg, La and Nate; a faithful Stake Primary Second Counselor; a consistent student of the Scriptures; a quieter person who can better hear the whisperings of the Lord guiding me.

I felt a quiet voice suggest that I have pizza delivered to the class I love the most—Plant Identification—this Tuesday night. Dr. Rogers approved the idea and it will be fun to have everyone eating rather than mumbling about how hungry they are because they didn’t have time for lunch or dinner.

Maybe that wasn’t the Spirit—maybe it was just a good idea to show everyone in that class how much I appreciate how they have accepted me—a non-professional-landscape-architect—into their circle. I like that I can do weird stuff like order pizza for a class of 20. They don’t know that I’m a Mormon, but if they ever meet another one I would like them to have a fond memory of one who loved being with them—and cherished the friendship that they returned.

A Cruise, An Elevator, and a Cold

To celebrate our 28th wedding anniversary in September, Brent and I went on our very first cruise. We visited the Mayan ruins in Cancun, Mexico and went SNUBA diving (a cross between scuba and snorkeling) in Key West. It was short--just 5 nights.4 days--but we had a really nice time getting to know each other again. We splurged and had one of the professional photographers do some portraits--this one is my favorite. Twenty eight years. If you get a chance, ask Brent about the acupuncture . . . good stuff.

I was in the elevator yesterday and a fellow got on with me. He was about my height, dark complexioned, and very compact and strong (muscular in a way that made me think that he probably worked in a job that required strength and agility). I noticed that he had a gold necklace on and I couldn't make out what the pendant was. I asked and he held it up for me to see. He proudly told me that his wife had bought it for him after he'd shot his first 8-point deer. It struck me as a very kind and thoughtful thing for her to do. While I didn't think that his shooting a deer (although he did look like the kind of fellow who actually ate the animals he killed) was all that fantastic, it was wonderful to see the result of her thoughtfulness. As he mentioned his wife, his whole being lit up with excitement and obvious love for her. He got off the elevator a floor before me and told me that he thought she'd probably get him another pendant of a boar after he shot his first wild pig!

After the conversations I’ve had with Nathan lately, centered on how evil and self-centered people in powerful places tend to become (if they were not already)--it was charming and reassuring to be in the presence of someone who loved the things he did and who openly cherished his wife.

It is easy to get hung up on the bad stuff that happens to you. People in broadcasting and other news reporting fields have learned that crisis sells--everyone slows to see a car wreck on the highway. It is more difficult to seek out the compassionate and generous things that happen--I think mostly because they happen in small ways in quiet places. These actions are not inspired by a desire to be acknowledged, thus there are no cameramen/women hired to document the event as it happens. Unfortunately, it is also difficult for someone who has been blessed in a specific moment by the charity of others to remember the act. The majority of times when I have received help I recall only feelings of relief and reassurance and gratitude to my Heavenly Father--and warmth and tenderness for such good friends.

Most of the occasions that I have influenced someone for good came about in the course of my everyday living. Small nudges of the Spirit cause me to do something a little out of the ordinary--and it just happens to be a thing that helps someone to feel better about themselves, their lives, and the Lord. Most of the time I only learn that I have been of help when I hear the report during a testimony in Sacrament Meeting. Other times people have been moved to vocalize gratitude that that they have kept quiet in their hearts during the last days before we moved to another state. I suppose that our leaving has "forced the moment to its crisis" (The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Eliot).

That's not exactly the concept I want to express--but you get the idea. I have most often recounted charity extended to me during conversations with others--rather than going to the person and thanking them directly. I am learning to change that, though. I've begun to report what a good job someone has done for me by writing notes and sending them to the place where the person works: public "thank you" that is also heard by the individual. I thank the cashier at the grocery store for working so late when I have gone in to buy bread and eggs at 9:00 pm. When we eat out and the waiter or waitress has gone out of their way to make the meal a pleasant experience, I try to tell them or leave a note on the receipt saying thank you for their taking such good care of us.

Most importantly, I have gotten into the good habit of telling Megan, Lauren and (especially, lately) Nathan (since he is still living here with Brent and me) that I appreciate the kind things they do for me, that I am proud of them, that I am grateful for their example of gracious living, that I really enjoy being with them, and that I am glad that they are my children.

Perhaps this is why the genuine satisfaction of the hunter on the elevator in sharing his testimony of how much he was loved by his wife keeps coming into my thoughts. Most of all, I have always tried to express to Brent my love for him and for the wonderful life that he makes possible. While our children were growing up, I repeatedly told them that I felt lucky to have met married such an extraordinary man--how generous, how handsome, and how thoughtful he was. Every night as we pray together, I hear him thank Heavenly Father "for my wife". When I say the prayer, thanks for Brent as my husband and companion are always the first things I express.

I am so lucky to have Brent. I think that in the pre-existence that when Heavenly Father was asking who wanted to fly through the air, experience the most joy (and its opposite, the most despair), to climb trees, to sing out loud, and to comprehend through mortal experience every extreme emotion, that I was sitting on the edge of my seat, raising and waving my arm and saying loudly "Oh, oh, yes! Pick me! Pick me!” And when the Lord decided to grant my desires, He looked around the heavens and found Brent.

Then, He asked Brent if he would take on the duty to take care of me and protect me because I really didn't know what I was asking for. At that point, as at every other time the Lord requested his service, Brent humbly accepted the calling. I think that he began, then, to practice loving me and keeping me out of trouble because he slipped quietly into that role the moment that we met.

His calm, moderate emotions balance mine. He has always been present to pick me up off of the ground, agonize over the falls I've taken, and then, because I wanted it so much, to pay for the horses that were involved in the accidents. He has, literally, saved my mortal life more than once.

He is the reason that I am still thankful for my body even when it is in painful pieces that must be sewn back together. He is the reason that I have fought every time to return from my blackest, coldest, most hopeless place. Even when I knew that Heavenly Father lived and that Christ sacrificed His life for my sins--but didn't care--I knew I could believe and trust Brent. During those times, he reminded me of that trust and that he knew that all of that mattered--so he would believe for the both of us until I could believe again on my own.

This essay actually began as a letter to Brent, but I want to share it with all of you now, too. I think it is important that we remind each other that there is good in the world--and that there is a reason for this world: we are that reason. I can reassure Nathan that even with all of the horrible things that are happening on the earth right now, for some unfathomable reason, the Lord has put us in a place where we can know the complete truth of the Gospel of Christ. He has given us resources that enable us to be healthy in both mind and body. He has allowed the five of us to be a family--and now to become the best of friends.

At this moment, I am laying in bed with the beginnings of a cold washing over me. I have an injured left shoulder that has made it necessary for me to drop the ceramics class I've been taking with Nate at the local college. Yesterday my orthopedic surgeon gave me a cortisone shot in my should so my left art feels like one be achy bruise. There is nerve damage on my upper left foot that makes walking a misery. I'm also hungry because I feel too gross to get up and fix something to eat--and Nathan is at class so he can't hover over me and keep me fed. Brent has been away in Washington DC on business all week and won't be home until Sunday night.

It has occurred to me as I have been writing, that I have the right to complain loudly to the walls that I hurt and that I miss Brent and that I am not happy. Weirdly enough though, I feel supremely at peace, grateful for the time and the place to rest and let my body repair itself. General Conference is this weekend and so I get to hear the Lord's living Prophet talk to me about how much Heavenly Father loves me and about what He needs me to be doing right now.

I especially want my family to know that I love the Lord and I am so grateful for the opportunity to be sealed to Him with Brent in an eternal union. I love the knowledge that God is part of the incredible relationship I have with Brent.

People that work with Brent are often surprised to find out that he has no real hobby except for me. His whole concern is that I am happy and feel loved. When others, envious, tell me that I have a really good life, I agree. I tell them of the promise that Brent made to me when he and the Lord decided that he needed to attend law school. He said that if I would support him through school, he would support me for the rest of my life. He has kept that promise. An especially choice friend of mine heard me say that, and then taught me something I had never considered before: that many husbands make that same promise--but do not keep it.

Thank you, Brent, for keeping all of your promises to me.

Some Really Bad Prints of a Really Nice Wedding

These four photos were taken with one of those little wedding cameras that was on our table at the reception of Sam (my sister Susan's son) and Ashley. Every picture was awful. I imagine that with the overwhelming influx of quick, inexpensive digital cameras that these old 27-exposure Kodak cameras have mostly come from the backs of wedding planning and catering supply closets.

Sam and Ashley coming into the reception room: during the time between the 2:30pm wedding and the 5:00pm reception, they took time to just be together. I had to smile when they admitted that they didn't feel any different now that they were married. I think that Robert Fulghum would tell them that they had already gone through the "real" wedding months or even years before at some unremembered moment when they each discovered that they loved the other and wanted nothing more than to be together. The public joining of their lives was made legal last Saturday afternoon. The marriage of their hearts--what really keeps people together when they hurt or are angry or feel pushed aside or are disappointed by things that have happened or even disappointed in themselves--that takes place when no one is "witnessing" or officiating. Sometimes it happens before a man and a woman are married; sometimes it happens after. The saddest things is when it doesn't happen at all. In such cases, the reception is the highlight of the day since there was a party for them and presents to open--as if it were a birthday celebration.
Me and my little sister Susan. We both wore black and looked fantastic.
This is the only photo I have of dad and me together. The photos were so bad that even my correcting for red-eye didn't help the way that I looked. Awful photo. Wonderful time spent with dad.
Dad sat up at the head table with Susan and Sam and Ashley and Ashley's parents. They also took time to talk quietly.

Even though the photographs turned out grainy and badly lit, I do cherish the people and the events that these photographs remind me of. If for nothing else, they are worth keeping on file so that I can skim by them everyone once in a while and see them unexpectedly--and be back in Wichita KS again. Everyone was so cordial and kind and Sam and Ashley were so beautiful together. Both of them cried through the wedding--my favorite memory is of Sam, during the middle of the wedding service, reaching to wipe the tears off of Ashley's face--and of her turning to look at him, rather than at the Catholic priest who was officiating.

Brent and I are going on our first cruise next week. For our anniversary, he found me a Pentax UNDERWATER CAMERA!!!!! It is a coppery-orange electronic marvel--water tight and sand proof. If I flatten my hand, the camera sits quite nicely in the middle. I have been practicing with it--and have gotten used to some of the features. It doesn't photograph in RAW, but it does have a maximum quality JPG so that I need all of the space I can on the memory card. Right now I am using the 16 gb card from my Nikon D300S. I took photos while I walked the dogs this morning and am really excited to see if I've gotten good enough with the camera to get some decent shots of the birds we saw today. I'll have to post some later if they turn out.

At the least, I expect that my photographs from today will be eons better than the few I got off of the disposable camera from Sam and Ashley's wedding. I hope so, anyway.

Isn't Brent incredible? He finds the best--the most surprising--things to get for me. I am spoiled. I am adored. I am loved. I am married forever to Brent in my heart, in my dreams--as well as in the legal wedding register at the Salt Lake Utah county government offices.

My Most Handsome Man and a Fairly Cool Beetle That Nathan Saved

I love this photo of Brent.

While Mary was here, Nathan kept an eye out for really cool bugs for her to take back for a friend who is enrolled in an etymology class at BYU. When he found this guy, though, he was just so energetic that Nathan didn't have the heart to immortalize him . . . but he did let me get some photos of the little guy before I let him go.

I put a couple of the beetle on my flash drive for my Digital Photography class. We're assigned to bring in images that will be easy to lift off of one image to use in another . . . everything needs to be our own art. No clip art--I'm excited to see what I can do with the Photoshop 5 program that we'll be learning. I've paid for at least three of the five versions of Photoshop, but I've never taken the time or effort to find out even a small fraction of what the program offers.

My whole life has felt like that. I have been offered so much--and I've been too weird or self-centered or mindless or turned-inward to see all the glorious potential for learning or exploring or listening or feeling. I've missed the opportunity to choose from options that I was too lame to look for--or too afraid to take on. My comfort zone still buffers me. When I'm manic or depressed or stressed, I fall back on what is easiest. It is simple for me to perform in front of an audience and much more demanding for me to approach people one on one. Personal friendships carry an emotional price that I would rather pay off in dollars--send out for pizza rather than make home-made soup--send off cards rather than take time for a personal visit. I think about how our family lives now--pool table and a well-loved baby grand piano instead of a dining room table and sofa and chairs. We don't have family dinners at night--Brent gets home and wants a few minutes to unwind from 12 hour days and then he's ready to go to sleep. Our FHEs are on Sunday evenings and take less than half an hour. Nathan gets an over-dose of me as I follow him around some of his college classes taking notes--then our evenings are spent studying, cleaning up after the bunnies, and folding clothes while Brent does his Stake clerk stuff.

I woke up this morning at 6am and had a wild energy spurt at about 8 and I vacuumed the kitchen and family room. The rabbits went wild . . . noise! motion! ACK! They are tired tonight after such an unreal start to their day.

Actually, I am tired tonight. Nathan just brought me a millipede and I am too tired to photograph it tonight . . . so I need to give it some water and tuck it into the lovely dirt that Nathan's already gathered and it can sleep in comfort tonight until I can get some pictures tomorrow.

A son who takes Spanish, Psychology and Algebra by day and takes out the garbage and brings me bugs to see at night.

No wonder Brent is tired. So am I.

I Am a Broadway Musical Married to a PBS Documentary

I love this thought--almost a perfect metaphor describing Brent and me. I burst into song at odd and irregular intervals. Brent is careful and methodical and makes sure that he has all of the bases covered. I often forget where I put my bag/phone/glasses/keys/books/shoes. Brent gets up on Saturday morning and gets dressed and puts on his socks and shoes so that he is ready to go at a moment's notice.

I have much more to say about this. I am too tired right now. It is 2am Eastern Standard Time.

Cleaned up photo that Nathan took at Pelican Lake in Juno Beach FL in June or early July 2010.
I was outside dumping used bunny litter where I let it get rained on before I use it as mulch and potting soil. It had been raining; I saw a neighborhood of these mushrooms. Running back into the house, I grabbed my camera and took a series of mushroom family "groups". I like this little bunch.

I love being surrounded by new things--growing things. Even when I am stagnant--propped up on the couch with my knee up--waiting to heal, the rest of the yard is busy growing and changing.

An invitation to encourage my body to to get on with the process of healing.