Journal December 2009 Squash Skins, Pomegranate Seeds, Nathan at College, Back Shot, "ROSE DAUGHTER"

Journal         1 December 2009  11:40pm                       

Brent told Nathan tonight that if I wasn’t ready for bed – in bed – by the time Nathan was, that Nate was to come and wake Brent up. I finished the evening typing Nate’s speech, with him telling me what to say. I did the dishes by hand since the new dishwasher isn’t here yet, and I ruined the old one by taking a pocket knife to the lower and middle spray arms and enlarging the outlets for the water spray. I did this because bits of food kept getting caught in them, closing the water exit holes, and just swashing dirty (but hot) water all over everything. After that, I wiped off the counters and I mixed my purple lid stuff with some Tang to drink as I took my night meds: Lamictal, Seroquel, Wellbutrin, etc.

I don’t remember the other meds right now (usually I don’t remember them all, ever, because there are too many for my brain to store).

Then I petted each of the bunnies good night, and put some birdseed in their dishes as a treat. I turned off the lights – locked the sliding glass doors – and waited by Nate’s door until he put away his DS PlayStation . . . or something.

Last night I read Nephi’s words:

And if all the things which I saw are not written, the things which I

have written are true.

What a way to end a chapter. I think that I see way too many things and write about all too few of them.

The elders were over for supper on Sunday – Brent had seeded a pomegranate for me, and I put the bowlfull of seeds on the table. Both Elders – Jones and Bowman – took some. When the meal was almost over, Elder Jones looked over at Elder Bowman and asked him where his seeds were – we all looked at Elder Jones and laughed.

“Where were what seeds?”

“Your pomegranate seeds!” he exclaimed, genuinely surprised that Elder Bowman didn’t seem to have any on his plate left from his first serving of pomegranate seeds.

We all looked at Elder Jones.

            “I ate mine,” he answered, “What did you do with yours?” Elder Jones pointed to a tiny pile of flesh-less pomegranate seeds on the edge of his plate. “You mean you can eat these?”

Apparently, Elder Jones had consumed an entire pomegranate just a few days before – delicately, biting the red flesh off of each seed, and then, very inconspicuously, spitting each seed out into the trash.

He seemed to feel relieved that he could just crunch the whole thing down – much quicker, much more satisfying.

I wonder how many things I do that don’t need the caution I handle them with – and which others I should be more careful with.

When I was at BYU, one of my friends, who told the story of her roommate’s first experience with squash – served in the skins. My friend, after having scraped the flesh off of her portion, had – without the roommate noticing – left the table and thrown her squash rind into the garbage can. Her roommate only saw that as the meal was ending that her friend’s plate was devoid of any evidence of the stiff squash skins . . . and so she dutifully disposed of her squash remains – by eating them. As the table was cleared for dessert, my friend asked her roommate what she done with her squash remains? Her roommates responded with the quiet reply that she’d eaten them.

            “Do you like squash skins? my friend asked, astounded.

“Well, no.” came to reply.

“Why did you eat them then?”

Red faced, her roommate explained that she had noticed that everyone else’s plates were completely cleaned of the skins… So she figured that everyone else had also consumed theirs.

The family laughed. My friend, was almost unable to speak by the time she had reached the end of her anecdote – laughing so hard she could hardly breathe. I smile when I think of that moment – and I am sure that my friend’s family may still recount it and laugh, whenever squash is served.

Peeling grapes – spitting out pomegranate seeds – eating squash, skins – eating bananas by splitting them lengthwise into three triangular columns: a miniature version of a long quarter cut of watermelon:  round on the bottom, straight line of speckled seeds along the top line. Megan, who couldn’t do her homework during lunch time at school because she had to let it dry first.

About the last item: Megan’s juice box had squirted when she opened it, and her homework papers got soaked… so she had to let them dry first. Thus, she couldn’t do her homework during lunch as she usually did.

I have become really involved in the subjects that Nathan has been researching for his papers and speeches this semester at Palm Beach State College. In some ways, he reminds me of Megan – probably eight or nine years old. It was her turn to give the Family Home Evening lesson. I asked if I could help, but she assured me that she had everything under control. When the time arrived for her lesson, she stood before the family, and began to string together gospel “stuff”—that was not actually connected. Things like the widow, paying for her bills at the temple, and Jesus smiling at her and Heavenly Father being born at Bethlehem, and everyone had to wash their feet, because they all wore sandals. The 12 apostles walked on the water to come to Jesus –

Brent and I kept trying to steer her into a valid scripture story – but she only had bits and pieces coming to her narrative. After Home Evening, I asked her why she didn’t prepare for the lesson. She wanted to be like me she told me. When I got up to teach or give a talk, or do sharing time in Primary, I never had to prepare. I just stood up and said my stuff.

I admitted to her that there were many times when I was called on at the last minute – but I had been studying for 30 years before that point in time. Primary, Family Home Evening, Sunday School, Sacrament meetings, reading the scriptures and magazines like The Friend and the Ensign. Just standing up and being able to give a talk or a lesson didn’t work like it looked, if there wasn’t anything inside me, there wouldn’t have been anything to tell people who were waiting on the outside.

I helped Nate write up a five minute talk, and I am flooded by ideas, outline organizations, cool facts, and stories – I have a very hard time, keeping myself out of his work while giving of my body-self as a  stenographer, typist, proofreader – and all the way round “Girl Friday”—except that right now it is Tuesday – early Wednesday morning.

On Tuesday 1 December 2009     at 9:30 AM

I got a back shot – two of them actually. One on each side of my spine. The doctor hit the right side exactly on target – the nerve he flooded with whatever-it-is-he-floods-it-with lit fire and swooshed all the way down from the top of the needle near my spine to the end of each of the toes on my right foot. Everything was numbed for quite a few hours. And, when arriving home, refusing to move from my bed on the couch has helped to keep the intended results of the shots active—NO MORE PAIN—it makes a good start for the longevity of the injected medication.

Monday    2 December 2009, Florida 8:50 AM

Nate made me breakfast this morning – scrambled eggs and toast. I added butter honey on the toast, my a.m. pills and a small glass of milk.

I finished the book Rose Daughter, by Robin McKinley – again – and I found that she had made the plot much more complex – except that (since I was paying attention very carefully as I read) it (the plot) – did not flow like it has in her other books. She kept having to stop and explain the history that was driving the action… When it didn’t make the action any clearer or necessary. Evil is tangled and witless—but Good is unable to comprehend what is going on.

The end of the entry.
 

Journal 2001. The Flood; The Tear. Houston, TX.

JOURNAL 2001        The Flood; The Tear. 

29 June 2001, Friday                            Houston, TX

 

            I wonder if the mourning 

will ever start.  This year alone there would have seemed to have been events enough to sorrow over, to grieve over . . .

            In January, I lost the use of my right shoulder—thus, arm and hand.  It was the beginning of a struggle to recover from the surgery that, ultimately, would give me back (almost completely) a full-functioning body.  It required the sacrifice of my last month riding my horse.

            In January, I tried to force Nathan to re-enter the school system on the system’s terms.  In May I officially withdrew him from school, having been the cause of his implosion back into mania and terror at the thought of having to associate on his own with any group of children his own age.  I sacrificed Nathan so that I might have a chance to regain the same life I had enjoyed before he was diagnosed bi-polar.

            Three weeks ago, thou it seems like just last night, I lived calmly through a hellish fever of grabbing-pushing-packing-climbing-saving-leaving-climbing in the wet-dark-mist of morning-before-it-is-a-morning.  So good to not move; so tired, so wet, such a smell and stickiness that climb.  Finally I am still and I have finished living the nightmare.  And then it is light.  I was asleep in the hallway upstairs, Brent was gone, the light is day, it’s time to—they’re coming back in five minutes, Brent is gone; it’s time to go.  I come down the stairs to an endless, black mirror. There is no floor.  There.  Is.  No.  Floor.

            My house, dedicated to the service of the Lord.  Is no more. We are adrift on the second floor.  My heart is as empty as the gutted rooms beneath us.  There are windows and walls.  There are pipes that run here and there between the two-by-four studs—like errant blood vessels, cut off at the delivery point; nothing left to deliver.

            My heart.  Dedicated to the service of the Lord.  Feels no more.  I am adrift.  Though I am always, ALWAYS, always surrounded.  I am the empty rooms around which the two-by-fours stand guard with the pipe veins would pump nourishment to.  I am the space—that used to host strangers and friends—that was promised to be a pillar of righteousness; but who now sits in the shadow by the street corner holding out, hoping both to be ignored or pitied by a drop of kindness fallen into a cup that used to be running over 

            I looked into the mirror tonight.  I smiled and I saw the wrinkles of 42 years gather around my eyes.  I wondered about grieving.   I don’t know that I have ever grieved for my mother’s death, 4 years ago this August.  I see her and hear her and think of questions I would like to ask her over and over and over again—more often as the years pass.  I have lost time.  I think of those eyes, my eyes, tonight.

.   What have they seen me do that would mark the passage of half a lifetime?  There are a few cross-stitch pictures.  There are three good, honest children that the Lord has lent to me for a time.  There is a closet full of saddles and pads and riding boots and bridles that are the remainder of countless hours I have tried to snatch to ride horses.

            And then there is my horse.  Aggie.  Agraciada.  Too much money.  Countless headaches and worries.  Never enough time to ride.  The rear between home and horse between Brent and the wind between Nathan and physically exhausting satisfaction.  The tear.

            I think that I keep trying to grieve.  Perhaps I already have.  Maybe my entire life is a process of missing something, feeling a pang of sorrow for it—and not because it is gone so much as because I am now without it—perhaps it is just that I do not know how to let go of it, of the sorrow, I mean.  I want the memory of it—but I want to have the hurting pass away, pass on.  Maybe I want to be able to forgive myself for missing it so.  After all I know I will see my mother again and that she is well and happy now.  My life is not mine to direct, to parcel out—this time I give to the Lord, this time is mine.  And the house?  Well, the house is just a thing.

            Most have never had as much to lose.  Most never will.

            And yet I do ache for closure—to hunt for the hurting time and then to be cone with it.  It cannot be done like purchasing a pair of shoes—need them, see them, need them, pay the price . . . and then wear them out in the service of your fellowmen.

            I still, tonight, even though I know selling Agraciada to be the correct thing to do—for the family, for me—a part of me still pulls back.  The tearing.  The tear.   And although mother Nancy Kathleen Burton Wagstaff is gone and her body was worn out and everyone was relieved when she didn’t have to endure her suffering body any longer—a part of me still pulls back . . . and I don’t want her gone yet . . . I want to be able to visit her in the summer . . . and talk to her on the phone . . . and show her that I have finally learned how to be a friend to her instead of an independent icon that floats serenely on the horizon.  I can be a friend.  I can.  I could.

            I am tired.

            Very tired.

Just the Three of Us

 Brent began the tradition of taking a night walk.  Now Nathan and I also walk with him.  Nathan reminds us.  

I love being me right now.  Even with all the body weaknesses and concern for children and grandchildren; for Brent and Nate; I love being who I am right now.

Thank you Heavenly Father.

I Don't Want to Forget 9/11, Please Come Soon

Today is the 5th day of January in the year 2024.  I am watching a 9/11 documentary.  The first that I watched was a "look back" by 60 Minutes.  The video before me now is filled with "same day" footage. 

There are stories of people who helped each other and then were able to find the people they saved.  

One of them was responsible for getting a fatally wounded woman to the hospital in time for life-saving surgery. 

Two months after 9/11, the ambulance tech who made sure she was the first the doctors examined, visited her in the hospital.  He learned her name.   

He learned that she would recover.  He met her parents and fiancé. 

He felt the overwhelming joy of knowing that he had saved a life.

There were two men--whose stories you hear separately, not knowing that they had any connection.  One was a man who was being urged to climb higher, away from the smoke coming up the stairway.  He didn't know what to do and froze.  He told himself that he was going to die: if he were crushed by debris; if he was burned because the airplane fuel that covered everything ignited; if he was overcome by smoke inhalation.  But in his confusion, he heard a cry for help coming from the wall behind him.  

That sound focused him and he began to call out.  He guided the voice to the left, to the right, to turn around because the voice was getting dimmer.  Finally the voice was on the other side of the wall.  The voice asked him what he needed to do and he told him that he would have to get over the wall between them.  The first time was a failure.  He called out, "You can make it.  Try again."  In the next moment, someone landed on top of him and they fell flat to the floor.  When they got to their feet, the voice introduced himself and put out his hand to shake his saviour's hand.  The man who guided the voice put out his hand and he introduced himself.  

From a puncture wound in the first man's palm, they saw that they both had blood on their hands.  The man declared that they were now blood brothers for life.  They made their way down the staircase and outside.  When they got down to the street, they began to walk quickly away from the Twin Towers.  The voice turned around after a few minutes to find that they other wasn't there. The first man had grabbed a man in his truck and told him to drive him to Brooklyn: home to his children and a wife with whom he needed to work things out.  Life was immediately turned into a miracle for him and he needed to act on that miracle.

Next we see the two of them together--much older, but still friends.  They both tell the camera that the other was the one to save his life.  The voice because he couldn't have made it to the staircase and the man who called out directions because it was the sound of the voice that shook him out of a shocked, paralyzing panic.

There was also a Head of Security of a company who knew that they had been attacked in 1994--and they needed to be ready in case they were attacked again.  

He insisted on fire drills--everyone getting to the exit and walking down from the 70th floor to the ground.  Four times a year they were required to participate in descending the staircase.  When the attack happened and everyone was panicking, he started to sing, which helped everyone to focus--and then to do exactly what they had been trained to do.  He and is security guards went back inside the office to make sure that everyone had gotten out.  All 3 of them died.  

This man didn't save just one soul, but over 2,000 people.  These 2,000 owe their lives to this security officer and his dedication--over seven years--of keeping everyone safe.

New Subject

Our new Bishop Robinson--Bishop Jones was released on Christmas Day Sunday 2023--asked us to pray for 4 things every night at 9pm.  This prayer is a Stake-wide event, individually offered in private, but part of an unknowable number of souls who all have testimonies of Christ and the Plan of Redemption.  As a group, we have a power of faith that unites in a call to Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.  This faith is what heals injuries [those that happen to our bodies, our minds, our souls] and enables Christ's Priesthood to do miracles. 

Miracles like saving a life, or 2,000 lives, or bringing someone back to life.

What echos in my mind is the gratitude and admiration that the rescued have for those who saved them. Through no effort on their own, they were picked from all of the thousands who were there that day to survive--to have a life that is an un-repayable gift. 

Not all who survived were left without life long scars.  Both the rescued and the rescuers suffer from PTSD that makes a "normal" life impossible.  The images of death and destruction that they saw can never be unseen.  Hundreds of the rescue workers and first responders are now slowly dying of respiratory and lung damage.  Most of them have medical debt they will never be able to repay.  

So it is with me.  I am mentally and spiritually damaged goods.  Everyone here on Earth who won the right to be here has limitations--some of which can be recovered from, but many more that cannot.  One of my best friends looks forward to the time when they will be able to look back over their life and see the limitations they had to endure while on Earth.  They are looking forward to a perfected body, heart, mind and soul that will allow them to do things without constraint: to talk freely, to make friends easily, to remember names instantly, to move without constant, cumbersome pain.

This year in Sunday School we study the Book of Mormon--a volume of Scripture that was prepared to come to us "in a day of wickedness, degeneracy, and apostasy." Mormon 8 That time is now.              

 “Life is not easy. It's supposed to be hard, and it is hard.”

Elder Elder Yoon Hwan Choi, 1st Counselor of the Area Presidency

2 September 2022 - Manila 

News Release Cabuyao Philippines Stake fireside

 How do we rise above all the chaos that surrounds us?

       

 Christ promised in John 14                                                                        

18 I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.

 

20 At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.

 

21 He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.

 

We have been given the Book of Mormon.

We beheld and saw the plates, and the engravings thereon; and we know that it is by the grace of God the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, that we beheld and bear record that these things are true. And it is marvelous in our eyes. 

Nevertheless, the voice of the Lord commanded us that we should bear record of it; wherefore, to be obedient unto the commandments of God, we bear testimony of these things. 

And we know that if we are faithful in Christ, we shall rid our garments of the blood of all men, and be found spotless before the judgment-seat of Christ, and shall dwell with him eternally in the heavens. Testimony of 3 Witnesses

The Prophet Joseph Smith said, “I told the brethren that the Book of Mormon was the most correct of any book on earth, and the keystone of our religion, and a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book” (the introduction to the Book of Mormon).

 

I have changed my prayer from "Please soften the hearts of those who oppress others: those who starve, kill, and take joy in war." to "Please come soon."  

 

 

 

Don't Like Change

                                                                                                                  

This year I’m trying to write about things that happen more often.  I’m writing to you as part of that plan.  When I get to talk to you and hear about the challenges that your family is facing and the accomplishments of you, your children and husband, I remember when I used to write every week about what you, Nate and Meg were up to.  I sent developed pictures with the letters to Grandma W and L.  I think they enjoyed reading about my thoughts, but they liked the photos better.  

There was one series of photographs I remember where you and Meg were wearing matching t-shirts that your Uncle Rob had sent you.  Nathan wasn’t born yet, and I put two little wooden chairs that Grampa D had saved when their Ward got new, plastic ones.  I tried to get the two of you to sit still and smile for a camera shot to send to Rob.  I wanted to send him a Thank You card with an image of you both wearing the shirts he sent.  You and Meg climbed on the chairs, looked under them, just about anything but sit on them.  When I got both of you to sit still, one would smile and the other would make a face or look at the ceiling.  It was after bath time, so you two had damp curly hair.  You giggled and played with each other—anything but still for a moment for me to take a picture.  I never did get the perfect picture to send to Rob, but I’m sure that he didn’t mind.

 

Since my life now is calm and quiet compared to what it was even to last year, most of what comes out when I write is bits of our family history—and not the genealogy kind. The genealogy specialist of our ward, Sister B, is an amazing fount of knowledge.  She knows the system and how to find documents I never knew could exist.  She had a mind that moved at the speed of light, and I was so slow next to her that it overwhelmed me.  The Bishopric tried to put me into her place so that she could show me all she knew—I flinched at every procedure, computer short-cut, over-view setting, and reporting record due every month.  I was quickly released—your dad was still Stake Clerk and he got the calling off the records of the Church.  People still call me about genealogy information, but I have nothing to offer.  My Patriarchal blessing council need to prepare myself to serve in the great logical work of the church. I’m really, really hoping that they are talking about serving in the temple. If not, then Heavenly Father is going to have to rearrange my brain because the way it is now I could never show people how to find their relatives.

 

The thing that occupied my weeks last year was at the Sanctuary. I was there every day and when they moved to the new location, I was there sometimes 10 hours a day every week. Now, just about everything is organized, and I am mostly in the way. The office did ask for a picture of me to put in the January 2024 newsletter. They got three different volunteers from the three different areas of the sanctuary: the hospital, animal care, and the education department. 

 

Sunny is holding the barn owl named Athena who died more than six years ago.  I miss her. 

I also miss Earl, the flying squirrel, who was here at home with me for a while before he left me. 

I’ve never told anyone how I lost him.  We got to the point where we would walk around the block  after dark.  On the last night I ever saw him, a truck drove up at full speed behind us.  Earl panicked and jumped to the lowest branch of the tree we were walking beside.  I never saw him again.  Alone, fat and accustomed to getting his food handed to him, I doubt that he lived more than a few days.  That night I walked back and forth, calling out to him—until a neighbor got tired of my noise and came outside to walk me home. I still call for him outside at night sometimes. When he was alive, he would jump from the small trees in our yard back and forth between me and the branches. When I was ready to go in, I would call to him and he would come for a treat and a ride on my shoulder into the kitchen.  Flying squirrels do not live alone in the wild.  They thrive, if there is plenty of food, in family groups.  The babies learn how to eat and find shelter from the adults around them.  Earl was always (illegally) a pet.   

    The Bard owl I spend time with outside

You deal with children, I deal with gopher tortoises, a retired Bard owl, cleaning cages for raptors and falcons who were injured in the wild and have never gotten used to humans, and prepping food for the animals to eat the next day.  

They have banned me from going into the enclosure with Coon, a shrike that was brought into the hospital after a big storm.  He became acclimated to people—especially me because I worked with him for the few months he was growing up in the hospital.   He dive bombs people and pokes holes in hands and arms as they clean his cage and give him fresh food.  Coon would sit on my finger and come when I motioned to him.  After a time, I wore eye protection because he flew at a volunteer’s eye.  He was never “tame” but the times he got out, he came when I put my finger up to him.  The new location is open—there are no niches where animals are housed out of the public eye.  It is a place where everything has to be done before 10am—no contact with the animals after that.  My motivation for volunteering has been the opportunity to interact with the animals and birds.  I still go, but my heart is not there as it used to be.  

 

Like your dad and Nathan, change is now hard for me.  

Christmas Eve 2023 to New Year's Day, 2024. Dear Megan.

Christmas Eve, December 2023

Dear Megan,

 

It almost broke my heart for us to hang up yesterday afternoon.  I saw you there and heard you talk about all the things you were planning for the house, for the family and for yourself.  Then your family came back from a walk with Anton and his sister Jen--and you were overwhelmed by questions and stories the children had to tell and requests for food and attention.

I missed the hours that you used to spend talking to me as you did art homework at CCAD. Especially now, I remember that you had done a pencil sketch of yourself sitting on the floor of your room in front of a mirror.  It was a little off and you were asked to do it again because the teacher knew that you could sketch and present a piece of art that looked like a photograph.  I also remember, as I sit here on Christmas eve, how worried you were because one of the teachers used your assignment to show the other students how their drawings should have looked—and you felt proud that he used it this way.  I was so impressed at how concerned you were about your feelings of pride—while I only thought of how wonderful you were (and still are.)

After Church on Christmas Eve day.  I think this is the only time I have ever worn the jacket I got for Megan to wear to Prom her Junior year.  It came from Talbots and I'm sure she didn't like it at all.  I've held on to it all these years and I hope I will wear it again.

The earrings were a birthday gift I asked for from Nathan and Brent a long time ago.  They were in the gift shop of some museum.  I've worn them a few times.  

Christmas Day 2023

 

Nathan had to go to work this morning—on holidays that the Sanctuary is closed everyone comes in and gets the animals fed and their enclosures quickly cleaned. They started at 6 and were done by 8 this morning.  He got a shower and changed clothes before I got up.  

 

Our Christmas morning was very different from those that occupy my memory.  

Usually there is a lot of noise and squeals and torn paper . . . there are moments of quiet as freshly open presents are inspected.  In a flash the morning is over and the afternoon is occupied with preparations for Christmas dinner.  

 

Today everything is quiet.  There are few surprises, but mostly everyone knows before hand what the gift boxes contain.  

This Christmas, there was one exception: 

Years ago, Nathan found a set of square mouthed cups at a thrift store that he fell in love with.  One by one they broke--and I was able to find replacements, but they were badly packed and arrived as a crumble of white and brown ceramic.  While looking on-line a few months ago, I found someone who made square mouthed cups and bought 4 of them.  The artist put NAH on the bottom of each cup. When he opened that present, he was really surprised and pleased.

I started to cook dinner for us (Prime Rib, baked potatoes, Brussel sprouts, biscuits)--but your dad has already begun dinner with a bowl of bananas with whip cream. Now he’s on to organic, non—gluten, generic Pringles. 

 

26 December 2023

 

I am trying to get ready to put 2024 on everything.  As I sit here and write, I am listening to Alma 60-61.  I love these two chapters because of Pahoran’s soft answer to Moroni’s angry demands for support and accusations of neglect.  It seems that the two of them were both on the Lord’s errand, but from opposing perspectives.  With Brent and I are talking, disagreeing (so I thought) with each other—it turns out we are both saying the same thing, but from different perspectives.  The realization that we are both saying the same thing, but in different words, we laugh and go on to other things.  I don’t know it other couples start arguing, but actually are saying the same thing, and can’t see the other’s way of thinking.  

 

It amazes me that the Nephites will stop fighting and let the Lamanites leave in peace—on the strength of a promise that the Lamanites will never come against them again.  The righteous believe the best of even their enemies—even when the covenant of peace has been broken again and again.

 

27 December 2023

 

Good morning! Today’s Wednesday and so I go in to do meal preparation for the animals at Busch. For some reason, even though I went to bed last night before midnight I am awake at 6:30 a.m. Today’s weather will flip between cold and humid and hot and humid. Doesn’t seem like much of a variety.  Your dad has this whole week off. I think I’m going to go early to get my work done so that I can get back and be with him while he works in his Blacksmith shop.

 

I got to meet our next-door neighbors yesterday. Apparently, their grandson received a kind of Whirlyball and it got away from them on the wind. I actually have one myself. If you throw them correctly, they come right back to you—they work a little bit better, or at least more dependably, if you are throwing them where there isn’t a breeze. 

 

I think the cat has finally discovered the bird. I moved the cage so that when the cleaners came, they would be sure to wash that part of the floor, and forgot to move him back when they left.  There is not really any problem with this, though.  I guess the cat has a memory as undependable as mine.  Since Chee is so small and quiet, Fern hasn’t even shown any interest in her—even when she calls out her sad, warbling “Chee-eee-eee” that starts high and runs down the scale until it disappears.  

Saturday, December 30, 2023

Today I took a long nap.  We went to try shooting Nathan’s new gun (that he got for Christmas) this morning, but everyone else had the same idea and so the shooting range was full to over-flowing.  Nathan doesn’t like being in places with a lot of people and so he decided that we’d come back later.  

New Years Eve

Sunday, 31 December 2023

Brent has been working on a rocket stove all year. He presented it to me and Nathan and it's finished form on Christmas Day. I decided that I wanted to have roasted marshmallows and that the rocket stove would be perfect place to roast them on.

As usual Brent and Nathan got everything ready for me, and I brought out the marshmallows. I was the only one who wanted any, but they stood around and fiddled with the fire in the stove while I toasted and devoured 4 very large, fluffy marshmallows.

These gourds and pumpkins that you see around me, are leftover from all of the ones that were donated to Busch Wildlife Sanctuary over the holidays. In the end, they have so many that they throw some of them away or the employees take some home. Nathan has been using them to test his spares and very sharp axes that he has been collecting this year.

 

Monday, 1 January 2024

 

Tonight we went on a walk together. It has become a daily tradition for all of us.  It used to be just your dad.  Then Nathan noticed that sometimes he didn’t go out for his walk.  After a few evenings of Nathan reminding dad to go for a walk, all three of us get done with Scriptures and prayers we put shoes on, go to the bathroom and move around the block.  It is a sweet time for us together every evening before Nate goes to bed. 

One last picture for New Year's Day. Chi got away from me while I was giving her clean water and some food. Your dad got up to help me find her, and she finally got caught nestled between the wall and a stack of pictures and a cupboard where Nathan keeps his Nintendo games.

She is so tiny, and I have not been making much of an effort to tame her. When I hold her, I can feel her little heart trembling. I want so much for her to be more like Earl and love the freedom and the company that I can give her. I guess that's something I can work on this next year.

I love you, Megan.  Happy new year.

A Gift of Heart, Carolyn Hendry, Des Moines 1986

 

A Gift of Heart

Carolyn EW Hendry

Des Moines, IA USA   1986

 

I offer hands that work and write.

I offer arms that hold you tight.

I offer eyes that love the small.

A gift of heart, I offer all.

        I offer meals that feed the poor; 

        I offer songs to cheer them more. 

        I offer tears that mourn with all.

        A gift of heart, I offer all.

I offer hand that hoe and till.

I offered, too, a carpenter’s skill, 

I offer hands that harvest fall—

A gift of heart, I offer all.

        I offer a voice to light the dawn,

        I offer movement, lithe and long. 

        I offer, hands that sculpt and draw;

        A gift of heart, I offer all.

I offered time to hear a friend; 

I offer care to help hurts mend. 

I offer love to ease the fall.

A gift of heart, I offer all.

        I offer prayers that plead for mine— 

        I offer litanies divine.  

        I offer thanks for blessings full.

        A gift of heart, I offer all.

I offer strength to lean upon. 

I offer cheer to speed you on 

And confidence to help stand tall— 

A gift of heart, I offer all.

        I offer a heart who’s broken girth 

        Yearns for peace and healing truth. 

        I offer faith as such had Paul.

        A gift of heart, I offer all.

I offer wisdom learned from God: 

With me, come seek the iron rod. 

I offer lips to drink the gaul; 

A gift of heart, I offer all.

        I offer a soul that cries: “Send me!” 

        I offer truth—He died for thee. 

        My head bowed I accept the call: 

        I give my heart, I offer all.

I wrote this poem in response to a theme my mom (Nancy Kathleen Burton Wagstaff)  and her counselors picked for a Stake Women's Conference:  "Gift of Heart"

It took me a few days.  When I was done, I gave it to mom and she used it--at least part of it--during the Conference.