Category: Life according to Angela

Lost

I lost the diamond from my wedding ring today. I had been everywhere inside and outside the house. I was calm, but felt like I had been kicked in the stomach. Things have not been easy lately, but I have felt supported and strengthened by unseen hands. I knew that I would find the diamond if it was important that I did.

So I prayed, and asked myself if it was important.

I knew that the diamond didn’t define my marriage. I knew that Richard wouldn’t be angry. I lost it because I was working so hard that I didn’t even notice that my ring was smashed, the prongs all askew.

As I searched the gravel of our yard and through boxes and shelves in the garage, I tried to gain the courage to not tell Richard until we had money again, maybe in 15 years or so.

I thought of all the women I know who have lost a diamond. I thought of the reward I would offer the movers if they found it.

My kids helped me look, and somehow I knew it had to be in the gravel in the front yard, which meant that it was gone forever. I pulled out one of the several rings that Richard has given me over the years and slipped it on my finger, ready to live without my wedding ring.

But then Timothy ran inside. He was holding the diamond, not daring to believe that he had found it. It was in the gravel in our front yard. When I hugged him, I felt his heart racing. What a lovey. I hugged and kissed everyone and said another prayer.

I guess that it was important to find it. Although I knew that my marriage and my faith didn’t hinge on the diamond, I was reminded that I’m known and loved. God is in the details of our lives.

This has been a summer of miracles for me and our family. In my efforts to be in charge of my life, I have been humbled as I have had evidence that it’s not my hands which control what happens. That’s a great comfort, because I’m pretty weak and shortsighted.

Girls’ Camp: check.

Shamrock Headbands seemed like a good idea at the time... (Photo stolen from Emily's Facebook post.) 😉

Pioneer Trek and Girls’ Camp are finished. I am tired and there is dirt embedded in my nails, but it’s been a good few weeks with the youth.

The smell of an afternoon rain shower is so soothing. I feel relaxed and ready to take on the next hurdle: our move to Utah.

We’re leaving the desert after 7 years and these recent experiences with the youth don’t make it very easy to leave.

If I think, “Where will we be next month?” I just have a dark space which doesn’t include our house or our friends. It still doesn’t seem real, but as I take down our photos from the walls and we begin to fill in the trampoline hole in the back yard, I see that it is real and that our mark on this house is being carefully erased. I find myself growing less concerned about the house and more concerned about the impact we have made in our little community. I hope that we have made a difference.

Record

I’ve been looking through old photographs to find a picture of my friend’s son who passed away last Friday. I found him. There he was at a Primary activity in Austin back in 1997. The children were dressed in pajamas and I was telling the children “bedtime” stories. And there he was, a member of my Primary choir at the ward Christmas party, dressed as a shepherd. I will send these to his mother who is a dear friend.

I love photos. They help to reinforce the memories of dear friends and family. When I go to a party, you can find me in the corner looking through the family’s photo albums and scrapbooks. When people come to visit, I pull out the photos and hope to find a funny one from our past for them to take home. And when someone is having a hard time I try to find a photo that will cheer them.

I hope my small offering helps my friend. It’s a record that her son’s life lives in my memory, too.

Goals and patterns

I don’t think of myself as a goal-oriented person because I don’t make New Year’s resolutions and if I make a goal, I rarely write it down. However, I do try to establish patterns in my life. One of those patterns is to read a book a week. Oh, snap. Now it’s written down.

I made this goal after I learned that President Bush read a book a week. If he could do it, so could I. (You can read whatever you want into that comment.) I’ve never made it to 52 books a year (and I mean grown-up books!), but it doesn’t matter. Sometimes I pick up a 900 page novel and that’s just not going to be finished in a week… unless it’s Tolstoy. Sometimes life gets too busy, but I don’t scold myself.

With my schedule, I can only read little bits here and there when I am waiting in the car and this doesn’t amount to a lot of progress. I also don’t have a lot of evenings available. What this means is that I usually have to dedicate a day each week to reading. It’s a pajama day. It’s the day we have a meal from the freezer for dinner. It’s usually a Monday or a Tuesday. I still teach and oversee school, but I do minimal housework. It’s one of my favorite days of the week. It brings me into focus. It makes me feel spoiled. The kids like it, too, because they have a little more freedom.

Do you have a goal or pattern of living that feeds your soul?

Frontier

Each of us lives to forge a path through a frontier, a place no one has traveled. I don’t count myself as unique in my feelings, but it feels a bit lonely in my frontier today. Motherhood has always felt like parting curtain after curtain over vistas I could barely imagine. Paige has been the little pioneer who has borne the task of living the results of my reactions to each new vista.

I realized this week that my vision for my children during the past few years hasn’t stretched much past the age of 15. We’ve passed that ridge and now I feel more than a little suspended. I don’t want Paige to feel as suspended as I do. To whom can I talk? I worked for years to build a community among home educators here, but as the years have passed, Paige and Daniel’s age group has dwindled.  In our church congregation I am one of the oldest mothers. Paige has no one her age who attends church. She never complains. I just keep telling her that Heavenly Father knows where she lives and that it will all work out. My question, through my certain knowledge of God’s hand in our lives is, “What do we do now?”

I feel a little jump of excitement inside for whatever is next. We’ll figure it out like we always do, remembering that Heavenly Father knows where we are.

You’ve got to have fun

I teach Newton’s Laws of motion using a hovercraft. A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to teach a large group of elementary age children. One of the parents snapped these photos and I am so glad to have them. It was just a fun day. Daniel was my helper.

 We had a father and a grandfather there and I was so glad that they were willing to help. Timothy, Mark, and Daniel all took rides, but I don’t have photos of all of them.

I think this picture is hilarious. My favorite part of the class was after the kids left and all of the adults took a turn on the hovercraft.

The villain speaks truth

Claudius in Hamlet has some of the best lines. To hide my nerdy nature, I had to hold myself back from quoting him last night to my friend who had just told me about all her troubles.

When sorrows come, they come not single spies,

But in battalions. (Hamlet, 4.5)

 

I think about this quote as I try to juggle all of my responsibilities (and do a poor job of it):

 And, like a man to double business bound,

I stand in pause where I shall first begin,

And both neglect. (Hamlet, 3.3)

Claudius also knows what women like to hear. To Ophelia, who was too crazy at the time to appreciate it:

How do you, pretty lady?

 

Pretty Ophelia–

 

And a little reminder to me to be more purposeful in my prayers,

My words fly up, my thoughts remain below.

Words without thoughts never to heaven go.

(Hamlet, 3.3)

Do you have any Shakespeare in your pocket that you can draw from now and then? If not, then you should. There is something comforting in being understood. And that guy understood people.

 

Desert Friends

Here are some of us at the youth temple trip. It was a good day and 5 of these youth brought family names to the temple. They like family history work and they love the temple.

I smile at the permanent connections that are forged through this service with the youth. T. Nay was a scout leader in this ward, but the first time I met him was when I was 16 and he was a scout leader with my dad. One of the women in my presidency is Lucille S’s niece. Lucille served with my mom when my mom was Young Women president. I didn’t stay in Provo, but despite this, in this tiny town we meet and continue the tapestry of our relationships with these families.

I don’t think that it is a coincidence that there are certain people in our lives with whom we learn and serve. The individual nature of Christ’s rescue and concern is evidenced in the people which seem to be hand-picked for us to meet. We need them and they need us and my obscure location matters little because the Lord finds a way to continue the ties and raise up friends and associates to help us.

Some days it feels lonely in this desert, but I just need to think about the people I know here and it doesn’t seem as barren.

What to do?

Richard

It’s Sunday, and that usually means extra church meetings for Richard and me. But today is special because it’s a rare, unscheduled 5th Sunday.

What to do?

I think I’ll take some time and reflect about the week. It was a big week.

The mornings brought seminary, school, visitors, and a trip to Tucson for some scriptures.

The afternoons involved more school, violin teaching, a bike ride with friends, grocery shopping, cleaning, playing with friends, a birthday party, and Piano Guild Auditions.

In the evenings, we had 4 baseball games, 2 practices, 3 ballet classes, one night working with the missionaries, Scout meetings, a Young Women activity, and one night out to dinner to celebrate the end of Piano Guild auditions. We had a youth temple trip all day on Saturday.

What do all of these activities have in common?

They produced a lot of laundry, my magnum opus.

I’ve learned that doing laundry provides a special key to knowledge about my family. As I empty pockets, I discover what is important to my little people. I see who played outside on the grass enough (I don’t hate grass stains. I encourage them.) and who needs to shower more often. I see evidence of baseball feats of skill, ballet workouts, weight training, bicycling (Love those mud stains up the back of the shirts…), and dirt play (which I also encourage). I can’t say that I love doing laundry, but I take pride in doing it and caring for our clothing.

We wear many clothes and play many roles, and it was a happy family reunion on Friday when our schedules eventually collided and we all met at the restaurant to celebrate a year of piano effort. The kids were dressed up in their Sunday best. Mark’s face was probably a bit sticky from birthday party food, I looked a bit bedraggled, and Richard was clad in his work outfit.

After a Saturday evening laundry marathon, the piles of laundry are neatly folded in their baskets and they smell fresh. It was a good week and now I get to enjoy this day of rest.