Ready for Valentine's?

There were no crowds at the gym this January. I even got up an hour early so that I could be sure to park and find a machine to work out on. Considering that I already basically live on Eastern time, that was pretty early. I smugly did my workout, just sure that by the time I left, crowds of people in their new Christmas sweats would be swarming all around me, desperate for exercise.

I was wrong.

Which was good, because I could stop getting up at 3:30, but also bad, because where were the exercisers? As annoying as a crowded gym is, it is gratifying to see people--at least for three weeks of the year--seeing the need for exercise.

Well, to my surprise, it hit this week. Yesterday and today, I had to park so far away from the gym that I didn't really need the gym quite so much by the time I arrived at it on foot.

Really? That many people thought, "I'd better get a good workout in before my hot Valentines' date!"? Like, two workouts is going to solve your problem? Amusing.

I knew that Valentine's Day was not going to be a big deal for us because my husband has to work and we don't have any money.

We made homemade valentines with the children. Our baby decided to decorate all of his with stamps. He confided to me that he had used a stamp saying, "Kiss!" on Daddy's valentine. "He'll have to kiss me when I give him his valentine!" he exulted. Daddy overheard and snickered silently to himself. Later, the baby told me, showing me the back of the heart, "Daddy will have to kiss me AND hug me! Look!" I updated Paul so he wouldn't blow his cue.

The finished valentines went into a basket on the counter. I didn't give it much more thought.

Which was bad. Huge faux pas time, honest.

Last night, I was working fiercely on writing something that seemed urgent at the time when my husband came home. I shared with him what I was doing and, good sport that he is, he listened and advised. I remember he brought up Valentine's Day twice. Once, to say he thought he would slide the kids' valentines under their bedroom doors. "Good idea," I responded. Twice, to ask about the valentines I had made. "Sure, put mine with them, too."

It wasn't until I got to the gym this morning that I realized that I basically told my husband--without meaning to--to go find his own valentine out of the stack while I was too busy to look at him.

Following that grim realization, I found my valentine from him in my gym bag when I went to shower.

Yes, he can be very cute.

So I reversed my position on purchasing a cookie to decorate from the employee's association at work, and bought one for Paul in order to make up for my lack of romantic thought last night. He can find it when he gets home. Kissing and hugging will be optional.

Enjoy!

Over the holidays, I think I pretty much proved my theory that I cannot gain weight if I only eat one small sugary treat a day. . .and that I will if I eat more. But, honestly, I got through the holidays without really any weight gain. Yay! There was some fluctuation, but on January 2, I actually weighed less than I had on Halloween.

I think that finally, after years of effort and frustration, trying what I thought was my best, I have figured out the solution for myself. It involves, yes, eating healthy and daily exercise, but that's to be expected.

I think somewhere in the back of my mind, I thought that if I could just lose the weight I'd gained from having five babies in middle age, I could then eat whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, and in whatever amount I wanted. I think I was erroneously looking to exercise to void bad eating.

Acceptance of the concept that I actually have to adopt new habits and rules came slowly.

But, one day, in the midst of the holiday season, I heard two people say something about being on a diet, and I realized: I'm not on a diet--I just keep my rules. It was the most freeing thought I think I'd ever had. Because I can eat whatever I want--just not too much of it if it is not good for me.

I mean, if we really like a new shampoo, we don't get right back in the shower and use it again, right? Or go for another walk right after an invigorating walk? Why is it so hard to enjoy a small something and then quit there? Why does a two-cookie snack become a six-cookie snack? Maybe we don't take the time to savor our treat as much as we should--we just wolf it down. Or maybe a bowl full of four scoops of ice cream has become a "normal" serving to us.

Right now, I am fifteen pounds over what I want to be. Fifteen doesn't sound too bad, but imagine trying to hide fifteen packages of butter under your clothes and have them not show! It's no wonder some of my clothes don't fit. Fifteen pounds of butter equals 60 squares.

I overheard someone asking a friend what she could reward herself with if she lost fifteen pounds. Her suggestions were all naughty food, and it got me thinking. Maybe we jump to food as a reward when we could really think of something else we would enjoy just as much. I bet I could think of sixty things I could let myself enjoy as much as food, if I let myself:

A gorgeous sky.

A tall glass of cold water.

A hug from a child.

Chatting with a friend.

A hot shower when I'm cold.

Flowers.

A reunion.

Trying something another way and finding it works.

Seeing my mother's face on a child.

Being on time.

A nap.

A walk.

The feel of cool water when I'm hot.

A good haircut.

An intriguing novel.

Watching a play.

Watching someone you love achieve something they want.

A vivid color.

Writing on a clean sheet of paper.

Making someone laugh.

An organized drawer.

Learning something new.

Counted cross-stitch.

Getting things done early.

Receiving mail that isn't a bill.

A good cry.

A favorite movie.

A long, hot bath.

A holiday.

Snuggling with a loved one.

Learning about an ancestor.

Looking at houses.

Playing a game.

Working a Sudoku.

Spring.

Reading with a child.

Art.

A clean house.

Fresh laundry.

A massage.

Pine trees.

All the bills paid.

A new item of clothing.

Classical music.

A good story.

Going to bed before dusk and watching the room glow at the point of sunset.

A valentine.

A day off work.

Rain.

Exchanging knowing smiles.

A message.

Clockwork.

An anniversary.

Passing off a song.

Using nice dishes.

Soft fabric or blanket.

Pastel colors in an Easter basket.

Time.

Love.

Understanding someone or something.

What's on your list?

May I Hang up Your Coat?

I seem to have a manic decorator in my midst. And I mean "midst" quite literally, as this creative energy is bursting from a middle child, starting with her bedroom in the center of the house.

It started with her posting ALL of the pictures from one calendar side by side on her bedroom wall. The calendar featured whimsical fairies in various poses and costumes, so seemed really quite typical for a little girl's tastes, and I let it slide without comment. A few months later, more pictures--original artwork this time--appeared on her walls. Again, it was her room, so no big deal.

Lately, however, her walls have become more crowded. I frowned when I saw her backpack and her jacket nailed up by her bedroom door, as though she lived in a log cabin, and those have come down.

A couple of weeks ago, she helped her baby brother clean his room. I was thrilled, touched, relieved--all the positive feelings a mother can have in such an event as that. Until bedtime, when I went in and saw dozens of stickers plastered all over his closet doors.

It seems to be getting worse. The other night, I noticed her brown hair ribbon push-pinned into the wall among dozens of other things and asked her about it. Like, really, a hair ribbon!? She tucked her chin down in her shy way and said that she and her brother had been playing, and that had been his leash.

That there is no room for anything else has not slowed her down. Tacked up among what can really be called pictures are the following: a dream catcher, documents, a list of phone numbers, butterfly stickers, a paper doll, cutouts from magazines, a table of measures, an ad for Utah tourism, a CD, a cootie catcher, Primary handouts, a pedigree chart, photographs, bookmarks, and a plastic key chain with the six "Be's."

I'm not sure where she got her supply of push-pins, but she even has a broken lamp tacked up by string next to her bed so she can read at night, and--get this!--her scriptures.

Hilarious!

The hair ribbon in the wall led to a discussion about the growing vertical hoarding, and I made a rule: nothing else goes up without permission. She's a girl who quietly goes about doing the things that come into her mind. Most of her ideas are good--she's very thoughtful and helpful. But I've talked to her many times over the years of her life about not cutting and/or drawing on things that are not meant to be cut and/or drawn on.

Despite all this, last night, I found myself staring at flowers and stars drawn in orange and green magic marker on her light switch. I just pointed to it.

She blushed and got her shy look. We looked at each other.

"I'll wash it off," she said, barely audibly.

Earlier, she had asked if she could hang her science fair certificate. The certificate is not for winning, just for participating. I looked up from my perch on the kitchen floor where I sort the laundry into piles each Friday evening. "Yes," I said, "but take something else down."

I thought we finally understood each other. I really did.

Then, this morning, there was a squabble. I let my husband handle it because I was on my way to drive a teenager to two events (you know how it is) and get to a meeting of my own that was to start at the same time. (I was soon to arrive at the meeting giggling at this chapter of my hilarious life.) He put both this child and a different brother on time-out chairs. When I made a mad dash back in to get my wedding rings, I found out why.

My daughter and her brother had been fighting over whether or not she could hang up some things in his room.

In Matters of Evil, the Need to be Bilingual

What's more important--the desires of a person who has declared war on his family, or the cognitive development and safety of a child?

We seem to get this wrong every time.

Think carefully. A child holds the future in his mind. The healthier his experiences, the more wholesome the future world will be. A person who chooses to treat his children's lifeblood and caretaker with hostility has already dug a gulch under his children's feet that promises to cave in their world. Why, in the name of everything and anything, should he have any right--or opportunity--to pursue his sick agenda?

We can pretty much know that everything such a person does or says is designed to further his evil purposes. He whines about supervised visits not being private enough? Should we follow the flowchart to a) let him conduct them at his house then, or b) realize it's too bad he caused this consequence?

Josh Powell simply could not have carried out his plot to murder his children if the visit had taken place in public. Not that one, anyway. Why make it easy for him?

In order to prove to the world that he was not a murderer, he took the lives of his innocent sons. In order to prove that he should have custody of them, he blew them up. If anyone was still believing him, they shouldn't be able to now.

Although, people who insist on being blind to the truth have the capacity to invent numerous ways to continue being stupid. There is probably someone somewhere who will say that he just felt so bad at not regaining custody that he couldn't help himself.

But the rest of us need to get better at reading the subtext. Otherwise, evil keeps winning. Violence continues. Tiny children not protected from its poison grow up to perpetrate it to the next generation. If they live that long. We need to do a lot better at handling this in our society. Thousands--even millions--of children are in a similar situation. Fortunately, most such situations do not end quite so spectacularly. Many, in fact, are never resolved, but the emotional, spiritual, and mental devastation that go along with exposure to a disturbed parent wreak havoc in children, and the poison of abuse continues to spread.

We can't go on just believing what people say. We have to listen to what they do. We have to see, for example, that a dead woman in a canal is a murder. But that's another story.

Those of us who have taken a crash course and become fluent in abuser-speak never believed a word Josh Powell said.

What he said: he was a good father who would never harm his children--or anyone--and should have custody. The truth is in the news.

What he said: he had nothing to do with his wife's disappearance--she happened to run off (without her purse and keys) with some other man at the same moment he took his sons on a midnight camping trip to the middle of nowhere in subzero temperatures. The truth: Mommy was in the trunk, and he had two big fans aimed at a wet spot on the living room carpet.

What he said: Susan, his wife, was a promiscuous flirt. The truth: he and his father were both out of control sexually and viewed women and children as possessions, not people.

What he said: he would publish her journals in order to prove her character. The truth: in so saying, he proved his character and his crime. He would have no right to publish her journals if she were still alive. He, alone, knew for certain that she wasn't.

And Sunday was not just a bad day for poor Josh. It takes time to amass ten gallons of gasoline and lay out a foolproof plan. He gave away their toys several days ahead of time. Then there are all the goodbye emails (complete with attempts at beyond-the-grave-control). This was completely premeditated. (Why he requested privacy.)

If Theodore Hesburgh was right that "The best thing a man can do for his children is to love their mother," the converse holds true that turning abuse on their mother is among the worst things he can do to his children.

But evil never wins in the end. Josh didn't take the children with him. In order to keep his wife's parents from raising his children, he transferred custody permanently to his wife, where, in the words of their grandfather, they are finally "safe" from him. I trust heaven has enough good in it to heal them from the horror of their last moments.

And that he is still burning.

Have Yourself a Sturdy Little Christmas

The cards. The baking. The decorating. The shopping. The gifts. The clothing. The caroling. The calories. The nativity play. The parties. The tree. The family get-togethers. The office get-together. The church services. The neighbor cookie plates.

How many things are on your list?

For many people, Christmas spells S-T-R-E-S-S!

If we don't do it all--and do it perfectly--will we ruin Christmas? For us or for others--which one bothers us more?

Over the years, I've learned to do some things to reduce my Christmas stress. Aspects of poverty and illness have forced me to. Most of these things could boil down to simplifying and doing things ahead.

I've forgiven myself--well, sort of--for not sending Christmas cards for several years running, and counting. Maybe next year.

While listening to the Church-wide devotional Sunday, one word caught my attention. President Uchtdorf said that Christmas is sturdier than we think. Sturdy. I like it!

Christmas has, after all, endured all these years. If I don't have the time, health, or means to do some part of Christmas, it won't go away. Other people are keeping up the traditions I've temporarily dropped. They'll still be there when I'm ready to pick them up again.

My thoughts lit happily on that word, sturdy, and then they went even deeper. What is Christmas, anyway? Is it the cards? The songs? The parties? The tree? All of those things are simply ways to celebrate what Christmas is. Christmas is a celebration of the most--maybe only--completely perfect gift ever given: the gift of a Savior to redeem the people in a darkened world. A gift so miraculous that no one but God could ever pull it off. A gift so perfect that no one needs to--nor can--improve upon it. No one can add to or detract from it one bit. No one can stop it from being given. It was given. Perfectly. Whole and complete. For everyone who ever lived or ever will live on the earth.

So, the things we do at Christmas time are all options for celebrating that gift. Some are perfect and miraculous in themselves. Some are generous. Some are merely well-intentioned. But they are all meant to help us remember God's gift to us and find joy in our knowledge of that. All of our Christmas gifts, songs, parties, and offerings put together can't make up Christmas. They only reflect it. Imperfectly. And that's okay, because that's the best we can do.

The best we can do to celebrate Christmas at a given time is perfectly okay. No stress necessary.

Maybe, just maybe, it's actually. . .arrogant of us to think we can ruin Christmas.

Let's do what gives us joy without giving us stress, and then sit back and enjoy it.

The Great Grape Pie

A mystery is brewing in my basement.

It might not be a mystery to everyone who lives here, but it is becoming one to me.

Of course, I don't always know much of what goes on here, because while I'm at work, the rest of my family is living their lives--especially when school is out--here in the house without me, and I have to keep up solely by reading Facebook postings.

Yesterday, I learned via Facebook that Paul had the kids squeezing "the jelly from [the] eyes" of the grapes that had been hurriedly harvested from the back fence on the first cold day and had been sitting in a basket on the counter ever since.

We've lived in this house for ten years, with grapes living out their lives and marrying, having babies and affairs and dying without any notice from us. So why the grapes had to be saved was the first part of the mystery.

But the Facebook post that something was actually being done with them was probably good news, as the grapes had started throwing parties there on the counter without the permission of their landlords.

Paul asked for suggestions from his peeps on what to do with the grapes, and got several, but decided for whatever reason to post, "I think pie!"

Grape pie is, to me, somewhat of a mystery all by itself.

When I got home from work yesterday, Paul was, of course, at work, and the children informed me that the pie was not yet ready. This was odd, but I accepted it.

Today when I got home from work, my children informed me again that the pie was still not ready. Possibly tomorrow.

I am really wondering now what kind of grape pie takes three days to make.

"Daddy had to watch two really long movies today," I was told.

"We made the crust today!" I was reassured.

This is all complicated by the fact that we are now using what Paul sort of termed the service quarters kitchen downstairs one day when he was feeling isolated cooking down there. I won't quote what he actually said, because it's just not PC, but it had to do with what kind of "help" he was feeling like at the moment. This downstairs kitchen is, well, downstairs, down a hall, around the corner, and the third light on your right.

If we didn't need the stove in it--currently the only functioning stove in the house--none of us would ever venture in there at all.

Personally, I haven't been in there since I blew out the fire I caused by forgetting all about the eggs I was boiling. And threw away my mother's pan.

Maybe I'll go down and check out this mystery for myself. Or not. I think I'll let the mystery play itself out. It's providing an interesting thread in this section of the tapestry of our hilarious lives.

Seeing It Both Ways

On Sunday, a daughter in a white dress with beautiful peacock trim harassed me for two hours over it feeling uncomfortable. She looked lovely in it. I even felt inspired to take a picture of her.

But, she's slim, and she needed a slip to help prevent a gap between the dress and her torso. And the slip straps tended to fall down occasionally. And sometimes, the dress (or the slip) was itchy.

"Welcome to the world of being female," I wanted to say.

Actually, I was torn. I could see it both ways.

Because there was nothing really wrong with her outfit and she'd even worn it before, I wanted her to stick it out. I want her to develop some emotional stamina and not need to give in as soon as something becomes difficult to deal with.

On the other hand, I don't believe women should put up with a ridiculous amount of discomfort just to look pretty.

We all draw our own lines between comfort and appearance. I want my daughter to learn to do this for herself. I tried to talk to her about it. From outside the dress, it was hard for me to tell just how bad her discomfort was. It seemed minor. This daughter reminds me of Scout in To Kill a Mockingbird, and pulls this rather often.

I talked to her about the dress and determined that she does like it. I talked to her about the idea of clothing rotation, and that if she wants to keep this dress, she should wear it sometimes. I asked her questions, but she didn't say much. She made faces and squirmed. I encouraged her to put it out of her mind. Part of that was for her benefit, but, honestly, it was also to accommodate my duties at church. Helping her change, at that point, would curtail my timeliness.

She kept it up after the services started. I put my arm around her and encouraged her. I said, "It's only three hours," but I think she heard, "It's only three days."

She squirmed. She frowned. She made faces. She scratched. She flounced. She pulled at her clothes. She huffed, and she puffed, and she blew my patience in.

"You're not the worst-off person in the world," I whispered to her as the sacrament song began.

I have sometimes wondered about the worst-off person in the world. Who would it be? And what would s/he have to be suffering to earn that distinction? It makes me shudder, but, still, it has crossed my mind more than once.

This comes from my own moderation of self-pity as I go to work each day and see people whose lives are--no matter what my current challenges may be--quite likely to be worse than mine. I see people who have made stupid mistakes--like tatooing the F word onto their body, as though getting a job weren't hard enough. I see people flattened by an unbelievable series of misfortunes. I see people who've never known anyone who didn't live in poverty--who have no family members who have ever finished high school or held a job. I see people who have piled so many barriers onto their own heads, it seems it would take a Resurrection or an archeological dig to unearth them. I see people who "did everything right" but woke up to find their health gone forever.

I've developed a mantra that has helped me keep perspective: You can always find someone better off and worse off than you are.

Whenever my mind has veered to wonder about THE WORST-OFF PERSON in the world, I imagine it must be someone in incredible pain, in a horrible victim situation, or being tortured. I can't think about it for long. My one comfort is the hope and likelihood that no one person occupies that place for very long. Hopefully, she or he mercifully dies, recovers, or is replaced shortly by someone in an even worse situation.

I'm sure it's something only God can track.

But, as I said those words to my daughter while the introduction to the sacrament song played in my ears and my hands opened the hymn book to the right page and offered it to share with her and my eyes caught some of the words of the song, I had an amazing insight.

I knew who the worst-off person in the whole world had been.

It had not occurred to me before, but, surely, the person who had ever suffered the most pain, the most agony, the heaviest burden, EVER, had to have been Jesus.

This surprised me, because I tend to think of Jesus as the best-off person. I mean, He was perfect. He's the Chosen One, the Beloved Son, an exalted God. He can do anything.

And then I thought again about the paradoxes in the gospel that always mystify me. The last shall be first. The greatest must be the least. The poor in spirit and meek inherit the earth. He who loseth himself shall find himself. If you seek riches in order to do good and not for yourself, then you will find them. To gain all, you must sacrifice everything. I think about the balance this gives.

And this brought an even better insight.

Long ago, I noticed that, while men generally build things in straight lines, God builds in circles. All fruits are round in some way. The earth, the sun, the planets and stars, orbits, atoms, body parts--round. Circular patterns in almost everything--the cycle of life, the water cycle, the cycles of systems in our bodies--reproductive cycle, circulatory system.

Advanced building.

And then I pictured two opposites--the dichotomies inherent in the gospel--filling out to make a round shape. The worst and the best on opposite sides of each other in a circle.

As God breathes life into these opposites--or fills them with spirit--they become a round whole.

As we achieve balance, as we are directed to do, we achieve a kind of wholeness that is our perfect form. We must be humble to be great. We must give to receive. We must forget ourselves to be remembered on the rolls of heaven.

Just one more way God builds--US--in circles.

So I struck some balance with my daughter. After she had suffered for half of the time of church in her dress, I took her home to change. But I felt unsettled, so I eventually asked a friend who has good sense what she would have done with a child whose clothes were uncomfortable at church.

"Have them stick it out," she said. Then, she reflected on her words and added, "But, sometimes, I think how I would feel in that position, and if I were really too uncomfortable, I might take myself home to change."

So, there I had it again--balance.

I guess I didn't do too badly, after all.

Except for the part where I lost patience. So I'll keep practicing on my balance beam until, through God's grace and with His help, I can round out to be whole.