Tonight, we pulled out the packet of scripture story pictures you get when they rope you into teaching Primary. Olivia was looking through them, and spontaneously started reciting what she knew about each picture. It took me a few minutes to recognize a hilariously precious moment, but after a few stories, I grabbed my camera and started recording. I am working on downloading some of those, but I want to capture what she told us about the picture of the First Vision, which is one of the stories I missed with the camera. So, as near as I can recall, here is what Olivia knows about the first vision:
"This guy is Joseph Smith, and these guys are Heavenly Father and Jesus Joseph went into the woods to pray, but it was very dark and he got lost, and was very scared, so he knelt down to pray, and..... oh, wait a minute, before he left home, he prayed to know which church to join, then he went into the woods to pray, and it was very dark because he didn't choose the right. Well, he tried to choose the right, so he kept praying. Then Heavenly Father and Jesus appeared to him and told him to join none of the churches for they were all wrong.
Then he went home and told his mother what happened. And she believed him, because mothers should always believe their children."
P.S. I love teaching Primary. I was not roped into it. Well, maybe I was at first, but now I love it. Best church job ever.
P.P.S. Irony is playing Hangman with your Primary kids to get them to guess the word resurrection. It didn't really hit me until we had to hang the poor guy before they figured out what the word was.
P.P.P.S. Olivia also said that she never wants to get married. Because she doesn't want to die in childbirth.
Sunday, April 21, 2013
Sunday, April 14, 2013
Twenty second
Ah, the old jokes have begun. The cracks about the candle factories and fire extinguishers.
The thing is, those jokes are only funny when you are still young. So they were really funny this year, at least to those of us who were making them about Alisa. Not so much to Alisa, who does not appreciate how young and beautiful and full of potential she still is.
The really funny moment came when Alisa opened her mouth, and something that I say ALL THE TIME, came out of it. It has begun! She is slowly but surely turning into HER mother, just as I am turning into mine. You can't help it. It is inevitable. If you are lucky, you have a mother who starts out as, and remains throughout your life, the voice inside your head. Does that mean I can stop nagging her now?
At any rate, we had a lovely dinner and a lovely cake that was a new recipe that I had never tried before and will never try again. It was nasty. I do believe I owe her a better birthday cake.
You are never too old to make a wish and blow out candles. Only I think that instead of the birthday person getting to make a wish for what they want, the mother of the birthday person should get to make a wish. Mothers know best after all.
I don't know what she wished for, but I would have wished for her good health, safety in her travels, hard work, (even though she has already had quite a bit of that this year), cheerfulness, good fortune, and plenty of beach time in the sun. Also, I would wish that she would go to church once in a while. Oh, well, no matter where she winds up, I am awfully glad she is mine. Twenty two years went by way too fast, but having Alisa for all those years has been a wonderful adventure, and I can't wait to see where she goes next.
The thing is, those jokes are only funny when you are still young. So they were really funny this year, at least to those of us who were making them about Alisa. Not so much to Alisa, who does not appreciate how young and beautiful and full of potential she still is.
The really funny moment came when Alisa opened her mouth, and something that I say ALL THE TIME, came out of it. It has begun! She is slowly but surely turning into HER mother, just as I am turning into mine. You can't help it. It is inevitable. If you are lucky, you have a mother who starts out as, and remains throughout your life, the voice inside your head. Does that mean I can stop nagging her now?
don't waste
your time
on me
You're already
the voice inside
my head
At any rate, we had a lovely dinner and a lovely cake that was a new recipe that I had never tried before and will never try again. It was nasty. I do believe I owe her a better birthday cake.
Saturday, April 6, 2013
Reason Number 13473
One of the many reasons I love Audrey: Tonight, all the boys at our house were gone to the priesthood meeting at the conference center. Whic means that me and the girls had the TV to ourselves, so of course we went and got some chocolate and a movie. And the movie Audrey picked? Spiderman. I said we were having a girls night. I said we should pick a chick flick, something we could never get away with watching when the boys were home. No, she said. I'm not into all the mushy romantic stuff anyway, she said. I would rather watch Spiderman. THAT is my girl! No Twilight crap for the women in this house, it's action/adventure and sci fi all the way. Also, she picked strawberries for her treat tonight. Over chocolate. Not sure where she got THAT preference from, but I like it. And I like her.
Here is another reason to love Audrey: she is over 200 pages into writing her book. She spent almost her entire spring break writing. She is not yet ready to share the plot or to let anyone read any of it. She wants to finish the first draft. So I have no idea what it is about, but I'm excited to find out, and I'm amazed that she has stuck to this project for so long and come so far.
Here is another reason to love Audrey: she is over 200 pages into writing her book. She spent almost her entire spring break writing. She is not yet ready to share the plot or to let anyone read any of it. She wants to finish the first draft. So I have no idea what it is about, but I'm excited to find out, and I'm amazed that she has stuck to this project for so long and come so far.
Thursday, April 4, 2013
Home Visits
One of my favorite days in Haiti was the day I volunteered to go out as part of a team on home visits. This is where one of our clinic docs would take a few of us and, with a Haitian guide/interpreter, would travel out into the mountains to visit people who were too sick to get to the clinic.
Talk about humbling.
We visited four home in the course of an afternoon. Each home was located progressively further from the clinic, and they were all at least two miles apart from each other. And they each required a major hike to get to. I can't begin to describe the steepness and the roughness of the trail. Keep in mind that a major hurricane had hit the area just the week before we were there. The trails, which were not much to begin with, had been washed away in the storm, making them extremely difficult to navigate. Some parts of them you just had to grab on to roots, grasses, rocks, branches- whatever you could find to assist in dragging you up that mountain.
After what seemed like an eternal hike, we reached the first home. It was a tiny shack in the middle of a clearing of tall trees, in the middle of nowhere. An 86 year old woman lived there alone with a few chickens and a nephew who visited her once in a while and tried his best to keep an eye on her. She was so tiny and frail, and when we looked inside her dark little house, I could not believe that people in the 21st century still lived like she was living. She had nothing. Of course there was no electricity and no running water. Dirt floor. That is all standard fair for the area we were in. But she had no furniture. She slept on a pile of blankets on the dirt. The front of her house was divided into two sections- one was a small area she had set up as a bed, and the other side was her storage area where she had some beans and rice stored. In the back of the house was a little cooking area- a place for a fire and a few cooking utensils. The whole structure was maybe 6x12 at the very biggest.
We took her blood pressure and gave her some ibuprofen for her arthritis pain. The doctor asked how she was doing and she said something to the effect of she did not feel like she was important enough to have the American doctor come to see her. We asked if she needed anything else, and she replied in her Haitian creole, "only God can help me now". We gave her some new crocs to wear, which she was slightly embarrassed and very pleased about, and left her there. I won't ever forget walking away from that place, that ancient little lady sitting in her chair, just outside her little shack in the middle of the mountains of Haiti, with her brand new pink crocs on her feet and a week's supply of ibuprofen in her hands.
We were only a few feet away from her house when we came across a big tree that had been uprooted and come crashing down on several other trees that had been surrounding it. Esai, our Haitian guide, told us that it was the hurricane from last week that had uprooted that tree. Upon hearing that, we turned around and took one last look at that little lady and her fragile, rickety little shack. How in the world had that shack stood up to the winds of the hurricane when that big tree had fallen? How in the world had that little lady sat inside her house while the wind blew and the rain fell, and come out alive?
Esai, who would turn out to be my hero, told us it was only a short walk to the next house. Take my word for it: a Haitian's idea of a short walk and an American's idea of a short walk are two very different things. It was again, at least a 2 mile up hill hike, up very rough rocky terrain. When we made it there, we could tell immediately that this was a much more prosperous family than the first lady. The first thing we saw was an older gentlemen threshing his beans. I think that is what they call it. He had a big pile of bean plants that he had gathered up onto a tarp and he was beating the plants with a stick to knock the beans off. Every once in a while he would stop and gather up every single bean that had fallen off the tarp. As we moved a little closer in, he smiled wide and posed for our pictures.
He was proud of his work and his home, and he had good reason to be proud.He had a nicer, airier home, although still little more than a shack. Inside of the home, we could see several pieces of heavy, ornately carved wooden furniture. It was beautiful. There was a bed with a huge carved headboard, and a buffet type thing with some beautiful china in it. I wondered who had carried that heavy furniture up the mountain, and how they had done it. This family also had a little garden, a green house and a cat. At the back of the house was another tiny dark little house. Inside the house was a young woman who was nine months pregnant. She was sitting in the dark, over an open fire, cooking a meal. She said she spent most of her day in there cooking. Haiti is hot and humid. I can't imagine the misery of sitting on a hard little stool all day, in heat and the dark, with the fire going, AND being nine months pregnant.
The doctor measured the carbon dioxide levels in the house, which not surprisingly were waaay too high to be safe, and encouraged her to get out and take breaks as often as she could. He wished her well with the birth of her baby. And we were on our way again.
The next part of the hike was absolutely excruciating. The longest part so far. Up, up, up to the very top of the mountain. We stopped to take pictures of the amazing views of the valley.
Then down through more rocks, around and around, then up again. We met an old man on the way who called me Blanca. We finally got to the river we had to cross only to be told by a young girl there that it was too dangerous to cross, and we had to walk further down. She stopped what she was doing, and led us on our way. It was at least a 30 minute walk down the river to where it was safer. She saw us all safely across the water, holding out her hand to us as we crossed, then showed us the way back to the trail. We thanked her and then she started back the way she had led us, to resume whatever it was she had been doing
We hiked up yet another muddy mountain, grabbing at roots and rock and whatever else we could find to help haul ourselves up. I would not have made it without Esai, who pretty much pushed and pulled me up to the top. And at the next stop we were greeted by a huge turkey and a darling little boy. The turkey was making all kinds of noise. The little boy was silent.
Inside this house was the little boy's mom, dad and little sister. At first I thought the dad must be the grandpa, because he looked so old. I would have guessed him to be in his 70's but then he told us he was only 46. He had such bad back pain he couldn't get out of bed. I have no idea how this little family made it's living. They all got new crocs, and we were on our way again. I bet that turkey has since been served as dinner.
Stop number three was actually not too far up the hill from the last place. These little kiddos lived at this home, and they had been to the clinic the day before. They were STINKERS, especially that little boy.
Their dad climbed up the hill with his machete and cut a bunch of sugar cane for us to take back with us. Like five foot long stalks of sugar cane. He was surprised and very happy that we wanted to take some of it. He really, really wanted to give us something in appreciation for visiting his home.
The next stop was the only time I every saw a fat Haitian. That's him at the bottom of this picture. Not bad for a beans and rice diet, eh? These guys were building a tomb for their grandparents, about 25 feet from the family home. The custom in Haiti seems to be to bury your relatives close by your home, in a cement tomb. I guess they figured Grandpa was getting close, and it was time to start construction. I am still puzzling about how they got all those bags of cement and sand up that infernal mountain.
This is not the greatest picture of their home, but this is the courtyard area between the two houses where this family lives. The guy in the orange shirt is our doctor. Just beyond where he is sitting is a CLIFF. There were four or five little kids running back and forth along that edge the whole time we were there. I was sure one of them was going to topple right off. Nobody else seemed to think anything of it. Crazy Haitians.
We hiked at least six or seven miles that day. We basically just made a giant circle, over and down one mountain then over and down another and then back to the clinic.By the time we got back, I was as bushed as I have ever been in my entire life. On our way back, the trail got extremely narrow and rocky and at certain points we were walking through mud and water along the edge of some pretty steep places. Slightly treacherous, especially as tired as we were. We were getting close to the end when we met an old man who was on his way back home after visiting the clinic. And I kid you not, he was barefoot and blind. I know, it sounds like something out of a movie, but it's true. He had walked probably two or three miles through the mountains by himself to see a doctor. We asked our guide if the old man needed help getting home, but he said no, he would be fine, he knew the way. What about the rocks, I thought. What about the water? What about the EDGE? I was barely making it through that trail, and I was 40 years younger, and had shoes AND sight.
That's Haiti for you. They run up mountains barefoot in the dark and think nothing of it. They chop down sugar cane for you as a parting gift. They send their kids out the door at five in the morning for a four hour walk to school. They will gladly take an hour or longer out of their day to show a bunch of strangers around a mountain. They are amazing.
Many of them will also steal your money and your shoes the first chance they get, but that is a story for another day.
Talk about humbling.
We visited four home in the course of an afternoon. Each home was located progressively further from the clinic, and they were all at least two miles apart from each other. And they each required a major hike to get to. I can't begin to describe the steepness and the roughness of the trail. Keep in mind that a major hurricane had hit the area just the week before we were there. The trails, which were not much to begin with, had been washed away in the storm, making them extremely difficult to navigate. Some parts of them you just had to grab on to roots, grasses, rocks, branches- whatever you could find to assist in dragging you up that mountain.
After what seemed like an eternal hike, we reached the first home. It was a tiny shack in the middle of a clearing of tall trees, in the middle of nowhere. An 86 year old woman lived there alone with a few chickens and a nephew who visited her once in a while and tried his best to keep an eye on her. She was so tiny and frail, and when we looked inside her dark little house, I could not believe that people in the 21st century still lived like she was living. She had nothing. Of course there was no electricity and no running water. Dirt floor. That is all standard fair for the area we were in. But she had no furniture. She slept on a pile of blankets on the dirt. The front of her house was divided into two sections- one was a small area she had set up as a bed, and the other side was her storage area where she had some beans and rice stored. In the back of the house was a little cooking area- a place for a fire and a few cooking utensils. The whole structure was maybe 6x12 at the very biggest.
We took her blood pressure and gave her some ibuprofen for her arthritis pain. The doctor asked how she was doing and she said something to the effect of she did not feel like she was important enough to have the American doctor come to see her. We asked if she needed anything else, and she replied in her Haitian creole, "only God can help me now". We gave her some new crocs to wear, which she was slightly embarrassed and very pleased about, and left her there. I won't ever forget walking away from that place, that ancient little lady sitting in her chair, just outside her little shack in the middle of the mountains of Haiti, with her brand new pink crocs on her feet and a week's supply of ibuprofen in her hands.
We were only a few feet away from her house when we came across a big tree that had been uprooted and come crashing down on several other trees that had been surrounding it. Esai, our Haitian guide, told us that it was the hurricane from last week that had uprooted that tree. Upon hearing that, we turned around and took one last look at that little lady and her fragile, rickety little shack. How in the world had that shack stood up to the winds of the hurricane when that big tree had fallen? How in the world had that little lady sat inside her house while the wind blew and the rain fell, and come out alive?
Esai, who would turn out to be my hero, told us it was only a short walk to the next house. Take my word for it: a Haitian's idea of a short walk and an American's idea of a short walk are two very different things. It was again, at least a 2 mile up hill hike, up very rough rocky terrain. When we made it there, we could tell immediately that this was a much more prosperous family than the first lady. The first thing we saw was an older gentlemen threshing his beans. I think that is what they call it. He had a big pile of bean plants that he had gathered up onto a tarp and he was beating the plants with a stick to knock the beans off. Every once in a while he would stop and gather up every single bean that had fallen off the tarp. As we moved a little closer in, he smiled wide and posed for our pictures.
The next part of the hike was absolutely excruciating. The longest part so far. Up, up, up to the very top of the mountain. We stopped to take pictures of the amazing views of the valley.
 |
| Those mountains? Yes. We climbed them. |
Then down through more rocks, around and around, then up again. We met an old man on the way who called me Blanca. We finally got to the river we had to cross only to be told by a young girl there that it was too dangerous to cross, and we had to walk further down. She stopped what she was doing, and led us on our way. It was at least a 30 minute walk down the river to where it was safer. She saw us all safely across the water, holding out her hand to us as we crossed, then showed us the way back to the trail. We thanked her and then she started back the way she had led us, to resume whatever it was she had been doing
We hiked up yet another muddy mountain, grabbing at roots and rock and whatever else we could find to help haul ourselves up. I would not have made it without Esai, who pretty much pushed and pulled me up to the top. And at the next stop we were greeted by a huge turkey and a darling little boy. The turkey was making all kinds of noise. The little boy was silent.
Inside this house was the little boy's mom, dad and little sister. At first I thought the dad must be the grandpa, because he looked so old. I would have guessed him to be in his 70's but then he told us he was only 46. He had such bad back pain he couldn't get out of bed. I have no idea how this little family made it's living. They all got new crocs, and we were on our way again. I bet that turkey has since been served as dinner.
Stop number three was actually not too far up the hill from the last place. These little kiddos lived at this home, and they had been to the clinic the day before. They were STINKERS, especially that little boy.
The next stop was the only time I every saw a fat Haitian. That's him at the bottom of this picture. Not bad for a beans and rice diet, eh? These guys were building a tomb for their grandparents, about 25 feet from the family home. The custom in Haiti seems to be to bury your relatives close by your home, in a cement tomb. I guess they figured Grandpa was getting close, and it was time to start construction. I am still puzzling about how they got all those bags of cement and sand up that infernal mountain.
This is not the greatest picture of their home, but this is the courtyard area between the two houses where this family lives. The guy in the orange shirt is our doctor. Just beyond where he is sitting is a CLIFF. There were four or five little kids running back and forth along that edge the whole time we were there. I was sure one of them was going to topple right off. Nobody else seemed to think anything of it. Crazy Haitians.
We hiked at least six or seven miles that day. We basically just made a giant circle, over and down one mountain then over and down another and then back to the clinic.By the time we got back, I was as bushed as I have ever been in my entire life. On our way back, the trail got extremely narrow and rocky and at certain points we were walking through mud and water along the edge of some pretty steep places. Slightly treacherous, especially as tired as we were. We were getting close to the end when we met an old man who was on his way back home after visiting the clinic. And I kid you not, he was barefoot and blind. I know, it sounds like something out of a movie, but it's true. He had walked probably two or three miles through the mountains by himself to see a doctor. We asked our guide if the old man needed help getting home, but he said no, he would be fine, he knew the way. What about the rocks, I thought. What about the water? What about the EDGE? I was barely making it through that trail, and I was 40 years younger, and had shoes AND sight.
That's Haiti for you. They run up mountains barefoot in the dark and think nothing of it. They chop down sugar cane for you as a parting gift. They send their kids out the door at five in the morning for a four hour walk to school. They will gladly take an hour or longer out of their day to show a bunch of strangers around a mountain. They are amazing.
Many of them will also steal your money and your shoes the first chance they get, but that is a story for another day.
Tuesday, April 2, 2013
Spring Broke
Me and the kids saw a real live, honest to goodness Tibetan monk today, walking out of the bank. He came complete with shaved head, sandals, and flowing orange robes. I didn't know monks had money. And I didn't know any Tibetan monks lived in Utah. The kids were all excited about seeing him, because they assumed he was an Avatar. Not being an Avatar fan myself, I am clueless as to the association, except that I remember seeing bald Asian guys in robes in the animated version of Avatar, which is on constantly at our house now, courtesy of Netflix. I thought that when we switched from Dish to Netflix, that TV viewing around here would be reduced. But no. Netflix just lets you become completely obsessive about your viewing habits. Now, instead of spending an hour or two watching their favorite shows, they can watch entire seasons, without even any commercial breaks! It could take all day, or even longer. Oh, and my favorite part has got to be all those old Star Trek episodes that are on there. That's super awesome! Not.
Anyhow, seeing the monk has been the highlight of spring break so far. The kids are out of school all week. I had yesterday and today off, and was determined to spend those two days doing something fun with them. I had big plans yesterday to go hiking, until it rained all day. So we went to a movie instead. Today, we went to Barnes and Noble, Old Navy, the D.I. and Sams., and came home with two new glasses, a Vote for Pedro shirt for Will, and some string cheese. So much for a memorable spring break.
Anyhow, seeing the monk has been the highlight of spring break so far. The kids are out of school all week. I had yesterday and today off, and was determined to spend those two days doing something fun with them. I had big plans yesterday to go hiking, until it rained all day. So we went to a movie instead. Today, we went to Barnes and Noble, Old Navy, the D.I. and Sams., and came home with two new glasses, a Vote for Pedro shirt for Will, and some string cheese. So much for a memorable spring break.
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