Inigo Montoya really said it best, with pith and a Spanish accent: "I hate waiting." That about sums it up, eh? There isn't a big enough font: I HATE. Waiting. In any line, even less than 2 people deep, after checking cart contents before committing For a medical appointment of any kind In traffic - particularly left turn lanes with any color arrow For an upload For a download For a laundry load - the last 5 minutes of the cycle? I swear it's 15 For miracles I'm not sure we're actually wired for waiting; in fact I'm pretty sure we're not. I mean, think about babies. Talk about a creature who wants what it wants 5 minutes ago. Apparently, we came to the planet with zero capacity for waiting. And then we wait. To turn 5 so we can go to school. WHAT were we thinking? For Halloween. For your birthday. For Christmas. For your first bicycle. Then we wait some more. For school to get OUT. To find out if you made the team. For your first job. Your first kiss. Did I get into yet another school? The waiting we do to master any skill is particularly vexing. This waiting involves work we very often don't really want to do. Whether it's mastering free throws, the splits, a back flip, or a Chopin nocturne, there is the legitimate pain of discipline that we have absolutely no other option but to work through. WAIT through. And that's not even the self-mastery of holiness: compassion, empathy, forgiveness, generosity, benevolence, patience. Wait. Don't you need patience to wait? Do you have to wait for patience? Is this one of those chicken and egg things? My most profound and important life lessons on waiting came from two completely different life events, and in different ways, underscore what I think might be at the heart of why we humans loathe waiting: usually waiting is part of a circumstance that is completely beyond our control. But these two circumstances have also taught me that while we might not be wired to wait, we are wired to learn to wait. Thanks to divine DNA, we have inherited a very important eternal skill. And that's for a very eternal reason - we're going to need it in the future. Story Number One: I'm sorry to bring this up again, but there was that time 4 years ago when I spent nearly 4 months hospitalized. Any institutionalized health care setting is going to involve waiting, but when that institution becomes your zip code? OY. With the waiting. And bear in mind, half way through the fun, I was transferred to a skilled nursing facility to learn how to do everything over again. Even talking; at my worst, I was weakly pointing to an alphabet chart to communicate, and at one point, I was certain it was NOT the English alphabet. I had to learn to breathe and swallow again before they even thought about taking out the feeding tube I'd been on for months. I needed a hoyer lift to get to daily dialysis sessions; hence, my going to a SNF 45 minutes from home. It was one of two in a 4-state area who had in-house dialysis. I bring this all up again to tell you about the funniest thing Heavenly Father told me the night I was transferred to Heritage Park in Roy. I tell you because it has to do with the point about our waiting lessons. I heard just two words in my head - several times - during the process of that transfer: "DAY TWO." This statement was part of a shorthand of sorts, built through the Spirit over years of my life. Does that happen with you? I know it happens in families; one word or phrase captures an entire series of ideas or a reminder of past events. All this to facilitate brevity in communicating something complex. Early in my adult life, I read Stephen R. Covey's Spiritual Roots of Human Relationships. In it, he writes about progressively growing into healthier relationships, and how sometimes we get impatient to move through necessary developmental stages by skipping essential first steps. He used the analogy of the Creation - for example, how God needed to have a solid earth mass before He could cover it with water - how there needed to be a division between water and land before vegetation could be planted - how that vegetation had to be well established before it could feed animals, etc. The shorthand created from reading that book was the idea that in our growth, we humans often impatiently want to skip Days 1-5, and land happily on Day 6, with most of the grunt work finished, poised to enjoy the fruits of the planting, and skipping the planting - including the digging, pruning, dunging - altogether. That sounds very human of us, doesn't it? Surely, it's not just me. On January 6, 2022, after a difficult yet tender 45-minute ride from IMC in Murray, Utah to Heritage Park in Roy, I got the distinct message from Heavenly Father, unmistakably: "DAY TWO." Father may as well have given me an entire pep talk, but with those two words, brought to remembrance by the Holy Ghost, it was if He actually said: "You have a long way to go, Daughter. You're just beginning this journey of recovery. Be patient; you've got a lot of work to do. You can't skip any of the steps - you need to do all of it. I will help you and be with you every step of the way." That was on the 64th day of my captivity. Little did I know I was still 48 days away from the day I'd walk back into my house. Through those next seven weeks, there was a day when I remember hearing - feeling, really - DAY THREE." Another time, when I was feeling most impatient to be finished with daily dialysis - something which made daily occupational and physical therapy far more grueling if they happened afterwards - I didn't hear a day number, but something I came to realize was connected: "I DO THINGS IN THEIR PROPER ORDER." Impatient with the process and tired of waiting for my kidneys to function on their own, I had failed to consider the implications of what that would look like when I still couldn't sit up on the edge of my bed on my own - much less walk to a bathroom. Proper order, indeed. So grateful for the gentle reminder. As I began to be able to sit up on my own and walk the length of the physical therapy room several times, I remember a night when I had the impression: "DAY FIVE." Even still, that was a few weeks from my discharge. The acid test came the day before my discharge - climbing down a huge flight of concrete stairs to the boiler room and back up, on my own. The night before, the nephrologist made a special trip to my room to announce I was finished with dialysis, and wouldn't need to continue it when I went home two days later. This singular experience taught me that there's a purpose in waiting - even in God's waiting - but I also need to talk about what Father has taught me about how to wait differently. Learning how to wait differently has changed everything.

(Come Follow Me, 3 Nephi 12-16) Jesus loves to talk about His Father. In the New Testament and in 3 Nephi in the Book of Mormon, it's clear Jesus wants people to know who His Father is. He wants people to know of His boundless goodness, and feel completely unafraid to come to Him with our needs - even our fondest desires. Approaching the throne of God is so much more safe than many imagine, and Jesus wants the human race to know it. Much of 3 Nephi mirrors scripture in the New Testament - like here, where Jesus explains how His Father God answers prayers: "For every one that asketh, receiveth; and he that seeketh, findeth; and to him that knocketh, it shall be opened. "Or what man is there of you, who if his son asked bread, will give him a stone? "Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? "If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father who is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?" (3 Nephi 14:8-11) If an earthly father knows to not give a stone for bread when his child is hungry, then certainly a Heavenly Father will give that earthly need - and how much more? "...remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall." (Helaman 5:12) If an earthly father knows to not give that hungry child a serpent instead of a fish, then certainly a Heavenly Father will provide for that temporal - temporary need - and how much more? "...as the Lord God liveth that brought Israel up out of the land of Egypt, and gave unto Moses power that he should heal the nations after they had been bitten by the poisonous serpents, if they would cast their eyes unto the serpent which he did raise up before them,... there is none other name given under heaven save it be this Jesus Christ, of which I have spoken, whereby man can be saved." (2 Nephi 25:20) Jesus subtly teaches this powerful truth: God has asked us to pray for our temporal needs, but He is far more concerned about our eternal spiritual needs. And because He is our Father and loves us, He will generously give us both. I can look back on so many times when I've prayed for something transient and gotten so much more than I asked for. God's abundance has taught me to be instantly suspicious of anyone preaching scarcity. Scarcity breeds fear, coveting, greed, and pettiness. Abundance breeds faith, generosity, and benevolence. That's who our God is. That's who He wants us to be. How often will He give us more than we asked for, in order to teach us this? I can also look back on many more times when I've prayed for something terribly important, and in the transient moment, received an answer of no. As time passes, I've learned that Father's noes look like this - either: A permanent no is because I've asked for something not in accordance with His will, or The temporary no is really an answer of "not now" or "not yet" - or The no could actually include this statement: "I have something better for you." The Bible Dictionary teaches this powerful truth about asking amiss: "Prayer is the act by which the will of the Father and the will of the child are brought into correspondence with each other. The object of prayer is not to change the will of God, but to secure for ourselves and for others blessings that God is already willing to grant, but that are made conditional on our asking for them." (Bible Dictionary, p. 752-753) I've learned that the condition of asking is more about honoring my agency than anything else. I've learned that as much as our Father God wants to be actively involved in my life, He's terribly polite, and will not intrude when not invited. What a Gentleman. If I pray like I'm putting coins in a vending machine, the outcome is rarely the Milky Way I thought I was after. But as I learn to pray to seek the will of God, and to train my unruly human heart to want that Will more than my own, I start to see that my Father God will give me bread - for now - and an immovable stone of faith to build my life on. He will give me the fish I need to fill my belly today - and access to His Only Begotten Son. "...And as he lifted up the brazen serpent in the wilderness, even so shall he be lifted up who should come. "And as many as should look upon that serpent should live, even so as many as should look upon the Son of God with faith, having a contrite spirit, might live, even unto that life which is eternal." (Helaman 8:14-15) How much more does our God want to give us, if we learn to want it, and ask? He wants to give us everything - and His Beloved, perfect Son gave His all to provide it. Bread and stone; fish and serpent. More than we can ever possibly need or want - now and eternally. That's who our God is - Our Father. Abundance. Generosity. And love beyond measure. "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." (John 3:16)

It was January of 2019 when I knew I needed to read Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. It was his son, Ignat, who convinced me. Ignat was a guest on the Eric Metaxas Show (https://ignatsolzhenitsyn.com/latest/2019/1/29/interview-with-eric-metaxas). Their conversation recounted his father's life as the second man to be permanently exiled from the former USSR (Leon Trotsky was the first). He spoke with such matter-of-fact respect for his father's integrity - as if it were naturally owed him - that by the end of the interview, I knew I had to become acquainted with his father myself by reading what might be considered his most important work. By dumb luck, I acquired an abridged compilation of the three volumes - totaling around 1800 pages collectively - abridged in collaboration with Solzhenitsyn himself - by Eric Ericson, Jr. This abridgement weighs in at a mere 472 pages. I started it in early 2024 expecting it would be that year's steep reading climb. Little did I know it would take me nearly 3 years to get through the "short" version. Why? Two main reasons: Number one - my incredibly frightening ADHD brain, of course. Since internally I may still be 7 years old, I must have a "bedtime story" be the last thing I read at night. THIS. IS NOT. THAT BOOK. Besides the novel that serves as that bedtime story, I've picked up the habit of generally having a history/bio book going simultaneously; these always take me longer to get through. Even with this habit, I never dreamed I'd pick this book up after putting it aside so very many times. Which brings me to the second reason this book took well over two years for me to read: while not graphic in nature, the grim brutality of the system brought to light in Gulag could not be drunk - not by this reader, anyway. I had to imbibe in small sips, until I got to the heart of the book in the last hundred or so pages, when finally FINALLY - I couldn't put it down. Gulag Archipelago was so named to create a metaphor to describe the vastness of the Soviet system established to surveil, arrest, interrogate, and imprison political dissidents from the early 1920's and well into the 1950's. Solzhenitsyn portrays it as such a well-oiled machine that once a person fell under suspicion and was caught up in the intricate network of it, he rarely came out the other end until after a lengthy sentence to a work camp. If he came out at all. The irony of Solzhenitsyn being the one to globally expose this horrific system is rich. This young man came out of university in 1941 as far too many of our young men (and women) come out of university today - deeply committed to Marxist principles and to his country's counterfeit utopian vision for the world. I'm both saddened and compelled to add parenthetically that this is one of the highest purposes of education today; and the bitter fruit from decades of this trajectory lies all around us in a rubble heap of all the failed attempts where it hasn't been "properly" implemented. (Something about a definition of insanity comes to mind here...) At the end of his military service and WWII, Solzhenitsyn had the audacity to mockingly criticize - not by name, but insinuation only - Joseph Stalin in a private letter. He was sentenced to 8 years in the gulag - the final step short of death in a system with zero due process of individual rights. This relatively short sentence - of a man originally committed to the principles behind the system who put him in the gulag - served as muse for that man to write the 1800 pages which exposed that system to the entire world. Weeks after the publication of Gulag Archipelago in December 1973, Solzhenitsyn was arrested, charged with treason, and forcibly removed from the Soviet Union stripped of his citizenship. The status of brave whistle blower staled after an astounding speech given at Harvard University's commencement in 1978 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WuVG8SnxxCM&list=PLZ0qrzrD-278Y_1qZrNP-KZFK4K7xv1L6). Suddenly, this global darling of the literary world lost much of his romantic luster as he pointed his finger of criticism to the West - presciently warning that too many "democracies" were following the exact path of Soviets. The most beautiful, authoritative, and important voices in the public square are those of the convert. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn is one of those voices for me. While raised in the Russian Orthodox faith, he didn't return to faith in any God until his circumstances became so limited, He quite literally bumped into God in the tiny space that had become his life. I recognized that limitation, and this poem he wrote in praise of God - and his return to God - made me weep: When was it that I completely Scattered the good seeds, one and all? For after all I spent my boyhood In the bright singing of Thy temples. Bookish subtleties sparkled brightly, Piercing my arrogant brain, The secrets of the world were . . . in my grasp, Life's destiny . . . as pliable as wax. Blood seethed - and every swirl Gleamed iridescently before me, Without a rumble the building of my faith Quietly crumbled within my heart. But passing here between being and nothingness, Stumbling and clutching at the edge, I look behind me with a grateful tremor Upon the life that I have lived. Not with good judgment nor with desire Are its twists and turns illumined. But with the even glow of the Higher Meaning Which became apparent to me only later on. And now with measuring cup returned to me, Scooping up the living water, God of the Universe! I believe again! Though I renounced You, You were with me! (In this abridgement, this poem can be found in Part 4 - "The Soul and Barbed Wire," Chapter 1 - "Ascent") This book mattered because of its warning, but also because of its beauty - the beautiful words emanating from a beautiful heart reknitted to his Creator in the furnace of affliction. It mattered to have another witness of what Viktor Frankl more pithily testified of from a similar furnace: "There are two races of men in this world, but only these two - the "race" of the decent man and the "race" of the indecent man. Both are found everywhere; they penetrate into all groups of society. No group consists entirely of decent or indecent people." (Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning) This book reminded me of a scripture in the Book of Mormon - after King Mosiah has read the grim and brutal account of the Jaredites to his innocent-hearted people - people who most likely would rather have been spared such a bleak picture of the depths to which fallen humanity is capable: "Now this account did cause the people of Mosiah to mourn exceedingly, yea, they were filled with sorrow; nevertheless it gave them great knowledge, in the which they did rejoice" (Mosiah 28:18, emphasis added). This dismal look at humanity included some exalting glimpses of man's potential for a higher existence - of man's ability to transcend from the race of the indecent to the higher race of the decent - only possible by individual choice. With Jesus Christ. For that knowledge, I do indeed rejoice.

Repentance gets SUCH a bad rap. And frankly, so does being damned. I blame Hollywood, which is a little fun, and kind of a bonus. Hollywood's depiction of an evangelical preacher is over-the-top caricature, and I think I've decided that's by design, to portray all religion as performative histrionics. Perhaps you can hear a Southern drawl as you picture such a preacher as you read: "RePENT...or be Daa-aamned!" Possibly add a fist pounding a pulpit on the two-syllabled 'daa-aamned' for full effect. Thanks to legions of such stereotyped portrayals, that's what a secular world - only mildly interested in spirituality and almost completely bored or antagonistic towards religion - thinks of the Christian message. And seriously - with such portrayals, can you blame them for rejecting such a message, delivered in such a way? The real message of Jesus needs to be seen and heard - and especially felt - in context with every other thing He says and does, or you might really fall for the stereotype. This is a Man who walked on water to save His friends in the middle of the night. This is a Man who healed a lame man who could never get to the healing waters fast enough. This is a Man who knew strength had left Him when an unclean woman touched his robe in a crowd. This is a Man who restored an ear when an impetuous friend tried to defend Him from being unjustly arrested. This Man. Loves us. The voice of the stereotyped preacher - sadly - is too much like the voice of the accuser. The accuser is the one who says, "You can't fix this... There's no going back... You might as well..." Any thought you have that you are worthless comes from the destroyer. A Creator doesn't talk like that - especially about His precious children. The real message of Jesus Christ which has been truncated into "Repent... or be damned," needs more accurate translation - after decoding the scriptures and watching the Man: "Come back this way. Turn around; you'll get stuck over there." And when I say "over there" I mean ALL the "other theres" - other than the one Way that leads toward Jesus. Jesus - who is the Light and Life of the world - who is the Love and LAW of the world. Jesus IS the Way - because ALL the other ways lead to dead ends. Dead ends as in dead. As in not alive. Jesus came to mark the way and paid to do it with His life's blood so He can tell us - with the moral authority needed to make such a statement: "Come back to me or the path you're pursuing will end. My path has no end. C.S. Lewis understood this as he wrote fantastical images of never-ending journeys into hilltops and mountains far off - where Jesus lives in a higher (holier) place. In The Great Divorce, citizens from hell are invited to freely come into heaven and stay. But they're admonished to set down pet sins before they head for the far off high hills. As new residents of heaven, they're so insubstantial it hurts them to walk on the grass, yet they're assured by heavenly guides that they'll become more real as they choose the journey, unburdened by the sins they carried in this life. In The Chronicles of Narnia, the eternal nature of journeys beyond this life with Jesus promise to make more of us - if we'll just stay with Him. Of course, in Narnia, Jesus goes by another name - Aslan. Lewis' way of teaching children that Jesus has laws that must be obeyed, the citizens of Narnia describe Him to earth children as "not a tame lion." But Jesus' invitation is always to "Come." Always. He came to be the Way and show the Way so we wouldn't get stuck going the wrong way. If you like growing, I would suggest Jesus. Repentance is a gift, forgiveness is possible, redemption is real. And it's possible, because God's Son became a Man and walked among us, and suffered, and died for us, so we need never be permanently stuck in the wrong place. Repenting is about turning around and away from all the stuck places, and in the process, becoming someone who loves and yearns for the new direction and path - and the One who walked it first.

Warning: this is long and it's only part 1 of 3, but I don't know how to tell this short. I've needed to write about my journey through the workplace and back home for quite a while now. A dear friend who is a young mother on the front lines with three littles sent me a prop reel a few weeks ago, wondering what I thought of it. I say "prop reel" because it had the feel of advocation for a specific life path - that of a working mother. Rhetoric was specific and targeted. It got me thinking about my choice to stay home rather than stay in the work force, and what brought that about. Because these choices are only mine, based on revelation given only to me (private lesson), there's a danger this will be seen as judgmental if anyone reading this has received different personal revelation and made different choices. I could NOT be sorrier about that. I assure you: there is zero judgment in these observations which are born from my experiences and choices. That said - part 1 is the background to the choice: I never planned to do anything besides teach school. As a little kid, I absolutely loved everything about school. I was like a less likable Hermione Granger; it was ridiculous. I grew up hearing often from my dad - a school teacher - what a great job teaching was for a woman. You must forgive this sentiment from a different generation, bless him. He longed for my mom to go back to school and get a teaching degree so there could be two teachers' salaries in our home. And while my mother could've run a Fortune 500 company, she was no teacher, and had no desire to do that. As we kids got old enough to all be in school, she worked as a secretary at the high school to ease the financial burden of a little family growing up on one teacher's salary. My dad had a lawn business in the summer for many years to afford the luxury of being a basketball coach; I have this notion he made more money doing that than teaching. So while there was definitely some conditioning going on for me to become a teacher - looking back - I can't deny that I was born to teach. Some kids played hospital; I played school. As young as my toddler years, my parents punished my disobedience by taking away my books. This was the freakish child I was. I got a degree in English and reading secondary education and taught in a junior high school for five years before my first child was born - a waiting period that is a whole other private lesson for another day. I had every intention of going back to teaching. She was born in June of 1985, and I was given a year's unpaid LOA from Jordan School District. A year later, when I tried to re-enter the district, I requested a part-time position. The conditions of the LOA meant the district was under no obligation to re-hire me unless I came back to a similar position - full-time. That second school year began with me still at home and left me restless and ambivalent. During that second school year, in February 1987, President Ezra Taft Benson gave one of the talks that began his figurative stoning: "To the Mothers in Zion." (https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/eternal-marriage-student-manual/womens-divine-roles-and-responsibilities/to-the-mothers-in-zion-institute?lang=eng) It was broadcast as a Sunday evening fireside, and for some reason, Dale and I didn't attend. The next day, Dale came home from work a little shell shocked. "WHAT did President Benson say last night?? You should've heard the women at work today!" he said. Every woman there was MAD. Called President Benson an out-of-touch old man with no idea what it took to pay for a family these days. Dale and I looked in wonder at each other, and waited with great anticipation for the far less-than-instantly-available text of the talk. No technology to make it quickly available; we waited for weeks. When we finally got a hold of the talk and read it, I had the same powerful spiritual witness I've had when I've read the Book of Mormon. I knew by the power of the Holy Ghost that this talk was a "thus sayeth the Lord" talk. I put the career I had planned for my entire life on the altar that day and never looked back. Well. Almost. Looking back, it was the tiniest of widow's mites. It made the widow's mite of the Old Testament look like a Jon Huntsman donation. Talk about meager. But I witness: I laid it somewhat reluctantly on the altar with my whole heart, and proceeded to try - over the next 22 years - to devote my life to something I truly, truly reeked at. I nearly lost my entire identity making this choice. I cannot overstate how horrible I was at homemaking and mothering. I remember wandering through grocery stores when I went alone, bewildered at what my life meant, and wondered what it was supposed to be. I suffered from depression for much of it. Now, you might say - perhaps I wouldn't have been depressed if I'd just gone back to teaching - the job I felt more suited for - the job I felt I was born for. But beneath the difficulty of staying at home, I knew I would've come home exhausted - teaching 200 students for 6 hours is a special kind of adrenaline rush. I knew there would be nothing left for my most important job when I got home. And as an English teacher, I knew that job that sucked the life out of me wouldn't even be finished. So I tried to figure out homemaking and mothering. And while I really, really stunk at it, I can at least tell you this: I loved my children in the most fierce and flawed manner possible. I tried to give them what my parents had given me: I taught them the gospel. I read to them. I gave them Suzuki piano against their very wills. When Dale went back to work after both our children were born, his life resumed the patterns and routines it had always had. Mine vanished irretrievably. I quit teaching when we had a little starter home with a mortgage with a 14% interest rate. There was a "government program" at the time which subsidized some of that until we made more money; my $11,446 first year teaching contract was almost too high to qualify for it. Knowing what we now know about "government programs," we probably wouldn't have done it, but at the time, it seemed like our only shot at getting into a home. I started teaching piano lessons to six - maybe eight kids in the neighborhood, charging $20 a month. Wow. What a huge financial contribution. I sold Discovery Toys for a few years when for some reason, piano teaching had become quite odious. I imagine it had become odious because I started it with the same reluctant ambivalence that took me out of the public schools. Remembering snowy winter nights, lugging toy crates in and out of homes, I have to laugh that I imagined THAT was more attractive and less odious. I taught a music pre-school with no private students for a couple of years - again - ambivalent about wanting to teach, but trying to figure out how to do it from home. I was offered a job at a junior high school in 1997 for maybe 48 hours. I accepted it, had a major panic attack over it, and then called to turn it down. As bewildering as homemaking continued to be - even then - I recognized it as the treason it would have been, and couldn't make myself do it. After that, my piano studio grew to 20-35 students over the next 10-15 years - long past when my children were out of the house. By then, I saw it as the personal ministry it was, and felt almost called to do it. No one was more surprised at this change of heart than I was. These are the choices I made based on a real and profound revelatory moment which I cannot deny. That moment of "thus sayeth the Lord" wasn't a command that removed my agency; it was an invitation to a harder, higher climb. I was invited to place my career on the altar, and I obeyed. Part 2 - my reaction to a prop reel based on my life's experiences this far... Part 3 - the lessons I learned from my choice... If you're still reading, God bless you.

Me with Jesus Right after Thanksgiving in 2024, I got this bee in my bonnet to read one chapter in Psalms every day - knowing it would take me at least five months because there are 150 of them. Best. Self-imposed. Homework. Ever. The psalm was the first thing I read before I did my other scripture work, and those 5 PLUS months (I hadn't factored in Psalm 119) found me approaching each one like I was having an opening hymn for my own morning devotional. SUCH a good idea. I loved the project so much, I started over again when I finished. In all, it took the better part of a year and a half to read through the psalms twice - reading one daily (except for 119). I decided not to start over again a third time because a year of Old Testament study was approaching, which is quite a breathless steep climb if you want to do the whole thing... and Isaiah.... This time around I read Psalms in its appointed three weeks as many of you might have - which had the feel of trying to read the Old Testament in a year. One of my favorite takeaways from the Psalms: Remember the early days of smart phones, back while they were still addicting us with the pithy advertising slogan, "There's an app for that!"? And wasn't that cute and fun, back when all the apps were free at first? And we could barely conceive anything our phones weren't going to be able to do for us, all in the project of getting us to never put them down again? Well. This ancient hymn book has become beloved because there is a psalm for every possible emotion and mood of the landscape of human emotion. "There's a psalm for that." You're joyful and think you're going to burst for praise at what God has done for you? There's a psalm for that. You're in the depth of despair and need God to just stay with you and hold your hand, even if the despair doesn't lift for a few more minutes/years? There's a psalm for that. You see how severely LESS than God you are - and yearn to be where He is - but clearly see the problem of the Fall - which has alienated you forever from such glory - were it not for Jesus Christ? There's a psalm for that. You feel vulnerable and alone, abandoned or betrayed, and wonder how you can possibly prevail over the wickedness of the world - seeing all the darkness in it as a personal enemy to your well-being, safety, and happiness - and you know your only hope is for God to protect you? There's a psalm for that. Spending time in the psalms teaches that God is... GOD. The Being in the Universe with superior wisdom, knowledge, power, justice, mercy, love, and light. The Being who can part seas, calm seas, walk on seas, and fill them with fishes that weren't there just a minute ago. God is greater than all of fallen humanity, and we are hopelessly lost to reconciling the distance between us, were it not for His Son - the Lamb of God who was slain for the world. There are psalms filled with Messianic imagery and verbiage - prophetic because they're sung so many generations before they take place in the Savior's life. Spending time in the psalms also teaches that God is... FATHER. A real, personal, intimate Parent who craves oneness with His children the way we crave it with ours. Spending time in the psalms can leave you feeling about God the way you possibly felt about your earthly father as a little kid: My God is bigger than your God. My God is stronger than your God. My God is kinder than your God. My God is wiser than your God. My God... IS God. He's in my corner, and He longs to be in your corner, too. He'll come the very second He's invited. But He's terribly polite, and you KNOW how He feels about agency. He will wait until He's invited, and then He'll run. Because my God is also my Abba. Daddy. This is a Thing to know in a world where the darkness is gathering as quickly and surely as the Light is. If you need Him to be a Teacher, He's that. If you need Him to be a Comforter, He's that. If you take on the project of correction and growth inside a covenant relationship, He will be the chastening Life Coach you need to course correct as you walk with Him. How else can you walk without deviation? Because let me tell you what - without Him? I. DEVIATE. If you need more strength, He shows up with His. If you need Hope, that's what He brings. And the psalms - in whole - praise the fact that there is - in reality - such a Being who can provide ALL those things for His unruly, deviating children - calling us home if we'll allow it. My Father God is the Being whom I can't do without. I can't conceive anything He can't do - and that reality is articulated over and over again in the psalms. He's the one who provides every single thing needed for a perfect mortal curriculum to get me home again. I really can't say enough about Him. Nephi sums up all the psalms in this one verse: "I glory in plainness; I glory in truth; I glory in my Jesus, for he hath redeemed my soul from hell." (3 Nephi 33:6) Psalms is a beautiful poetic spot to meet Him - find out who He really is - and fall completely in love with Him.

I visited Job again this past month. I've only visited him three times in my life, yet I've known about him since I was a girl. My understanding of his experience was beyond shallow - is there a word shallower than shallow? That was me. My girlish understanding went something like this: "Job had everything taken away from him, and it was pretty awful, and then everything was restored." My first reading of the book of Job left a bit more profound impression - my girl version somehow missed the "friends" who came to mourn. Oh, that they had simply sat with him as they did those first seven days - silently! My second reading was the year I came back from the dead, so that was an interesting experience. While everything had yet to be restored to me, the fact that I was alive to read it at all felt like a huge blessing of restoration. I was alive; I had been spared. Now, last month, another girl - not so girlish anymore, someone who has found herself in even more holes to climb out of - read about Job with yet a different set of eyes. Maybe Job looks different every time you visit him. Here are my two favorite takeaways this time, still not quite out of the most recent hole to be climbed out of: Part of Job's witness to his friends is that God didn't do these horrible things to him, but was still his Friend and his Father - Someone to be trusted. This passage was particularly tender to me: "For there is hope of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that the tender branch thereof will not cease. "Though the root thereof wax old in the earth, and the stock thereof die in the ground; "Yet through the scent of water it will bud, and bring forth boughs like a plant." (Job 14:7-9) I had a thrill of new recognition at an old image - a tree and the water that feeds it so that it produces fruit. Job's beautiful witness is that there is such a Water that will revive even a withering and dying tree, and it can produce fruit again. This took me straight to Alma's sermon on planting such a tree with faith - not a tree OF faith; I really must niggle over this point. We plant the word of God's plan with our faith and desire, and Alma concludes with a promise that hearkens to Job's testimony: "And now, my brethren, I desire that ye shall plant this word in your hearts, and as it beginneth to swell even so nourish it by your faith. And behold it will become a tree, springing up in you unto everlasting life. And then may God grant unto you that your burdens may be light, through the joy of his Son. And even all this can ye do if ye will. Amen." (Alma 33:23, emphasis added) Another part of Job's witness of God's goodness was another evocative image for me - and I love when God teaches us with patterns! Once you start to see the patterns, you can never unsee them, and suddenly, it feels like maybe you've started to crack His code in the scriptures. Job witnesses of his trials: "God hath delivered me to the ungodly, and turned me over into the hands of the wicked. "I was at ease, but he hath broken me asunder; he hath also taken me by my neck, and shaken me to pieces, and set me up for his mark." (Job 16:11-12, emphasis added) My mind flew to another place where God's mark was mentioned: "And I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God: and he cried with a loud voice to the four angels, to whom it was given to hurt the earth and the sea. "Saying, Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads." "And one of the elders answered, saying unto me, What are these which are arrayed in white robes? and whence came they? "And I said unto him, Sir thou knowest. And he said to me, These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." (Revelation 7:2-3; 13-14, emphasis added) Camille Johnson said in March of this year: “I know that life is hard. You can do hard with Jesus, or you can do hard alone. That is your choice. But when you do hard with Jesus Christ, the hard becomes holy. YOU BECOME holy.” (https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/broadcasts/miscellaneous-events/2026/03/14johnson?lang=eng) It would seem that holiness can only be achieved through becoming clean first, and then becoming holy through practicing hard things with the enabling and transforming power of Jesus Christ, because of His atoning sacrifice. For Job to witness that God has set him up for His mark suggests that Job knew this, and though spending a fair amount of time in this treatise poetically saying "ouch," this beautiful soul cleaved unto God in all of the hard - in a pile on of hard. As I consider Job again after and in my own piles of hard, I feel grateful of a frank account of someone who absolutely had a horrible time through his piles of hard, and wasn't afraid to take that to His Father God, telling Him, "Hope ya know, [I'm having] a hard time!" (see https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2008/10/hope-ya-know-we-had-a-hard-time?lang=eng) Job's conversation with God was raw and real, but His love for his Father God never wavered in his firm witness to His friends: "Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him: but I will maintain mine own ways before him. "He also shall be my salvation: for an hypocrite shall not come before him." (Job 13:15-16) "For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: "Whom I shall see for myself..." (Job 19:25-27) "...till I did I will not remove mine integrity from me. "My righteousness I hold fast, and will not let it go." (Job 27:5-6) Job knew what he knew, and he knew God knew. When that's where you are, you can live life in all the holes and underneath all the piles with the utmost confidence nothing can shake - our Father God does not forsake those whom He has marked. It's completely antithetical to His nature and character to do so. You get to tell Him you're not having a great time throughout - I know I have. He can take it. But I also know this - He. Will. Not. Let. Go. Ever. When that's where you are, that's when it's your job to hold on tight right back. Help is right there.

I've been working feverishly on a Stars and Stripes quilt for the 4th of July. Nothing like waiting till the last minute, eh? That's a story not fit for telling. I'm holed up in my beautiful English-speaking sweat shop and just cranking out the last of this project, glutting myself with podcasts and audiobooks. This morning, I listened to an Inklings podcast about being good to each other and living in an attitude of perpetual belonging, perennially sending the inviting message that beckons, "Welcome! We've been waiting for you! There's a place set for you right here; we were hoping you'd come - it wouldn't have been the same without you." I found myself hoping I'm developing that vibe, and suddenly, a tidal wave of memories came, and here I am at my computer, weeping - when I should be starring and striping. I need to tell you about some of the loveliest times when someone gave me that vibe, and how it's forever changed my heart in wanting to always, always, always give that vibe to others. None of these are very grand gestures. The person offering them might read me rhapsodizing over them with nonchalance, like what they had done was not so grand at all. But grand they were, because each of them were mini lifelines, giving me the strength to keep going. I have to apologize in advance - these all happened during my Liberty Jail Winter - and they are only a small representation of the ordinary/extraordinary ministering that was given to me then. A lifetime of such acts - but I mention these from that singular life event: Not-so-grand gesture Number One and Two: When I couldn't move my legs, I'm pretty sure I was the UNfunnest of all the patients. Dale insisted the nurses would tell him they argued over who got to have me on their rotations, but I had a hard time believing that when I was buzzing the nurses constantly all through the night. Between the panic attacks that would awaken me when I'd forgotten I was relatively safe in a hospital, and NOT in an unknown prison where no one knew where I was (gotta love those ventilator sedatives!) and the inability to rearrange my body, it always felt like I'd been awake most of the night every morning when I "woke up." One of my favorite nurses came in one night after I'd awakened in that blind panic, and just stroked my hair and talked to me until I fell asleep again. I weep afresh remembering how safe I felt, when moments before I was certain I was hidden away and no one who loved me knew where I was but God Himself. Another night, there was this darling young man who was the aide for the night shift; I can't even remember how many times I had buzzed - apologetically - again - asking if someone could come in and rearrange my legs because I couldn't move them myself. On about the third or fourth rearranging, he said, "I'm a massage therapist - would it be all right if I just massaged your legs and feet so you can relax?" Who every says no to massage? As he worked, we got to talking (imagine!) and he learned I was writing a book. He said he was a writer, and we talked about writing. And in that way only explained as God doing His work in us, the two of us became deeply connected over higher things than this world, and felt like good friends when I was able to fall back asleep - comfortable at last. "I'd really like to give you a hug - may I?" he asked before he left. How can you know these will be lifelines? Not-so-grand gesture Number Three: When I finally got to the skilled nursing facility to learn how to do everything over again, my regular day aide was Olympia - the most adorable Hispanic woman who, from nearly day one, confidently told me I would walk out of that place on my own one day. Who knew it would take seven weeks?? When I could finally start eating again and the feeding tube came out, Olympia really paid attention to my food. Because my room was at the end of the hall, my food was generally cold by the time it got to me. It was uncanny how quickly Olympia would appear, asking if she could warm it up for me in the microwave at the nurse's station. I couldn't have gagged down those institutionalized eggs were it not for this and the several catsup packets she would bring me to smother them. What an ordinary, extraordinary thing - to pay attention when someone's appetite is coming back after not eating for three months. Lifeline indeed. Not-so-grand gesture Number Four: Women in my ward signed up to drive 45 minutes to Roy to sit with me so Dale could go home and rest - and run our household - before another day back in the saddle in that tiny little room that had become my entire world. One dear friend saw Dale's spread sheet (SO Dale!) - where he kept track of who came when, so he wouldn't overburden anyone. Indignant that she hadn't been there the most, Julie insisted on him putting her on the schedule more times in the coming week. Not-so-grand gesture Number Five: My ministering sister offered to bring a blanket from home one evening when Dale let her know he needed to take my favorite (yes, I had a blankie) home for washing. She grabbed a favorite of her daughter, then eight, without thinking to ask. When Katelyn protested, Mandy explained how I had been in the hospital for many, many weeks, and that I just needed it long enough for Brother Simper to wash mine and bring it back. She assured Katelyn that Dale would bring it back the very next day - that I'd only need it for tonight. This will never not choke me up: upon considering this, Katelyn thought for a few seconds, then told her mother, "Will you tell her she can keep it as long as she needs it? She can give it back when she comes home if she wants." Ordinary kindness is so very extraordinary. Not-so-grand can end up being so incredibly grand. Something that could be passed off as everyday mundane can be taken into a human heart as life changing - life saving. It will never be wrong to send a message with our demeanor, words, or not-so-grand gestures: I see you. But because those gestures affirm the divinity and potential holiness of the receiver of the gesture, what we're really saying is, "I. See. THOU." It really, really matters to be kind - to see souls - to imagine their needs as real and raw as our own. When Peter responds to the lame man begging for alms, he tells him: "Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk." (Acts 3:6) We generally don't give silver and gold these days, but there is silver in calming a troubled heart or massaging legs in the middle of the night. There is gold in helping someone gag down the first food being eaten for weeks, or in offering a beloved blanket to an old lady in the ward you barely know when you're only eight. What a lifestyle to practice - to go about as the Savior did, doing good, using our words and good will to say, "Such as I have, I give thee - in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth - let me do this ordinary thing for you so you can walk toward Jesus another day." When we look into someone's eyes and see a fellow traveler and respond in the name of Jesus Christ - we will turn our not-so-grand gestures into the grandest of life changing - life saving acts. And there's a very good chance we'll never even know how much it mattered. I am a humble victim of so very many.

Let me tell you about my dad. While my mother was growing up west of 5300 South, in smelter homes behind what would become the future site for Murray High School, Dad was growing up in a charming little house just off State Street on 48th South. His mother moved back in with her parents after divorcing my grandfather; my dad was only 5 or 6 years old. My grandmother's parents helped with her children so she could go back to work to provide for them. They had recently moved into their own apartment for the first time when my dad was nearly finished with high school; in February of his senior year, she was killed in a car accident. Dad left for a mission to Alberta, Canada in 1950, the year after he finished high school. He and Mom were great friends from 7th grade on. They met on registration day for high school. As they stood in line together, Dad confidently announced to Mom that he had a $100 to register for 7th grade. This was 1943, so naturally, Mom rolled her eyes. She had to laugh when she saw that Dad had carefully folded a $10 bill to make the last '0' on the far right side of the bill perfectly align with the '10' on the left. They often sat by each other in classes but never dated. It wasn't till Dad saw her for the first time after his mission in 1952 - at a stake conference - that he came just short of stalking her for three days until he had to leave for the army. What a lovely serendipitous thing for Mom to send Dad a Christmas card a few months later; they wrote the rest of the time he was in Korea. He got home in November of 1954 and they married 7 months later. Dad loved music when he listened to his mother play practically anything she could hear, but he couldn't be bothered with music lessons. But when he asked me to play the piano for him, he always sat so he could watch my hands. That was his favorite thing about watching his mother play. My grandmother read to Dad almost every single night, and just like old radio serials, loved to find a dramatic place to stop for bedtime. He loved books the way he loved oxygen: instinctively and for survival. It wasn't the books themselves so much as the beauty and truth that was in them. Tonight, I gave Dad his Father's Day present with a similar piano repertoire to Mom's Mother's Day present six weeks ago. As on Mother's Day - I was heading upstairs for bed and realized I hadn't given him his Father's Day present - a little concert. I taught Sunday School today a bit on the fly - got the schedule mixed up and only realized I was in the docket last night. When I think of how I've learned to study in such a way that this didn't cause the panic attack it would have even a few years ago, I have to thank Dad. If my love of the beauty and truth in music came from Mom, my love of the beauty and truth in words came from Dad. Both of them, really - they were such an inseparable team. But I attribute my love of music to my mother, and my love of words to my father. Music is for expressing the inexpressible, but words are most often the way truth and beauty are expressed. The Word - Logos - the source of both (see John 1:1). No wonder my love for music and words are so linked. Dad's the one who sprawled out on the floor with me - my notebook and pencil in hand - and patiently asked me questions and waited for my answers, instructing me to write them down. Those answers became rudimentary outlines for church talks or school papers. Dad shaped my voice in a nearly subliminal way. How was I to know that truth and beauty went together? But by Dad's reactions to both, I grew up knowing they did. He savored both - and because he had a true education, he had the ability to articulate what made something true - what made it beautiful. My love of truth and beauty catch in my throat because I watched them catch in my dad's. As I finished my concert, I turned to the empty couch where Mom and Dad used to sit when I played for them. I blew them a kiss and told them I loved them. What an investment they made in me - to make a home laboratory of learning and practice. Always the practice. How else do you become holy? I'm grateful I learned who Jesus Christ was from two phenomenal humans who adored Him - who lived grand lives of ordinary imperfection with extraordinary consistency to covenants. I can think of no finer legacy for a mama and daddy to leave their little girl.

I had the great fortune to grow up across the street from a mentally handicapped boy a few years older than me. We always knew Brad was different, but we didn't really care. He was just one of the neighborhood gang, and allowances were always made for the fact he couldn't do everything the rest of us could. Brad was smart in a different way - he was far more socially aware of tension in a group dynamic than you might expect. He had an hysterical sense of humor, and could keep up in quips with my mom and dad - king and queen of the quippers. Until his parents died and he went to live with siblings, he had a running contest with my mother to see who could get their American flag out first on holidays. The 'in-your-face' gloating began when he won. He worked at the Deseret Industries for decades, and was awarded an honorary Eagle Scout for his service in scouting in his 60's. Brad had a neighborhood of fierce friends who defended him when the pettiness of humanity was ever directed at him. All of us - not just his siblings - would brook no mockery of him. We had watched his older brother - the older brother of the block, really - always pick Brad first at games. Taking our cue from Brent, we subliminally learned to understand that Brad gave his best efforts to any neighborhood enterprise, and that was good enough for us. What a gift, to grow up with someone who comes into this world in such a notable disguise. It has been a major private lesson that has continued into my adult life, giving me an instant respect for anyone who comes into a fallen world gifted with a disguise of mental and physical limitations. Anyone reading this who has known such a person knows exactly what I'm talking about. The older I get, I'm realizing pretty much every one of us is in disguise in one way or another. And yes, if you must know, this is absolutely in part because the morning reflection in my mirror does terrify me at first glance. Talk about a disguise. Old age - let's not sugarcoat it - is a fascinating disguise. I can't remember exactly when it happened, but I was NOT an old lady when it did: I suddenly became invisible to anyone a generation younger than me on down. Or if seen, instantly dismissed as irrelevant. When one of my DF's needed to move her daddy into assisted living after too many falls to keep track of, she told me she made a placard to hang outside his door with this written on it (not a direct quote): "This is a cowboy. This is a former Golden Glove boxer. This is a former math teacher who has been Math Teacher of the Year. This is a beloved father, a grandfather and great-grandfather. This is our dad." My DF wanted casual caretakers to know whom they were taking care of in the hopes of inspiring a little more dignity and respect than is far too often afforded the elderly. Of course, the young often feel equally dismissed; their disguise is their obvious inexperience. Too often, passionate opinions are too often smiled at benignly, treated as a passing 'phase' and dismissed with not always unintentional condescension. How sad: that's the very dynamic that is often carefully choreographed to gaslight someone into escalating their passion to prove the point of mental instability. There's some dignity and respect for ya. And seriously - don't you think just garden-variety ordinariness is a disguise? Who lurks behind an accountant, a health care worker or welder? What wonders might you discover if you stumble into a conversation with the checkout clerk, and learn she's about to road trip to Cheyenne, Wyoming, to scatter her mother's ashes beside her father's grave? (This may or may not be actually based on a true story.) Ordinary is most definitely a disguise for us humans who "trail[ed] clouds of glory" into this world (nod to Wordsworth) from a home of glory. In a world where a pleasing appearance is everything, it can be challenging to go against the mainstream flow and not proverbially judge human books by their covers. Attractive disguises can be far more subtle, and even quite pernicious. Not only are many extraordinary humans disguised with ordinariness, the converse is true. There's an entirely different subset of humans who disguise shallowness and vapidness beneath a pleasing veneer of beauty. Worst of all, some of the darkest humans who glory in cruelty hide beneath this disguise. My favorite literary lesson of this principle is Victor Hugo's Hunchback of Notre Dame. You know it's a prominent human tendency when even Samuel in the Old Testament - a prophet of God - is surprised by the Lord repeatedly telling him - upon being presented SEVEN TIMES with one strapping, good-looking boy after another: "Not him. He's not the one I want as king, keep looking." (not a direct quote). "But the Lord said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart." (1 Samuel 16:7) Samuel got guidance from God Himself, but we're just ordinary humans. Do we have the Lord whispering in OUR ears the way a prophet of God does? Actually, yes, we do. It's definitely a project that takes a lot of practice, seeing beyond the disguises at all - but the greater practice is that of listening to the voice of our Father Creator who is constantly available to help us when we are serious about seeking His help. Curiously, the help seems contingent upon asking with the intent to actually DO something with what you're told. Generous Father that He is, He doesn't want you to ask in vain - ask and dismiss - and then be accountable for disobeying. There are learnable, practiceable things to see past disguises: Engage with people every chance you get. Make conversations about other people Inject yourself only as you look for common ground Assume each and every one of God's children has something to teach you (Imagine biggest font on this one) Limited mobility doesn't mean limited mind. Limited mind doesn't mean limited bandwidth and wellsprings of compassion and insight. Limited worldly experience doesn't mean limited experience. Limited depth doesn't mean limited life narrative. Limited physical beauty doesn't mean limited spiritual beauty. Limited flaws don't mean limited challenges. I repeat: if you assume everyone you meet - regardless of how they look, sound, smell, or act - has something of great value to teach you - and treat them with the respect and dignity that affords them - life will change and become profoundly richer. Seeing past the disguises of a fallen world (translation: temporal. Translation: temporary) is the hobby of a lifetime, and a huge stepping stone to develop charity, "the greatest of these" (1 Corinthians 13:13).

Dudley was right. Cary Grant played the part of Dudley - an angel - in the 1947 Christmas film, The Bishop's Wife. This photo shows Dudley him talking to Debbie, the bishop's daughter (also Su-Su in It's a Wonderful Life). He's telling her the story of David, a young shepherd - who, thanks to an angel, gets the idea of how to save one of his lambs and kill an attacking lion. While there's no account of an angel in this story in the Bible, the idea that an angel gave David an idea is a central theme in the film. Several characters besides the bishop in the title find solutions to pressing problems by seemingly receiving a sudden, expected - brilliant - idea. Perhaps you've had this kind of sudden inspiration: you're running errands and realize you're very near something else you'd intended to do, but somehow the task had left your current radar; now you can do both. Or maybe you're making a meal and suddenly decide it'll take no extra time to double up and stick the extra in the freezer... unless you've remembered while you're making it that so-and-so down the street just had a baby. It happens all the time, and here's a private lesson of late: the sooner I recognize it was heavenly help - angel or no - and the sooner I acknowledge it by muttering a quick prayer of thanks - the more "good ideas" I seem to get. Coincidence? I think not. A few recent "good ideas" lately have gotten me thinking there may be no such thing as a good idea, a good intention, or a good resolve - that didn't come first as the quietest inkling of an invitation from Someplace Else. Nothing bossy - no, no. Just a quiet: "You know what might be a great idea? _____" Fill in the blank with your most recent brilliant idea. In fact, I'm willing to up the ante and suggest that there's no such thing as any resolve in self-improvement, any attainment of a good habit, any good thing anyone may ever do, that if you trace the quiet thread back to the Source of the idea, you won't find Jesus standing there. I assert that Jesus is the Source of all the good ideas - because He is the source of all good. The reason we are able to choose to be good - choose to RSVP those quiet invitations at all - is because He performed the atoning sacrifice. His great gift is the only way we are truly able to choose and be 100% responsible for those choices. This is likely to tick off quite a few people - unbelievers and those who actually hate the influence of Jesus in the world. Imagine their surprise at the end of their lives, watching the whole thing play out in whatever version of home movies heaven has, and seeing that it wasn't an angel like Dudley who whispered quiet ideas to them - but the very Father of their spirits and the very Savior of the world Himself - through the quiet, inviting influence of the Holy Ghost. The mighty Godhead who work and serve in tandem for the good of humanity - for our very salvation and exaltation - are the reason any of us can do anything ennobling. They plant the idea through the influence of the Holy Ghost, and it's up to us to act on the ideas. No wonder daily repentance is such a great idea. How else can I review when I've listened - and give thanks - or when I haven't listened - and resolve to do better? That's what daily prayer is for - daily coaching sessions that involve this kind of review and resolve to do better in our practice tomorrow. The best news of all is that the more we practice accepting the quiet invitations, the better we get at recognizing them - and the stronger our inclination to act on them becomes. You really can get better at just about anything... with practice. Elder David A. Bednar has cut to the chase on this idea on a number of occasions - usually when speaking to youth, missionaries, or young adults. Here, in a 2009 talk in the Missionary Training Center, he explains: "Somehow, someway in the culture of the church, not in the doctrine, but in the culture of the church we have come to believe that I must know in the moment that it's a spiritual impression. That I must receive the spiritual impression so that it will guide me and tell me what to do. And that unless I receive such an impression, I cannot go forward because I won't know what to do. Now, Elders and Sisters, every once in a while, rarely, you will receive an impression that will guide you and you will know it before the fact. The overwhelming majority of the impressions and revelations you will ever receive will come in the course of you being a good boy or a good girl, honoring your covenants, keeping your commandments and you will become an instrument in the hands of God and He will take you where you need to be so you can do what He wants you to do and much of the time you'll never know it's happening that way." (https://ldsmomentsoflight.com/an-apostle-explains-revelation/) This teaching from an apostle suggests a powerful promise worth holding onto: the more you listen to the quiet invitations, the more you'll receive. And this idea has left me a little apprehensive about ever ever ever thinking I've ever ever ever had a good idea. EVER.

I need to tell you about my mama. She grew up in Murray, Utah. Her mother was pioneer stock - my 3rd great grandfather is atop the This is the Place Monument. Her father was born here after his mother and her parents immigrated from Sweden. Grandpa worked at the Murray smelter until it closed, and then at a paint store. Grandma kept a clean and tidy house, stating often that "soap was cheap." Mom loved music, and loved it when the family had the radio on in the evenings. It used to sadden her that her dad was able to turn the radio off in the middle of any piece of music when it was time for bed - slightly scandalized that he could interrupt such a heavenly flow of sound. There was no money for a piano, but she made one out of a cardboard box, fighting to cut through the cardboard on the "keys" she had drawn for a keyboard so the cardboard would somewhat reluctantly move up and down to her touch. The first thing Mom bought as an adult with a job was a piano. She made modest payments she could afford until it was all hers. That's the piano I first learned to play on. When my mother started to hear me trying to plunk out any melody I could hear - from Primary songs to movie themes - she started to get out the elementary reading books she had used to try to learn to play. I was temporarily overjoyed to start piano lessons, because as abby-normal as I was in soooo many things as a kid - in that thing - I was terribly normal. I loved to play the piano, but practice? You're kidding, right? This is actually the core of the book I'm striving to finish - the metaphor of personal practice in our lives and the individual tutoring we receive from God, but I merely digress with that brief interruption for a moment of shameless self-promotion. My mother was so sly about enticing me with new piano books. After movies like The Music Man, My Fair Lady, Mary Poppins, and The Sound of Music, little simplified piano books from the movies would just appear on the piano. Clever bird. Rather than insist I help with dinner dishes, Mom more often than not called out requests for various pieces while she did the dishes. Not that I never had those chores, but she often asked me to play specific songs while she worked, and I was only too happy to "get out of work." Clever bird. If you'd told my kid Self that I would make a 40+ year career out of teaching piano, there's an excellent chance I would have rebelled on the spot and never touched the piano again. I'm pretty sure this thought makes Heavenly Father smile quite big. My mother's tenacity at keeping me at piano study is a testament to her great love of music - and her ardent desire to give me something she so desperately wanted for herself. And my dad was her willing accomplice. A typical piano dropout who chose sports over music, he was the cliche of an adult who rued that he couldn't see the value of what his mother - a gifted pianist herself - was trying to give him. Well. I didn't see the value of what they were trying to give me, either. But tonight, as I got ready to come upstairs and go to bed, I realized I hadn't played the piano for several days. It suddenly felt a little urgent to play for a few minutes, because most of the times I've played the piano in the last 2 years, that's when I feel my parents come around the very most. I played several of my favorite pieces that still sound semi-respectable without practice: Mendelssohn's Venetian Gondola Song; Bach's Siciliano, Debussy's Reverie and Clair de Lune, and Ashokan Farewell. It felt like they'd come to listen, as they so often do. Gratitude rushed in like a tidal wave again, as I remembered - again - how I wouldn't have this beauty in my life - respite from chaos - were it not for two beautiful souls who gave me a gift almost against my very will. Thank you both - Mom and Dad - but thank you, especially, Mom - who had to put up with my attitude the most. When I think of the 40-year back pain you endured the last half of your life, I fear it was me that broke your spine of steel. I made deals with both my parents near the end of their lives that in the Millennium, I'll teach them to play the piano. Dad and I promised after several weeks of loving to learn to play right hands, only to discover he had a weakness in his left hand that wouldn't allow him to play hands together. Mom and I promised after she had become blind from macular degeneration - seeing only "men as trees walking" at that point in her life. What a lovely thing that will be - to give them the joy of creating music. The three greatest gifts my parents gave me: Jesus Words - given to me in stories and books Music - the language we use when we pray without words I'm glad I remembered just in the nick of time to give Mama her Mother's Day present this year. It's because of her I had it to give.