A Little Child Shall Lead Them

 

 

Dear family and dear friends,                                                                                     21 October 2012

  

 

Mid-September, our family had secured tickets to tour the new Brigham City temple.  I had invited Kristen and Zach.  Amber and Jake were on their month’s anniversary hike to Ensign Peak in Salt Lake, but Kristen and Zach and part of Steven’s family agreed to meet my parents and Val, who was bringing his mom.  I was following Val north on I-15, but became concerned when he did not take exit 362 (one traditionally easy to miss) to go to Logan via Brigham City.  Problem—I called him, and called him.  I needed to tell him he had missed the exit.  The problem became mine when I realized that it was not Val that I was following.  Good thing there are off-ramps on these freeways.  Good thing there are off-ramps for life in the event that we are following the wrong vehicle! 

We finally found the K-Mart parking lot and a host of familiar faces, scooped them all up and loaded the waiting charter bus.  I am unsure why I eventually got the prized position of being next to nearly two-year-old William. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What delight and freedom claimed his expression, when he could sit on a seat in a moving vehicle, something that goes “Vrrrroom,” without being soundly straight-jacketed into a toddler car seat!  With a large looming window beside him and the world in his view, the little boy could not stop grinning. 

 

 

 

Approaching the temple, we were shepherded into an underground parking garage film room where we learned of pioneers in the Brigham City area. 

The children were content and swallowed up into the tour until my dad allowed Zach to do some wheelchair derby steering,

while Kristen took a toddler’s hand

 

and handed me a nearly six-month Savanna.  Savanna seemed in her element.  It seems she has slept for six months.  But when carried into the first rooms of the temple, she came alive.  She cooed and chattered.  I was tempted to look at her little dress to find a “usher” or “tour guide” name tag attached.  From the paintings of pioneers picking peaches to the hallowed halls leading to altars and sacred sealing places, this child in my arms looked and talked and told us where we were.

 

I thought about this a few weeks later when I had learned that all my belongings had gone missing at our local hospital.  I had just wanted to call my daughters and let them know my procedure had gone successfully; I was recovering and well. 

 

But as we share cell phone minutes, we had exceeded our allotment last month during Val and my 19^th anniversary trip to Glacier, then Cardston, Banff, and Lake Louise in Canada. 

 

Thus, I hoped to phone cell to cell with the girls with no minutes charged—but I had no phone!  I called Val to ask Kristen to ask little William to pray.  He knows how to do this, with a little help.  Kristen coached, and as soon she had, and just after I decided I could forgive the hospital for losing everything (how hard is it to procure a new telephone? I needed a new one anyway)  the hospital found an envelope with a key to my locker that had slipped behind a drawer.  There is a scripture in Matthew 18:10 “Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones; for I say unto you, That in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven.”  So William prayed, and my phone was found.   The angels were working!    Little Savanna gave us a tour of Brigham City’s new temple, and now it is our job to be angels with these children, to teach them things like taking off shoes, putting away silverware, avoiding glass, chemicals, outlets, and “fun” buttons that control computers or electronics.  “Neither have angels ceased to minister unto the children of men…that [they] may have faith in Christ, that the Holy Ghost may have place in their hearts.”  (Moroni 7: 29-32)  Can we be the angels?  Are we not blessed to have the seedlings of goodness in our families and homes--if only via telephone or computer--to call us “Grandpa” even when we are “GrandMA!”) to help us become “alive” in Christ?  Are we not blessed to get dimples and wavy smiles on demand?

 Like watching green to yellow to crimson colors change outside our window with the seasons,

 

 these little lives inside our windows are constant in their change and just as brilliant. 

(above photo is from outside Cardston temple)

 

“And Jesus saith unto them, Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise?  (Matthew 21:16)  I am unsure if he was talking about Savanna’s gumby smile

 

or William’s hearty “amen” when a prayer is over…but “I sing and sing” when our little ones visit, and even when our neighbor Dylan watches from his front door to see if there is anything heavy to carry in.  “And [Jesus]…said unto them:  Behold your little ones.” 

 

What a blessing—to send our children out, and have them come back bringing something better!  May this changing of the seasons bring color, beauty, and joy!  Blessings to you, Laurene and Val

Above, was on the Road to the Sun, going to West Glacier

 

Above and below flowers are at Cardston temple grounds

All other temple pictures are from Brigham City temple

 

May your October be brilliant!

Lost Leaf Under a Lady Bug

 

3 October 2012...

On my parents' 54th anniversary, they are taking daughter in for a medical procedure today,about 12:15.  Thank you for your prayers.  (For the doctor, anaesthesiologist, nurses, and for the presidential debate and citizens viewing it, who each merit our prayers, even if I am a bit out of it.)

 

I just got this fun card from Marion, my family history center supervisor, who has added limbs and leaves of family names with pictures, gravestones, crests or flags to her ancestry account, but still has time to be creative and help the rest of us want to wake up and do good things!   This is my Sunday letter that has taken a minutes to prepare (downloading 400 pictures to find a few!) but hopefully is the beginning of better things.

 

Lost Leaf Under a Lady Bug

Dear family and dear friends,                                                                     30 September 2012

I wonder if autumn allows for turning over a new leaf.  I realize that it has been nearly a year since I penned anything to family or friends online in the form of a real live letter!  My last entry of stories about the celebration in honor of my father in San Antonio for 50 years of membership and service in the Soil Science Society of America marked a milestone.  Then the holidays came and went.  Midstream toward spring, I was able to care for a little grandson, while helping to welcome a granddaughter into the world.  Preparing a duet with our daughter Maria, I decided organ practice would be in order.  Hunting for the music (which had been marked and remarked for months—believe me, it was remarkable music!) the pages refused to be found.  After driving 20 minutes to Kristen’s house, cleaning and searching,  I drove to my mom’s house (no need to clean it—have you ever visited Shirley, even without notice? it was not there.)  I then tried Val’s mom’s house—no luck, no luck, no luck.  After checking the church, I finally resolved that the music and the ladybug bag it was in were permanently lost.  Lost and gone.  Then I realized that in the bag were my scriptures ($60 to replace) and a journal with three pages left to write.  Not long before, I had queried a dear junior high confidant—how does a person get to be like President Monson—ever so busy, finding time to jot something every day.  Every day!  How?  Truly, how?  She did not know, and neither did I.  I decided it might be a good thing to pray about (but I was not sure that this trait was one I wanted to commit to, even if it was enviable.) 

 

Then, I realized that a whole two years of journal had gone missing.  Amber tells me that her institute teacher told her that as long as it is written down, it will be recorded in heaven (even if it gets lost.)  But something lurks as disconcerting, a challenge to a person’s identity, to lose a whole year of life—worse than losing a purse.  So, after asking my Relief Society friends to include me in their prayers, and after some soul searching and prayers of my own, I finally resorted to bargaining—“If only I could find that journal [knowing it to be coupled with nearly a year of marked music and more years still of seasoned scriptures] I would write every day.”  More searching, no journal found.  Then, reflecting on the disgruntled nature accompanying the local gardener (me) asking for assistance to dig the Japanese maple with less-than-enthusiastic help, I decided I could promise to be nice--for the rest of my life.  That did it. 

Arriving home from our Sunday meetings, I had fasted, hoping it would help.  No luck.  But before finding lettuce for a family dinner, I decided to look one more time in the car.  Then check the banquet table in the garage that housed three of Maria’s boxes. To get ready for a visit from son-in-law-to-be, Jake, Kristen had visited and gently moved the boxes there, commenting, “You may want to empty them sometime; I found a twenty dollar bill in there!” 

“Why did she not just give her sister the money?”  I asked myself, walking inside.  “Maybe God is like Kristen, placing treasures in the middle of the clutter, so when we clean up, we find good things.”  Just as this profound little nugget of goodness nudged its way into my consciousness, I looked down at a bag of 24 double rolls of Quilted Northern toilet paper which had worked at being carried inside from a full car, toddler in tow.  Right next to the toilet paper sat a tapestry tote with tags taunting “sign here,” like Pamela Davies uses with her music. 

The bag looked suspiciously marked with lady bugs, and though it was next to several similar totes containing travel pamphlets, inside was indeed music-laden with “America, the Beautiful” (And, oh! Was it beautiful!) … along with a miniature quad and a 100 page journal with three blank pages beckoning to be penned.  

 

 

I get to write frequently in a little book, which wants to multiply monthly

 

… and (the hard part) I have to be nice for a long, long time.  The “nice” part is the struggle.  The journaling grows on a person (though it takes time, which may be a factor in failing to pen my family letter… along with loving two nearby grandchildren, hearing about seven more farther away, graduating Maria,

helping with two family reunions, seeing Amber married,

 

whisking Maria off to BYU, and cheering some gracefully aging parents and in-laws.  This week, Grandpa Starkey got released from McKay Dee Hospital after shaking off the odds of a life-threatening health challenge.  Sooo glad to enjoy corn on the cob and pork chops with him tonight!)  Maria marks her 18^th birthday on the morrow, voter application set to go out in the morning mail.  Val joined me at two “victory” centers Friday making calls for two of our favorite candidates--a privilege to take part in the political process!  A journal is said to enlarge memory…if one can remember the place that journal was last seen! 

And writing about life can make living more interesting—possibly more so when someone writes back—so jot a note if you choose.   You do not have to do it as regularly, and if you have not promised to be “nice” for the rest of your life, there may not be quite the puzzlement of what to say!  Take care--blessings from the Starkey empty nest