Since I last wrote my whole life has done a 180, turning me in a direction that I never thought I'd go. With less than a year left of school til I have my teaching degree, I have just left my beloved Brigham Young University and moved back to Indiana. They say home is where the heart is and in all honesty my heart is bleeding all over Provo and the rest of Utah right now. In the catacombs of my library, the apartments of the residence halls, the concerts halls in the HFAC, the chem labs in the Benson, the quiet nooks of reflection in the JSB. Beyond a shadow of a doubt I will miss gathering at Nana's on weekends or holidays, going bowling with my cousins or just hanging out with them, talking to my aunts and uncles, and visiting the cemetery for those long heart to hearts I've made a habit of. And my heart aches for the friends I won't get to see for awhile. I've waited for over two years for my boys to come home only to leave within weeks of a reunion. But I hope I will be able to go back and visit soon.
The decision to move back to Indiana was made as one job, the wonderful job of being a nanny to adorable wonderful Jackson, ended and as the other jobs I applied for fell through. In the LDS religion, women can serve missions at the age of 21 if they aren't married, so that consideration is in the mix. But I balked at returning home for fear of losing my independence despite the money it would help me save for a mission and schooling. I considered joining the Marines, even did PT with a group of them for several weeks while I contemplated. Ultimately the choice was made with much prayer, fasting, and thought. Every plan I had concocted seemed to fall apart and I felt the Lord's voice telling me I needed to go a different direction. Maybe it was where I needed to go the whole time, but I needed to experience other things first. It reminds me of a talk given in the last general conference by Elder Christoffersonhttp://lds.org/general-conference/2011/04/as-many-as-i-lohttp://lds.org/general-conference/2011/04/as-many-as-i-love-i-rebuke-and-chasten?lang=engve-i-rebuke-and-chasten?lang=eng.
I often think about the story of the footprints in the sand. Looking back on his life, the man notices that at some of the more difficult parts of his life there was only one set of footprints in the sand. The Lord answers that those were the times he carried the man. Now, I fully admit that everything I do is because of my Heavenly Father, with his help and power, and with him nothing is impossible. But I hope you understand that when I look back on my life across the sand, I want to see two sets the whole way. I want to see patches of bloodstains, sand wet from tears, muddled spots where I slid around and tripped. I want to look back upon this life with the Lord at my side and say that I put everything I had into it- I pushed forward through the changes and the thorny patches, over the rocks, up the mountains, and down the valley of shadow. It is not that I do not want the Lord to carry me, but I think He will always guide me as I experience all that is required of me in mortality. This year has been a year of bloody footprints and tears, but I wouldn't want to erase the footprints in favor of nice, easy little steps. For it's what makes me stronger for the next challenge.
Sister Majorie Pay Hinckley once expressed similar sentiments:
" I don't want to drive up to the pearly gates in a shiny sports car, wearing beautifully tailored clothes, my hair expertly coiffed, with long, perfectly manicured fingernails. I want to drive up in a station wagon that has mud on the tires from taking kids to scout camp. I want there to be a smudge of peanut butter on my shirt from making sandwiches for a sick neighbors kids. I want to be there with a little dirt under my nails from helping to weed someone's garden. I want to be there with children's sticky kisses on my cheeks and the tears of a friend on my shoulder. I want the Lord to know that I was really here and that I really lived."
