Walls and Bridges

          The Roseburg Stake had a blog which would refer members to stake conference.  It provided a list of speakers and the meeting agenda.  I remember the leaders referred to it in years’ past, but did not have any information for it this year.  I unfortunately did not write down the name of the speaker who gave a beautiful talk comparing physical walls and bridges to what wills us. 

          She started out her talk with a brief history of the Berlin wall which was built in 1961.  Citizens were informed that the wall was for their protection.  Whether we choose to call it protection or defense, for many the wall was a personal prison.  The wall did not come down until almost two decades later.  That is a long time to feel trapped and apart.  It isn’t healthy.

          The speaker then went on to talk about the bridge that was built between Afghanistan and Uzbekistan – a simple bridge really.  There didn’t seem anything special or sophisticated about the structure itself – and yet the bridge seemed to open many doors and provide opportunities that the bridge eventually became known as “Friendship Bridge” because it provided a way to transport things through.

          She compared this to the ministering program – how sometimes we may run into sisters who have placed walls in front of themselves and may not wish to share personal information about themselves – and that is okay.  Perhaps we can be the ones to build up the bridges that if they ever decide to move beyond the walls that they may choose to extend that bridge.  I realize I am not doing the talk justice with my notes.  I hope those that read may get the gist of the message.  Sometimes it is just the small actions that help build and support lasting friendships.

          For more information on the history of the physical wall and bridge see here, here and here or go research on your own.  I know it's just a small sample.  I wish I could have documented the entire talk - I just don'e write that quickly and my short term memory isn't great.

high waves and hidden beaches

I took over 250 pictures on the coast and on our return yesterday.  Here is a taste of what we saw:

Bandon

This is Sunset Bay where we usually go

pictures of us on this beach found here and here

Shore Acres

shore Acres

Catching Up on Some ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZs

I was on my computer Tuesday morning when I received a call from one of the schools.  It was 8:35 and the shift started at 9:00.  It was for the school that is farthest away, but I thought I could be there on time.  At that point I didn’t know if I’d be working with the elementary or middle school age children.  I wish it had been the older kids instead of the younger ones.

I was over my sore throat but still had that darn dry cough, and because I was using my voice all day (except for recess) my cough became stronger and my throat started hurting again.  I did not work yesterday.

The RS presidency meets once a week.  Initially they met on Monday but had changed it to Wednesday to accommodate me.  I don’t particularly enjoy working on Wednesdays as it is the short day and school lets out at the same time I get off.  I’d rather not deal with school traffic – which I don’t on any other day.  If I know there is not going to be a meeting, I can accept an assignment.

After the meeting, Roland and I drove up to Roseburg to see the movie “Ad Astra” – what a waste.  I really liked “Space Cowboys” made almost 20 years before the release of “Ad Astra”.  Did not care for “Ad Astra” at all.  For one thing, the light fading in and out on the screen bothered my eyes.  Sitting for more than one hour and twenty minutes was killing my behind.  I finally got up just to go to the bathroom and check the snack bar for something that might help my throat.  Didn’t find anything, but it was worth a shot. 

Then I heard my stomach growl.  I was hungry.  I wanted real food – not candy or popcorn.  They sold hot dogs for 5.50.  5.50!  Flip! I would have gone elsewhere, but none of the nearby locations sell any kind of food.  There was a half hour left until the movie let out.  I ordered a hot dog.  It took 15 minutes just to make the dang thing.  Can you imagine? Good thing there were no other patrons standing in line – well, there was no line.  I was it.  Everyone else was in the theater.

I can’t believe everybody sat through it.  I didn’t hear anyone say it was good or they liked it.  I had only seen one other person leave before it ended.  Roland didn’t like it.  He should have left sooner and come out and found me. 

Today I am going to the coast with a friend.  I am not even going to bother looking for work today.  I told Roland that I would, but I don’t want my throat to start aching again.  I think being closer to the ocean today may assist in my healing.  Let us hope so anyway.

Sorry for the non-exciting post.

 

Dash #254 My Most Embarrassing Moment

          I  may have had other embarrassing moments, but the one that comes to mind involves a two-piece swimsuit when I was 12 to 14 – I think. I can’t remember if Kayla was around yet or not.  If so, I would have been older.

          I had worn the swimsuit only one time and knew it had gone through the wash.  My family was on our way to Lagoon Amusement Park and I went to the laundry room to retrieve my suit.  I was saddened  to see the bottoms had discolored as there had been a bleach spill.  My top, fortunately, had not been bleached.  The bottoms had become an ugly brown resembling soiled diapers.  The top, fortunately, hid the bottoms.  I figured it would be okay to wear them.

this is not the exact suit but does resemble the style

          Until that day, I was unaware how harmful too much bleach can be and how bleach combined with water can make fabric disintegrate – which is what happened in the pool.   I don’t know how soon after I started playing in the water that they disappeared.  I had been in the pool for a while (I think) before I realized that my bottom was bare.

          I remember making my way to the edge of the pool and asking my mom to hand me a towel.

          “They are just right there,” she said pointing to the towels on the nearby ground.

          “I know,” I said, holding the bottom of my suit top so that it wouldn’t float up and expose me more than I already was. “Could you hand me one?”

          Of course mom did not realize until after I had gotten out why I just didn’t lean down to get it myself.  There may have been pieces of fabric floating around in the pool – but not enough to identify as my bottoms.  It certainly could have been a more embarrassing situation.  I remember that I was mortified at the time.  I didn’t find the humor in it until many years later.

I Don’t Get It

                I think there are gremlins bugging the social media right now – or some aspects of it anyway.  I have noticed it on facebook and YouTube, but I don’t know which order – probably facebook.  Each time they try to improve the site, there are millions of bugs that cause havoc for the user.

            Lately facebook has ignored my requests of who I would like notifications from and have been throwing in notifications at random.  Just the other day I received a notification for someone I wasn’t even aware I was facebook friends with (which goes to show how close we are) and so I have been typing in the names of family members just so I am updated about their latest thoughts.

            As I have mentioned in at least two other posts, I created a Relief Society page for the ward that I currently attend.  Each of the wards I have attended have communication pages, but I did not see one for this ward and thus almost five years ago I took it upon myself to create one.  I did not have permission nor did it occur to me to seek it.  But nearly everybody loved the idea and requested that I keep it (even if I had to change the name).  Thus I am the administrator. I now come up as an administrator of our newest ward page.  What the heck?

            Another member of the group has tried to add pictures of thoughts to the group, but evidently access has been denied.  Thus I took it upon myself to repost her thoughts and received “badge” for joining the administration.  Say what now?  Why am I getting this “badge”?  Why do I all the sudden have this title of “founding member’?  I did not have anything to do with creating the ward group – but as I look into again, it appears that anyone who has posted anything receives a “founding member” except for the one who initially invited me in.  I don’t see next to her name.  Weird.

            The bishop, who did start the page, cannot open private messages which I had sent to him in facebook.  Three examples of facebook’s current gremlins.  Now let’s move on to YouTube, shall we?  Allthough the bugs may have been worked out now – but I haven’t completed this post.

            Viewers are given the option of not having to view ads for those who can afford the fee.  Although ten dollars a month may not seem like a big deal to some, I am not readily on YouTube enough that it is worth it. I can skip the ads  if I am near the computer, but if I’m across the room . . . well that’s a different story.  I brought YouTube up because I wanted to listen to the music to help me fall asleep.  I once had a computer that came with a remote.  I wondered why a person would ever need a remote to work the computer.  As I sat up in bed annoyed – not by the ads but the repeated plays (though I would rather hear the same song two or three times than any ads) I finally figured out why a remote would be handy.

            When I was taking accounting and other classes I was on YouTube all the time.  Because I would look for accounting and business videos, the ads would be geared toward such.  That was annoying.  However, YouTube's latest glitch was repeating the song that just played.  It wasn’t just my device or personal playlist.  Jenna was getting the same thing.  And although they are songs that we like, we like and would like to listen to others as well.  I have not experienced that problem at all while I type this. It has actually been quite enjoyable.

            As I did not have a remote to work while I was in bed I finally changed the position of YouTube coming through my computer to an alternate through the TV.  Our bedroom is not that far from our living room.  It’s not like we live in a mansion or anything that the two televisions or computers would have to be on different signals, and yet they seem so distant from one another as far as signal goes when theoretically it is less than 30 walking steps from one devise to the other.  Thus I don’t think the living room YouTube would cut out like the bedroom YouTube does.  Neither play an entire ad.  Both cut out, which I find amusing.  Both will make its own playlist.  The one in the living room will play until we stop it.  I have always fallen asleep in the bedroom except recently to see that after only six or seven songs it will freeze for several minutes before it kicks back to the regular station.  Gremlins.  Bedroom Gremlins.  Computer gremlins.  Facebook gremlins.

            Technology.  Fascinating but definitely imperfect.

Sunday Meeting

            On Thursday someone had called Roland’s phone to see if I would offer the closing prayer at the end of today’s sacrament meeting.  I didn’t know how my throat what be, but as it has started healing, I decided I would go to Church and stay for at least sacrament meeting but might not stay for Relief Society.  Jenna made other arrangements for getting a ride home.

            Sacrement meting was really good!  The first speaker expanded on Elder Uchtdorf’s talk “Our Great Adventure”(here) in which he compares the hobbit creatures to each of us.  For those who have seen or read “The Hobbit” the parallels may have been easily understood.  I’m not really big fan of fantasy and felt somewhat lost with Elder Uchtdorf’s talk which evidently our sacrament speaker had also and provided some more in depth detail to make more sense out of the talk that some of us just didn’t understand the first time around.

            The concluding speaker was our new bishop – a newly called bishop who was just sustained a high priest two weeks ago.  I have LOVED every talk he has given.  Today was no exceptions.  He reminisced a few quotes and conference and spending time with the family.  He just does it with such awesome enthusiasm that it just made everyone smile. 

            The Spiritual exceptions happened during the sacramental and concluding hymn.  I found it ironic that the first hymn “In Remembrance of Thy Suffering” had the word suffer in it as it seemed suffering to listen to the congregation struggling to sing it as though it was the first time each member had seen that particular piece of music.  Granted, it isn’t sung as regularly as some of the other sacrament hymnals that are in the book, but I know I have sung it before.  But the congregations very unsync efforts pretty much butchered the song.   

            The closing hymn didn’t sound as bad, but it was quite obvious that they both needed work and a professional choir we are not.  I gave  the closing prayer and returned home.  My plans were to kick back and drink some herbal tea.  Instead I am writing a post and drinking something terrible that should work like medicine because the taste is like medicine.

            Roland had purchased a box of vanilla protein shakes a while back figuring they might work as a substitute for milk in my lunches.  There is no substitute for milk!  I had told him that.  I had told him not to purchase the protein drinks but he gets a bee in his bonnet and forgets conversations.  I love him for thinking of me.  But come on.  It’s something you drink when you don’t have time for a meal – not with a meal.

           

            When I am not hungry but feel the need to eat, I will break on out but not enjoy it though the vanilla protein is better than the chocolate – which I can only drink when I mix it with actual chocolate milk (that is really milk) and so my drink is always twice the size of the intent.  Roland absolutely hates the vanilla.  Again, I told him not to purchase them in the first place.

            Anyway I am supposed to drink warm liquids – not that a warm protein drink is on the agenda, but I thought I’d try it figuring it would taste worse than refrigerated or room temperature.  Boy, did it ever!  What sane person does Not Love the taste of chalk?  My mouth is now on death row. When it cooled off, I added some honey to it.  That seemed to help.  But it hasn’t gotten rid of the yucchy residue build up on my tongue.

            And that concludes this post.  Now for kicking back and perhaps having the tea I should have had in the first place.

Medicine Mouth

            In May my teeth hurt along with the rest of my body.  I have made a conscience effort to brush them between medicine doses and always hope my teeth don’t rot as a result of my being sick.

           

            I do feel better today than yesterday.  My throat still hurts, but the swollen gland is a smaller size than what it was yesterday.

            I prefer drinking cold to room temperature liquids.  I enjoy gulping water.  I have never been a big fan of warm to hot drinks.  Once in a while, but certainly not on a daily basis.

            Roland, on the other hand, prefers hot drinks to cold (one of our many many oppositions) and will drink a hot chocolate even when it is 94 degrees outside.  I have learned that warm to hot drinks are better for the body’s system than cold drinks are.  Too bad.

            One cannot “gulp” when the drink is hot.  I can’t take pills (medication, vitamins) unless I am gulping.  But yesterday almost all of the liquid I put inside myself was warm to hot because warm to hot liquids are recommended for a sore throat.  Thus I will continue today.  I miss my cold water. 

A.L. Herbert Murders (Recipes Included)

 In this post I mention A.L. Herbert’s book “Murder with Fried Chicken”.  

I am now reading “Murder with Macaroni and Cheese” and am laughing at the crazy characters who get involved with yet another murder.  They have just discovered the body in a house where they didn’t belong and have returned to the scene of the crime.  I am just shaking my head about the choices they seem to be making because they are not wise choices, but because it is fiction, it is funny. 

Halia had been asked to cater her own class reunion.  There are quite a few chapters that introduce us to various characters and relationships. I had not figured out the victim of the last book, but had guessed who the victim was long before the murder – which they only suspect is a murder at this point.  But then they go and blab it to those who could very well be suspects.

This is what I am reading when I am not sleeping or fighting the infection that has been invading my body.  Not as bad as how I felt in May, but still.  I have already been sick this year.  I don’t need to be sick again.  I could go for ten years without being sick and I would seriously be fine with it.  I suspect I will be done with this book (as well as others) long before my cold is gone.  Hopefully neither Jenna nor Roland will get this.  Hopefully nobody does.

School’s out today.  Wish I felt well enough to spend it with Jenna instead of in bed trying to sleep.

When the day presents a 30 or 40 degree jump

I did not sleep well Tuesday Night/Wednesday morning

Amazingly I got cold and Roland woke up hot

Yesterday I woke up with a dry cough

Gradually it turned into a sore throat.

I have been sleeping with the windows open

even just a crack

except for the last two nights.

Yesterday after school I loaded myself with 

Musinex, Flonaze, Vitamin D3 and Chamomile Tea.  

I also broke out the humidifier.

I slept great

Up until 4:00 in the morning.

I took more Musinex

I tried closing my eyes but

wasn’t sleeping.

Now I’m writing this post.

I hope I can stay awake for the next eight hours. 

I have to leave for work just

under three.

This week I’ve been working with

the middle schoolers.

Both schools.

Yesterday I was sore. 

So sore.

My soreness grew throughout the day.

I don’t want to be sick!!!!

If I don't post for the next three days 

I'll be in bed trying to fight this.

Fog to Sun and 30 degree Jump

Roland turned up the heat as

he was cold yesterday morning. 

The fog was thick and did not seem

to start lifting until after 9:00. 

It started.

It was still foggy. 

I did not choose to leave the

house until almost 11:00.  It

appeared the fog had lifted

quicker in Myrtle Creek than in

Tri City.

Still the hills were hidden.  I

couldn’t see the towers until 11:30. 

It was 47 degrees just before

the fog lifted.  Of course

I was already hot and had the

windows open, fan running and  

told Roland that he should shut

 his door and plugged in the small

space heater that is probably

the perfect size for his office. 

I think his office is plenty hot without

the space heater.  The longer it

takes the fog to lift in the morning, the

hotter it gets during the day. 

It got up to 75. Fortunately

we have not removed the

air conditioners (as of yet)

The fog does not seem as dense
this morning.

Prayer in a Mustache

          Somewhere in my memoirs is a Beetle Bailey comic strip printed in September 1999 – maybe 2000.  Of course, I can’t locate it and thus I will describe what happens (although it will take more time).

          For those not familiar with Col. Hathaway (or General – whatever he is) he is bald – which I had never thought about one way or the other as his head is always covered with his army cap.  The only hair that is visible on his face are two little white eyebrows and a small white mustache (about the same size as his nose).  In this strip, Hathaway has his hat off and placed on his desk.  He announces that he has heard that hair can be grown through meditation and so he wants to try it.

          For the next four frames we see Hathaway deep in meditation trying so hard to get his hair to grow while his staff poke fun at his desire.  In the last frame, Hathaway touches his still bald head and comments that it must not have worked.  He doesn’t notice that his mustache has grown six times its size and extends beyond his face. 

          Although I would guess it probably wasn’t Mort Walker’s intent (Walker the creator of Beetle Bailey) that his pun should represent prayer, that is how I saw it.  I did not laugh when I saw his large mustache.  I saw a “prayer” being answered but not the way the Col. had wanted.  Yes, I probably read too much into this simple comic strip, but I refer to it as an analogy but must describe it in detail so that I can compare.

          So often I will look so long and hard at my metaphorical scalp where I think the blessing ought to be that I do not notice that which has been placed beneath my nose. In other words, God provided the tools I need that I may “grow” the blessing that is needed and not necessarily the one I was hoping for.  I have learned that often the direction I think I should go is not necessarily the one I should take.  God doesn’t rob me of my free agency.  I can still choose my own direction, but after some years of experience, I have learned that He is so much wiser than I and my faith is increased if I follow the path which He sets for me.

          Many of us have climbed mountains and often feel we don’t have the strength to go on.  But I know that trials make us stronger. Climbing mountains gives a sense of visibility that we are not able to see from the bottom.  I know that struggles will help to strengthen me one day.  I have to have faith.

There is Light

I once had an institute instructor who, after every conference, would ask the class members what we thought the theme of conference is/was.  I think this year’s theme is on listening to the guidance of the Holy Ghost and finding the light to overcome darkness – or help others to find light.

Light has so many meanings.  It is symbolic for overcoming a bad experience or finally understanding something that wasn’t understood before.

Light is illustrated through light bulbs, candles, lamps, Christmas lights, lighthouses.  Those kinds of lights are artificial.  The sun is a source of natural light.  The Son is a representation of light for us to follow. Other than leading us out of darkness, He can also lighten our burdens. 

Light can mean the opposite of dark. It can also mean the opposite of heavy.

I wear lighter clothes in the summer than in the winter.

The snow in the dessert is lighter than the snow on the coast (when there is snow on the coast).

Some breads use lighter grains than others.

I am a light sleeper

We have seen more light rains than heavy downpours.

Sometimes I’ll eat a light snack or a light meal.

I prefer a light breeze to a powerful wind.

The weight of my hair feels so light after I get a haircut.

I can lighten my hair or the color of my clothes.

I enjoy watching the light grow outside in the morning.

Myrtle Creek has only two traffic lights.

I can light birthday candles.

Sometimes strobe lights will give me headaches.

We all need exposure to the natural light.

I take comfort in light.

I take comfort in His Light.

I hope His Light shines within me that I may have a positive influence over others.