Coincidence? I Don't Think So!

I was talking with a young friend yesterday.  She has recently been released from Detention after a fairly lengthy incarceration.  She was anxious about the sudden emergence of temptation.  Temptation that had seemed distant and far from enticing when she was locked up, now is fiercely taunting her.  Having become trusting friends during her imprisonment, she called to see if I might come and help her get past it.  Awareness of the magnitude of the consequences of another slip has checked her inclination to give in and I rejoice over that.  Still she needs a more long term and permanent method, if she is to remain sober and out of trouble.  That she would ask for help is a very hopeful sign.

With her mother just out of ear shot, we sat in the living room of her home for about an hour discussing how we might proceed.  You see, I have been struggling with unusually persistent temptation lately as well.  Both of us are recovering addicts.  Neither of us has enough higher ground under foot, to presume to lift the other.  All we can do is commiserate and try to discover from our successes, how to overcome our failures.

As we spoke, my dear young friend observed that she needs to be occupied doing something productive.  So far, she hasn't got back in school, found a job, committed to attending church.  "Maybe," she said, "I just have too much idle time on my hands."  That really struck a chord with me.  A chord that had sounded in my ear once before on that day.  I'd gone to school to pick up my granddaughter from kindergarten.  I was reading a book while I waited.  The book is about freeing up more time and in the current chapter addresses the very real fact that people who acquire more time (by efficiency, retirement, etc.) often become depressed.  Then the author makes this observation:  "Too much free time is no more than fertilizer for self-doubt and assorted mental tail-chasing.  Subtracting the bad does not create the good.  It leaves a vacuum.  Decreasing income-driven work isn't the end goal.  Living more - and becoming more - is."  Later he says, "Retirees get depressed for a second reason, and you will too: social isolation."  (see The 4- hour Work Week by Timothy Ferriss) Oh, by the way, Sweetie had tried to teach me the same principle the night before!

So here we are, me and my young friend.  Both of us with a pile of free time on our hands, both of us isolated from clusters of friends from our previous situations and both of us - depressed, vulnerable, tempted and full of fear and anxiety.

We both concluded it was time for each of us to start living more and becoming more!

Now, do you not think it interesting that what I had just been taught by Sweetie, what I had just read in the book, what my friend had just observed, and what both of us were currently experiencing should all intersect at the same place and time?  Some would call that coincidence.  I'd rather think a loving Heavenly Father is orchestrating our lives.

Let me share a story from a few years ago.  I was driving for UPS.  One day, in a quite isolated and rural part of my route I was accosted by a little girl.  She said she wanted to grow up to be a UPS driver and asked for my autograph.  I had never been asked for my autograph before.  I didn't know what to make of it.  The little girl seemed desperate for attention and even affection.  That concerned me.  I didn't know if her parents were home.  I didn't feel comfortable encouraging her.  I could see she was desperate for love and all she wanted was a friend.  I just couldn't see how I could appropriately meet her need.  I chose to keep my distance.  As I drove away I studied the situation and concluded that if I encountered her with her pals around, I might be able to reach out a bit more safe and fittingly.

I had a model UPS truck at home and I took it to work intending to find an opportunity to give it to her along with some encouragement.  I carried it a couple of weeks before I encountered her again.  We'll call her Columbine, though that is not her name.  She was walking home from the bus stop with a few other kids and I pulled over.  I told her I was pleased she wanted to grow up to drive for UPS and that I had a little present for her.  I gave her the model package car.  She gave me a quick hug and ran to show her friends.  My prayers for her and my hope for an appropriate way to reach out to a sweet and melancholy child, had been answered.  She seemed so pleased to show her friends that she was important to somebody.  I only saw Columbine a time or two after that.  Her family moved away.  But I often wondered about that pretty little waif who seemed so desperate for love that she would seek it from a stranger.  I suppose, the UPS man seemed like a safe stranger, but still.

Anyway, yesterday, as I drove to see my troubled friend I passed Columbine's house.  I hadn't thought about her and the little UPS truck for years.  It was then it struck me - I was going to see Columbine!  Could they be the same person?  Could she be living in a different house in the same neck of the woods?  She could, and we both shed tears as we discovered that we had been friends much longer than we we'd been aware.  She told me she'd been abandoned by her father and that those were lonely, sad and confusing days.  She showed me she still cherishes her precious little UPS truck.

You might, again, call it coincidence.  But Columbine and I know that there is a third party to our friendship.  A loving Savior, who knows how to succor His children, each of us.

Growing Up In Himni, Utah - Episode 9

School Lunch

School Lunch was popular in the sixties. Oh, there were a few who sneaked off campus for a bottle of pop and a bag of potato chips (corn chips weren’t invented yet), but most of us stood in the lunch line and ate whatever the lunch ladies put on our trays.

A favorite place to socialize was in the lunch line and the lunch room. The food was pretty ordinary, but I thought it tasted great.

I remember standing in lunch line one day a few kids behind Marjorie Green and her girl friends. They were the popular girls of the Senior Class and always wore the most stylish fashions. Marjorie had on a green and orange dress that day. It was sort of a sack dress all pea soup green with a garish orange panel down the front. Separating the green from the orange panel were two large zippers, one down each side. The zipper pulls were two three inch brass rings. They were pretty predominant ornaments at her neckline. We hadn’t been standing there long when Billy Morton and Brock Hoopes walked by. Brock turned aside, walked up to Marjorie, inserted an index finger in each of those rings and pulled them clear down to her hemline where they completely disconnected. The whole orange panel fell to the floor. Bob Jensen, Marjorie’s football hero boyfriend, felled Brock with one punch.

When the pandemonium cleared up the Principal gave Marjorie the worst of it for wearing such a ridiculous outfit to school. “Seems to me,” he said, “She was begging for it.”

Lunch was pretty predictable. There were ten basic meals with few variations. These were cycled through with regularity. Then one day the cooks decided to get creative. They went Mexican. I had never eaten Mexican food. There was no Taco Bell in Himni; infact, I don’t think Utah had one anywhere. I didn’t know a burrito from a canoli. I got exposed to tacos the following summer when my aunt and uncle took me to San Diego for a couple of weeks. At this point in my life, though, this was as exotic as it gets!

As Mitch, Lew and I worked our way past the cooks at the lunch counter, Lew watched Nettie, our favorite cook, slap a large brown gooey looking glob next to the Spanish Rice on Mitch’s tray. He asked, “What is that!?”

“Refried Beans.”

Lew looked up at Nettie, then down at the glob. Then looking back at Nettie asked,”How many times?”

As Lew’s own glob now slowly slid down the front of his shirt, we walked cautiously over to our seats.

By the time we were Seniors, School Lunch was going out of vogue. My gang still ate there regularly, but fewer and fewer joined us. Along about April came National School Lunch Week. We decided in honor of our fair cooks and in order to promote School Lunch, we’d better do something special. We put our heads together and came up with a pretty good gag.

Between us we managed to gather up a complete collection of linen, china, crystal, silver and candelabra. After paying the clerk we ducked out of line and grabbed a table where we set out the whole table setting, lit candles and all. To our amazement, as we turned to go get our food, Nettie appeared at our table with all our food on a huge tray she’d conjured up somewhere. She served us with finesse befitting a king and then to our utter amazement, accepted our invitation to sit and dine with us. She was fine company, but kept picking at our poor table manners.

We had a newcomer in the gang that year. Bob Elkington was an exchange student from New Zealand and had fit right in. We loved trying to mimic his accent. Bob picked up his fork in his left hand, placed the tines, pointed down, on his plate and began stacking potatoes and peas on the back of the fork with his knife. “Mind your manners, Bob,” Nettie scolded, “One day you may eat with the Queen!” Bob replied, without even looking up, “Pahdon me mum, but this is ‘ow the Queen eats.”

Nettie stared resolutely at Bob for about a minute, then quietly switched her fork to the left hand and picked up her knife.

MarShel Erickson

MarShel Erickson, daughter of my dear friends, Darwin and Carolee passed away yesterday after a long painful bout with cancer.  I only got to meet her once.  She wasn't having a very good day.  Still, on that day, she was positive and cheerful, despite the misery she was enduring.  She was a friend of my daughter's who told me that you couldn't go see her with out coming away cheered up.  That was MarShel's way.  She loved making others happy.

Between, or after a Conference session, last week I watched a little presentation about the miraculous recovery of a young man who had been at death's door.  Some of the commentary made me shudder.  The interviewer seemed almost boastful at the miracle that had come to him.  I thought of dear sweet friends of mine, whose outcomes were nothing to boast about.  Friends who loved their spouse or child every bit as much as this man's family loved him.  The interviewer sounded as if this fine young man was just too special to be taken and I thought of broken hearts who felt the same way about loved ones who were just as special, but didn't survive.

Years ago, Elder Marvin J. Ashton was here for Stake Conference.  A Sister, spoke.  At the conclusion of her talk, she told of the number of her children who had gone on missions, married in the temple, graduated from college; and while, thankful, was also boastful.  When she finished Elder Ashton stood, out of turn, approached the pulpit and admonished the Sister to go home, kneel in her closet and thank the Lord for her many blessings and then ask for His forgiveness for all the hearts she had broken there that day, including his own.  It is so important that we are careful about the manner in which we receive God's blessings.

On another occasion I heard a sweet Sister bear her testimony in Church.  She'd just had a baby.  She thanked everyone for the out pouring of love manifest in the delivery of more food to their home, during the days which followed the birth, than they could consume.  Another Sister was in attendance that day.  She too had just had a baby.  I later, became aware, that in her case, no one dropped by with or without food.  No one even noticed.  She was no less deserving, no less in need.  I don't know if there is an adequate explanation when we mortals overlook someone.  But I know that no one is overlooked by God.  The fact that Marshel must go, while another stays is neither a condemnation of Marshel or something to brag about for the other.

I said that the interviewer seemed boastful, as did the theme of the whole program, but the young man, who had been permitted to tarry a while, was far from boastful.  When asked about what he'd learned in his ordeal he humbly said, (paraphrasing) that he'd gone, "from hope, to faith, to submission."  He knew, what we all must learn, that we each, in the end, must submit to whatever the Lord sees fit, in His wisdom, to inflict upon us.  I probably wouldn't be so brash as to mention this principle at such a tender time as this, except that this is the central theme taught to me over the years by MarShel's dear father.  Darwin, and I'm sure Carolee, have learned that true joy and peace in this life can only be had when we submit our will to God's.

MarShel was too precious to lose, but we lost her.  There is no explaining it.  It isn't a punishment.  It isn't a deserved outcome.  It just is.  And though we must wonder in sorrow - why - perhaps for the rest of our lives; we may rest assured that she was not, nor is she, overlooked by a neglectful God. Her loving Father in Heaven has taken her home to his loving embrace, where I'm sure she is happy and full of joy.

Let's Read The Book of Mormon Together!

Tomorrow, I'm going to begin reading The Book of Mormon again.  I'd love to have you join me.  I used to comment on what I've been reading in that great book on this blog.  A couple of weeks ago I decided to remodel things and make a separate blog expressly for the purpose of reading The Book of Mormon.

You can visit that blog by clicking on the tab above, labeled The Book of Mormon Today.

I sure hope to see you there.

Growing Up In Himni, Utah - Episode 8

Brer Rabbit, Brer Bear and Brer Fox

I was always pretty scrawny. Consequently, I got picked on quite a bit through Elementary School and Junior High. It was pretty unpleasant but I learned to keep clear of the bullies for the most part and managed alright.

When I got to ninth grade though, I really met my nemesis. Gavin Richardson was his name. Gavin was one of Butch Farley’s minions. Gavin was small and smart enough to befriend Butch because Butch could easily have whooped him. But, he was big and dumb enough to pick on me. Those intermediate bullies were the worst.

Butch for example never picked on the little kids. He had nothing to prove. Picking on us puny ones was the realm of bullies who didn’t dare pick on anybody their own size. There was one exception. One day Butch got crossways with my seventh grade brother, Todd. I really don’t know what made him mad but he slammed Todd up against the back wall of the auditorium so hard that Todd’s head ricocheted off the wall and head-butted Butch right in the nose. Blood splattered everywhere. Todd came out of it unscathed and Butch cut him some slack after that.

Gavin, however, wouldn’t cut me any slack. Going to school became a nightmare. I hardly slept at night for the dread. One day I happened to see the great Disney movie Song of the South. In it, Uncle Remus told the story of Brer Rabbit and how he out witted Brer Fox and Brer Bear. About the time the fox and bear tossed Brer Rabbit into the briar patch it occurred to me that I, like Brer Rabbit shouldn’t have all that much trouble out smarting Gavin, or Butch for that matter.

A couple of days later, I got my first chance to test my theory. We were showering after gym class. My locker was uncomfortably situated right between Butch and Gavin. Out of the corner of my eye I caught sight of Gavin winding up a towel with which to pop my bare backside. The Brer Rabbit in me began to emerge. I kept my cool and made like I hadn’t noticed. Just as Gavin let the towel fly, I moved and that towel snapped like a firecracker on Butch’s exposed rear end. All I had to do then, was quietly, discreetly, get dressed while Butch cleaned Gavin’s clock
.

Things quieted down for a few weeks.

The next semester though, I took Mr. Hocker’s typing class. Gavin took it too. My assigned seat was near the door at the side of the room. Gavin passed my desk every day and with an extended knuckle whopped me on the shoulder blade as he entered the room. It wasn’t three days before that became intolerable. There was no such thing as “Safe Schools” back then. I was pretty much on my own to solve this one. Gavin was clearly meaner and tougher than me, but I had already concluded that I was smarter.

The next day I kept a wary eye out for his approach. When he arrived and went to thump me, I exploded out of my chair, shoved him over a desk, typewriter and all, and came down on top of him swinging for all I was worth. The element of surprise gave me the initial advantage and I calculated that Mr. Hocker would be there to break thinks up before Gavin recovered enough to kill me. It worked! We got sent to the office where neither of us confessed the reason for the altercation. After a warning, we went back to class, Gavin subdued and Jinx quietly triumphant. Gavin never bothered me again.

In today’s schools the aggressor is automatically considered guilty and I’d most likely have been threatened with expulsion. That would prevent me from daring to defend myself against such subtle bullying. And that would tacitly give Gavin license to pick on me for the rest of my life. The old ways are sometimes better.

Other bullies have prevented Disney from distributing Song of the South anymore. The Sista Rabbit in my wife, however, found it for sale in Europe over the internet and bought us a copy on DVD.

Zippity Doo Dah!