On Sunday, we had Haley's birthday dinner. It's our tradition that for the kids' birthdays, we have both sets of grandparents come for dinner. The birthday girl/boy gets to choose the menu. I love this tradition we've developed, and the kids do, too; they look forward to it for most of their birthday month and there is much time spent discussing what they want to eat. For Haley's dinner, she chose her absolute favorite thing lately, my pasta salad. We had Caesar salad (another of her favorites) and chicken salad sandwiches, too. Definitely a salad-rich meal!

When we were outside on the patio eating dessert (Key lime bars instead of the traditional cake; I spelled out the "Happy Birthday" with whipped cream), I found myself staring at my dad. His Alzheimer's has manifested itself in silence; he very rarely says a word. But when I'd handed him his plate, he'd said "thank you, Amy." And he looked me right in the eye. I started to wonder: who is he, now? Or maybe the right question is where is he now? I have this image of his psyche as a sort of wilderness, crowded with trees and cliffs and a tangle of trails, each of them leading nowhere. But in that image, his soul is curled up, a cat in a soft bed of ferns, comfortable and quiet while his mind wanders. As I watched him eat his dessert, I wondered: what does it feel like to be him? Is this image I've created for myself anywhere close---is there a spot in him of peacefulness amid all the confusion and horrible silence? He looked up and caught my eye again, and he didn't look away, but he didn't really look, either. Our gaze, between two sets of brown eyes, was a one-way path. Nothing came back from him, and all I could do to not cry was to remember that he still knows my name.

Those few quick moments of looking into my dad's eyes have got me really thinking about him this week. My dad was far from the perfect dad. In our family, my mom was the go-getter. She made things happen, while my dad seemed just along for the ride. I have very few memories of him doing stuff with me. He took me fishing once at Deer Creek. He taught me how to water ski (I never trusted anyone else but my dad to pull me on water skis). He took me and Becky to the library. But he wasn't the kind of dad who helped with homework, or sat down and talked to me just to talk (until we were older), or took me with him to the hardware store. He never taught me to throw a football or catch a baseball. And he made quite a few bad financial decisions, which had enormous impacts on my own decisions.

But despite his shortcomings, he still managed to teach me things. I credit him with my love of reading, and he's half responsible for my love of flowers (the other half came from my Grandpa Fuzz). He liked to take pictures, and so do I. There's also a way of looking at the world that I think comes from my dad. Plus, my dad was an A/V geek. He had an enormous stereo, with speakers both upstairs and downstairs. I remember boyfriends admiring that stereo. I also remember the great Beta vs. VHS debate. In our house, it came down on the side of Beta, so my family was among those people in the late 80s who only got to rent a select few videos, the ones that came out in Beta. (That Beta player is still in my parents' basement, by the way. If you were curious.) We could listen to our Beta movies through the speakers instead of just through the TV. We had a custom stereo installed in our (very old) boat, too. We'd be hanging out under a shady overhang in Lake Powell with the stereo booming, his musical choices bouncing off the sandstone.

I didn't ever appreciate his stereo obsessions and possessions, though, because I was always so annoyed with his taste in music. What trying-to-be-cool teenager wants to listen to Kenny Rogers or Roger Whittaker? The always-dreaded "Put Another Log on The Fire"? Or the very special women in our musical heritage, Dolly Parton and the Mandrell sisters? Seriously. I hated his music. But here is a confession: I never minded Neil Diamond. (That's harder to admit to than liking Richard Marx.) "America" sounded especially impressive in the Lake Powell sandstone acoustics.

So last night, when the American Idol people sang the Neil Diamond songs? Here's another confession: I knew every single song. Even the ones David Cook sang. I watched the entire show. I sang along (much to Kendell's surprise) and then I got in the tub and had a good cry. Because I realized: I never told my dad I didn't mind Neil Diamond. I never told him I was grateful for that enormous stereo and the cool-with-boys status those huge speakers gave me. He doesn't know that part of the reason I still listen to music almost as much as I did as a teenager is because of his example. And that's just the beginning of a long, long list I could write, a catalog titled "what I should have told Dad." He doesn't know the things I am still deep-down angry over, or the things I have long-since forgiven him for. I never told him what I admired about him or what I wish he would have changed. I never even apologized for all my adolescent shenanigans.

And that is what I hate most about this disease: having a diminishing version of this person you love, watching him vanish by fractions, but he's still here, his brown eyes staring back at you with an awful blankness. Is this horrible to say? But if he were dead, I could imagine him at peace. I could have conversations with him in my head and imagine he could hear them. If he were gone I could picture his spirit as something more than a cat curled up in ferns. I could know he was doing something besides simply lingering on the edge of things. Out of all the baggage that comes with Alzheimer's, the worst thing is having this man sitting at my outdoor table eating dessert, knowing he looks like my father but no longer is my father. Knowing that my idyllic soul-setting is probably nothing close to the truth, is a construct for my own sense of peace, and that probably his sense of self---his soul---is a tormented and confused psychic scrap. Knowing I am helpless to do anything but watch the decline and wish I had even once just opened my mouth and told him what I wish he knew now.

Instead of a sparkly introductory sentence, today I'm starting with a comic strip:

Because, yeah: we like to eat at our house. And lately, things have been tight. You know, the rising cost of gas and food and just about everything else? It's upsetting our precarious balance. So when I saw a posting for an assistant librarian at my local library, I thought...why not? It'd actually be the perfect spot for me---part time, weekend and evenings mostly (cuts down on daycare costs!) and, hello, actually using my degree? The one that almost everyone told me would be useless? That'd be nice, too.

But, after the interview, I'm fairly certain: I'm not going to get the spot.

Because apparently to be a librarian, you have to actually be smart. You have to know things about art history, and science, and history, and music and film. And yeah: I know a ton about literature. I could talk literary theory, or the Romantic poets, or current literary trends till your ear falls off. But you're wondering about what happened in the 1800's, technology wise? Um. Let's look that up, shall we?

I'm fairly certain I had the world's worst librarian interview. First, I had to fill out a sheet so they could know everything I know (about history, art history, science, technology, and, luckily, literature---but since the dawn of conscious thought). I knew I was in trouble when the first question was "list your favorite authors" and I could only think of one author. Luckily I could remember the last book I read for question number two (The Friday Night Knitting Club) and the next one I'll be reading (The Best American Essays 2007). I'm not sure what it was, but my mind just went blank. It took me ten minutes to remember the name of my favorite painterly group (the Pre Raphelites) and I never could get my mind to come up with Picasso. At least, not until I was in the car driving home.

And it just got worse in the interview. "What would you recommend to an older woman who needed books to read during a six-week surgery recovery?" Ummm... "Or to a teenaged football player who has to read a book from American history?" How about.... OK, here's one: "who's your favorite essayist?" And there, in sanctified library air, I couldn't remember. "Anne Fadiman" (which is the correct answer), or Ex Libris (which would have been a satisfactory answer, since she wrote it and it's my favorite essay collection) would just not enter my puny little brain. In the name of all that is holy---what in the hell was wrong with me?

So, yeah. I'm certain I impressed no one in that interview. And while I'm trying to keep a cheerful "things will work out" sort of attitude lately, that's been a mute point since that interview. Suddenly, my "I'll get it if I'm supposed to" is feeling fairly pathetic, and I'm realizing just how much I wanted that job (now that I botched it well enough I'll be embarrassed to even check out books from the library from now on). Ah, well. Maybe stable hands have a flexible part-time schedule and benefits?

Sigh.

Without really noticing it, I've become a fan of Geraldine Brooks. I read her first novel, Year of Wonders, while sick with the stomach flu. I'd literally put it down to rush to the bathroom to throw up, and then curl back up in bed to read. Honestly, I need to re-read it, just so it's not associated with nausea! And her novel March is one of my favorites. So when I saw she had a new book out, I couldn't wait to read it---although I did. Wait, that is, as the hold list at the library was interminable. But it was definitely worth the wait.

The novel is a fictional history of the real-life Sarajevo Haggadah, which is an illustrated Hebrew codex created in 1480. The novel's protagonist, Hanna, is a rare book expert given the task of preparing the manuscript to be displayed in the Sarajevo museum. Her experiences, though---both in restoring the haggadah and in the things she discovers about her own life---are a sort of subtext to the real story, which is the imagined history of the haggadah. Woven around Hanna's life, the haggadah's history starts at the most recent events and moves backward.

Two things struck me as I read this novel. First was the research that Brooks must have done. She creates entire historical societies---Vienna in the 1890s, Sarajevo during World War II, Spain during the time of the Inquisition. Small details bring each of these societies to life---for example, did you know that to cure syphilis, infected people would expose themselves to malaria in order to bring on a fever that might cure both diseases? The cultures that Brooks recreates are vivid and memorable and, in my mind, astonishing in their reality.

The second thing that stood out for me was the relentless persecution of Jewish people throughout history. For me, a historical novel is successful, in part, if it illuminates a bit of history so I know it better, and after reading this novel I have a much more thorough understanding of this topic. Well, "understanding" might be the wrong word, as it is difficult to understand so much hatred for one group of people. Knowledge, I suppose, is a better one. I ached for the things these characters endured, knowing that it was a just a taste of the cumulative anguish of the people. And yet they remained strong in their faith. One of my favorite characters, the Rabbi Judah Aryeh who managed to save the haggadah from the fires of the Inquisition, explained that "to us, printing was an avodat ha kodesh, a holy work. Some rabbis even likened the press to an alter. We called it 'writing with many pens' and saw it as furthering the spread of the word that began with Moses on Mount Sinai." I confess that my knowledge of the Jewish faith is sketchy, but I cannot understand so much hatred, over so many years, for a group of people who seem intelligent and vibrant.

Yet the haggadah manages, somehow, to survive what Hanna's coworker Raz calls "the same human disaster. . . Somehow," he continues, "this fear, this hate, this need to demonize 'the other'---it just sort of rears up and smashes the whole society. Inquisition, Nazis extremist Serb nationalists . . . the book, at this point, bears witness to all that." That "bearing witness" is the most interesting theme in the novel, to me. I am starting to understand that not everyone has this feeling that I do about old things, but when I am around something old, I find myself drawn to wanting to know its story, whose hands have made it and cared for it and used it. Something made by a person that outlives its maker---that holds a fascination for me because of the stories it could tell. The haggadah is simply saturated with its ability to bear witness, if only in the tiny clues Hanna discovers during her research.

Even from its very beginning, the Sarajevo Haggadah made a statement. During the mid 1400s, it was considered to be a heresy to create a realistic portrait, an attempt to play God with paint and brushes. Illuminations as a form of rebellion is a way of saying this human spirit will not be held down. The novel does the same thing, in a different way. It is a collection of sorrow, but it is also a statement about hope. So many things are lost through time, sacred objects, possessions that are meaningful only for their owners, individual stories of common people. And evil---hatred spurned by fear---is a constant. But somehow, some things endure anyway. This time, it was the haggadah, but in each of us, it can also be, simply, us.

Once upon a time, a few years back, I had a neighbor who officially Did Not Like Me. The reasons behind her dislike were varied, not a few of them based on my trees, and seriously: if I told you all the stories I could tell, you would likely think I was a liar. There's the fact that I had to very carefully time my approach to the mailbox (because if we happened to arrive at the mailbox at the same time, she would cast such daggers), which is only the smallest effect from this neighborly dislike. Because she didn't like me, I assumed that everyone in her fairly-large neighborly social circle also didn't like me. (A few years into this whole mess, I received factual confirmation that this woman did, in fact, bash me to her friends, so I wasn't altogether too suspicious in my assumptions.) And---big shock!---this assumption that I was disliked caused me to withdraw into myself.

Which means that I very rarely went to Relief Society functions. (Relief Society is the women's organization in the LDS faith.) A flyer would show up on my door: "come to dinner!" and I'd think "yeah, that'd be fun. But who would I sit by? And how will I know who isn't involved in the neighborly gossip circle and who thinks I am a lazy, self-centered, horrible person with too many trees?" I felt that way in church, too. I didn't talk much to anyone, I never raised my hand to offer up my opinion. I kept to myself.

But then a couple of things happened. A few of my neighbor's friends apologized to me. I was asked to teach a lesson once a month in Relief Society. My neighbor moved. Our ward boundaries changed and there were other women who I didn't think yet knew the awful secrets about me that my neighbor did. (I still don't know all of them, in fact!) I began to reach out a little bit, believing that maybe I could find a place. It's been a very long haul for me to feel comfortable in my ward, to feel like I belonged here or that my presence mattered. But last night, in a very real way, I realized: I am, I do, it does.

We had our Relief Society birthday dinner. And here's the thing: I went. I went without once thinking "yeah, but who will I sit by?" I just took the last empty chair at one of the tables and started chatting to the women sitting there. We had hor d'oeuvres in the gym, and then we went into smaller rooms (which had been decorated most gorgeously by some of the women) for the main course---the room that you went to was determined by the color of birthday candle you'd chosen when you first came in. I loved this idea, as it ensured that each room was peopled with a variety of women, instead of the usual groups we tend to cluster in. I sat with three older women, three women around my age, and one ten years younger than me. We talked and laughed and shared experiences. Then we went back to the gym, for dessert and a talk.

As I listened to the talk, one idea stood out to me: "Women need women." When she said that, it felt crafted just for me. I took a breath and looked around, making myself really concentrate on what I was feeling right then, and it was this: love for the people around me, and also feeling love from them. I thought about those older women I had eaten dinner with, and how they have each, in different ways, influenced my life in ways they probably don't even realize, and of how much I admire the woman who had decorated our room because she is artistic and always looks put together (I blogged about her experiences once before), and how happy I was that another woman at our table put her head on my shoulder when pictures were being taken. And then I thought about the patterns my friendships have taken over the years, how they have morphed from one group to another but how I have always been blessed with girl friends in one form or another.

And I realized: the speaker was right. I need women in my life. Even though I tend to pull away, to stay reserved, to not be trusting. I need them because that feeling last night---feeling, at last, like I mattered, like I belonged---was delicious. It felt like I had overcomed something, the lingering effects of all those years of being disliked by my neighbor. I realized that even if she were there, it wouldn't matter, and that by withdrawing rather than being myself during those years, I had contributed to making the problem bigger. I felt this little spark of courage, fed by feeling accepted, that makes me want to continue to put myself out there a bit more.

Tonight while we were having our pre-tuck-in chat, Haley asked me what I did for my sixteenth birthday, since it was twenty years ago today that I turned sixteen. I spent my sixteenth birthday traveling to Phoenix for my very last gymnastics competition, which was the Class II Regionals competition. I fell on my back handspring layout on the beam (a fall I still sometimes dream about), ensuring myself second place instead of first in the All-Around, although I did win first on bars (my favorite event) and third on floor (my music was from the movie Top Gun). Haley's next question:  why that was my last meet---why'd I leave gymnastics? Which is a hard question to answer: because I felt guilty about my mom having to work and go without so that I could go to the gym, and because I was afraid of going on to Class I gymnastics---the big release moves on bars, the Yurchenko vault---and because I didn't feel that any of my coaches would take care of me, and because part of me wanted to be like everyone else---to come home after school and hang out with friends. I can't really say if any of these reasons were THE reason. A combination of them all, plus depression and anxiety and teenage angst. Who would I be now if I hadn't quit? My life changed drastically after my sixteenth birthday...things definitely fell apart. It was a turning point.

Her questions made me remember things I'd not thought of in years, and then I dug out some photos. Here's Amy at sweet sixteen:

(all of them grainy and slightly out of focus, and I'm still glad to have them anyway.)
(Ooooh, and don't fail to notice that white-blond hair of mine. Painful.)

I'm not sure what this little gander down memory lane has to do with my birthday. Other than the fact that in some ways, I feel exactly the same as I did then, and in many others there's a huge disconnect with that version of myself. Maybe it's that birthdays are the best time---far better than New Year's Day, in my opinion---to take stock of your life. What decisions did I make incorrectly? (And isn't that quite the laundry list?) What decisions turned out just fine? And what am I going to do with the upcoming year of my life? How can I make today another turning point, the corner that starts taking me in a more positive direction? How can I stop wishing and start taking action---start becoming the person I thought I'd be when these photos were taken?

If I stop to think about it, it freaks me out a little bit to know that I'm already half-way to 70. There are still so many goals I have to fulfill and things I want to do in my life before my time runs out. And all of this birthday, I've found myself thinking of those goals, realizing that maybe I have been wasting time. Maybe, like that decision I made at 16, I am deciding things based partly on fear and self doubt. I don't want either to hold me back anymore. Part of this is coming from watching my mom's current struggles, as she fights against the circumstances that decisions she made in her middle thirties and early forties are creating for her now. I don't want to look back and see my life as a series of regrets, a litany of "should haves" and "why didn't I's." Today, turning 36 has been strangely invigorating. I want to stop wasting time. I want to start taking action, to be as fierce and motivated and energetic---and as passionate about and dedicated to my decisions---as I was twenty years ago. Maybe now I am finally ready.

So. You know how I blogged last about the stomach flu, and dreading my turn? Well, I got my turn...and then yesterday I got it again. Yay me! Between turns, I scrubbed and wiped and washed everywhere I can think of, but I feel like there's the stomach-flu virus lingering somewhere in my house...waiting to strike again!

Between the cold weather and the stomach aches in my house, this hasn't been a great spring break for anyone. But, I woke up today feeling so much better---almost back to normal. And it is a gorgeous spring day---finally! The boys are all outside in shorts, helping Kendell wash the car, and I'm feeling like I need to buy everyone some new sandals very, very soon.

If I owe you an email (and I owe several), it's coming now that I am recuperated!

If there's one thing in the world I hate, it's the stomach flu. I remember having it all the time as a kid---one particularly clear memory is being sick at my grandma's house, rolling back and forth on her couch in that pre-puking anguish. My kids---especially Jake---all seemed to have inherited my weakness for a good stomach bug. There was one stretch of almost three years when someone in my house---usually Jake---had it every three months. Family vacation to Disneyland? I know, let's find a stomach bug and all come down with it! Christmas or Thanksgiving or a random day off from school? Who's going to throw up today? And it's never limited to just one kid, is it? If one gets it, I know we'll all get it---except for Kendell, who very rarely gets sick. As soon as one kid starts retching (and it's always in the middle of the night---why doesn't anyone ever start with the stomach flu at 10:00 in the morning?), I know exactly what's coming: each of them coming down with it eventually, or, even better, all at once, and all that endless extra laundry, and of course it's bedding and it takes forever to dry, and then looming on the horizon is my turn.

So, last night was my turn. Tonight I kept the "coke and crackers" diet while the kids had pancakes for dinner. I kept thinking, today, of a line I heard in a movie once: "I'm only two good stomach flus away from my goal weight." lol. Actually I think I'm about 15 stomach flus away, but the thought did cheer me up a little bit. It's also cheering to know that 3 out of my four kids can actually make it to the toilet, so the laundry is not so daunting. Well, at least I finished my turn before I start on the laundry, because I need to wash the bedding anyway, and scrub everything down with Clorox, and then leave all the windows open for some sweet fresh air. Maybe that's why we get it so often---it's karma's way of making me deep-clean my house? At any rate, if I leave this world knowing anything, it's this: I really, really hate the stomach flu.

I've taken to watching the Robin Miller show on Food Network almost every afternoon. Mostly I watch it because it makes me oddly happy the way she responds the exact same way every single time she takes a bite of something---the blowing of the food to cool it off, the bite, the pause, the eye roll, the "yum." But she also has some great recipes! Last night I tried her pork fried rice, only because I can't leave anything alone, I modified it. It turned out SO good, I had to share! Well, that and write down my modifications so I can make it again. I think this would be equally delicious with chicken.

6 pork chops
olive oil
Lawry's season salt
powdered ginger
1/4 cup half & half
3 T soy sauce
3 tablespoons peanut oil, divided
4 eggs, lightly beaten
1 bunch green onion, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger
3 cups cooked rice
8 ounce package sliced mushrooms
1 1/2 cup green peas
1/2 cup soy sauce
2 teaspoons sesame oil

In a large pan, heat the olive oil (just enough to cover the bottom of the pan). Sprinkle one side of the pork chops with the seasoned salt and the ginger. Put that side down in the bottom of the hot oil. Sprinkle the other side. Turn when first side is brown; brown second side. Pour half-and-half and 3 T soy sauce on top of the chops. Cover and simmer on very low heat until cooked through. Meanwhile, cook rice. Dice pork chops.

Heat 1/2 tsp peanut oil in pan; scramble eggs, then set aside. Heat remaining peanut oil, then saute green onions, garlic, and fresh ginger till soft. Add pork (or chicken) and saute till heated through; add peas and mushrooms, saute till heated, then add rice and sesame oil. Mix well; add soy sauce and eggs; continue sauteing until everything is hot and mixed.

(PS. I made one small pan without the peanut oil, since Jake is mildy allergic to peanuts. The flavor without the peanut oil was less rich, but still delicious! If I didn't have peanut oil, I wouldn't sweat it!)

(Ignore children who pick out mushrooms because otherwise they don't complain about this meal at all!)

My best friend and I both have birthdays in April (hers is just the day before mine). I remember talking once about why an April birthday is perfect: it's usually warm, the flowers are out just for you, and all of your presents can be new spring clothes and shoes. Of course, it's been a cold spring here so far---it is snowing again right now, as I write, big, fluffy flakes that are actually sticking in the greening grass. But I also know it will come, eventually, that April feeling: being outside in a world transformed by color, feeling free without a sweatshirt weighing down your shoulders or boots on your feet. I love April. That it's also National Poetry Month makes it even better, so I'm going to post a few more poems than normal this month to celebrate!

This poem was written when one of the poet's students asked her to write him a poem. I'm posting it today because it feels more like Valentine's Day here than warm April, but also because the last stanza resonates with me so strongly. I'd like to think that reinventing my life's events into poems might be a cathartic and peace-bringing experience. So, I keep trying, keep writing, hoping one day it will all make sense.

Valentine for Ernest Mann
by Naomi Shihab Nye

You can't order a poem like you order a taco.
Walk up to the counter, say, "I'll take two"
and expect it to be handed back to you
on a shiny plate.

Still, I like your spirit.
Anyone who says, "Here's my address,
write me a poem," deserves something in reply.
So I'll tell you a secret instead:
poems hide. In the bottoms of our shoes,
they are sleeping. They are the shadows
drifting across our ceilings the moment
before we wake up. What we have to do
is live in a way that lets us find them.

Once I knew a man who gave his wife
two skunks for a valentine.
He couldn't understand why she was crying.
"I thought they had such beautiful eyes."
And he was serious. He was a serious man
who lived in a serious way. Nothing was ugly
just because the world said so. He really
liked those skunks. So, he re-invented them
as valentines and they became beautiful.
At least, to him. And the poems that had been hiding
in the eyes of skunks for centuries
crawled out and curled up at his feet.

Maybe if we re-invent whatever our lives give us
we find poems. Check your garage, the odd sock
in your drawer, the person you almost like, but not quite.
And let me know.

Last Saturday, Haley and I got the opportunity to go to the General Young Women Meeting at the LDS Conference Center in Salt Lake City.  This is a yearly event that happens one week before our spring General Conference---the time when we have the opportunity to listen to our prophet and other leaders. The Young Women meeting is directed to 12 to 18-year-old girls. Like General Conference, the Young Women meeting is televised, and most groups get together at the church to watch it, but there are also tickets available to the conference center. I'm not really clear on how they are distributed, but this year our stake had the opportunity to attend. I'd never been inside the conference center, except for a quick glance inside during the open house when it was first constructed. To see it full of people was amazing. Even just sitting down, the spirit was overwhelming. Maybe because the place is enormous.

Before the meeting started, I had a little bit of camera drama. I brought my camera along because I was hoping there would be time to take some pictures of the temple in that glowy light that happens just before the sun dips below the mountains. (There wasn't much, but I did get a few pictures of all the girls with us.) When I got to the Conference Center, I discovered that they have the full security detail---X-ray machines like in an airport and a more thorough bag search than I've ever experienced. The security people at the main doors told me I would have to check my camera. So, I had to walk all the way around to the other side of the building (this was the only time I had to snap a few photos of the temple, and I was feeling so anxious that I didn't get any good ones) to the bag check. Once I got there, they told me that no, I actually could take my camera in, I just couldn't take in the bag. That seemed odd, but since Haley wanted some photos of the inside, I thought it was good, too. So I walked back around the building, stood in line again to go through the security check (one person asked me if I was a member of the press, lol...maybe my camera really is too fancy?), only to be told that no, I couldn't bring in my camera. I politely argued with the security lady (the one digging in my purse, checking out every zippered compartment), telling her that the other department had told me I could. She finally let me through with a very stern warning to not take any pictures during the meeting. I felt like everyone in the lobby was staring at me. When I went back to the bag check after the meeting, the guy behind the counter handed me my camera bag and said "Oh, you're that lady. You're infamous here now!" and he went on to explain that any camera with a removable lens is not allowed inside the conference center, and then there were several joking comments all around about why I needed such a big camera in the first place. I left wishing I'd just kept it at home.

The talks that were given in the meeting were incredible. Since I still have so much trouble writing publicly about my spiritual experiences, most of the details are in my personal journal. But, I feel strongly that I should blog about President Henry B. Eyring's talk. It's titled "Walk in the Light." Here is the thing I am discovering as I work in my calling in Young Women: just as my first year of teaching was a little bit about exorcising the ghosts of the experiences I had in high school, working with the young women is forcing me to remember myself at their age. A few weeks ago, I taught a lesson about making wise choices, and I found myself crying as I taught it---and I never cry when I am teaching. It wasn't so much about the lesson material as it was me wishing that I could have really heard what I was teaching that day, only heard it it when I was about fifteen or so. By "hearing" I mean really listening, taking something in and making a change because of it. I walked a lot of dark paths because of my not-so-wise decisions, but looking at myself from a distance I know that I thought I knew everything, and that I never would have listened even if I had gone to church.

So as I listened to President Eyring's talk about walking in the light, and how every decision you make either keeps you in the light or takes you away from it, I kept remembering that lesson I gave, and the overwhelming feeling I had of how impossible it is to teach teenagers the things that you know---how hard it is to get them to hear what you are saying so that they don't make the same mistakes you made. Several times during the talk, President Eyring's voice filled up with emotion, and I wondered if his thoughts were similar to mine---if he was feeling that not many of those girls would really and truly hear him, and would end up walking their own dark paths. Or maybe just that not all of them would hear him---that even just one would choose to walk in darkness.

Because if I have learned anything on my life's journey, it is this: you can be forgiven for almost anything, but forgiveness doesn't eliminate consequences. The effects of the decisions I made as a teenager are still with me. I left the conference feeling a renewed desire to be, somehow, a better mother and leader and example---to manage to teach my daughter (and my sons, too, as they enter adolescence) and the young women at church, somehow, just a few of the things I have learned, so that they can stay on a lighted path.