word lists

The goal for this year is to write 50 blog posts very fast, each on a 15 minute timer. To use this time effectively, my thought is to start drafting paragraphs for my Scout memoir and use one word prompts about Scouts. Not like anyone reads this blog except for me anyway …

So here’s a word list to go from, starting with all the typical words that people think of when they think of Scouts –

trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, reverent

Scout rank, Tenderfoot, Second Class, First Class, Star, Life, Eagle

honor, best, duty, God, country, morals, ranks, merit badges, citizenship, patriotism, hands-on learning, leadership, resilience, challenge, community service

camping, outdoors, hiking, campfires, conservation, swimming, historic sites, knots, tents, astronomy, fitness, dutch oven, nature, headlamp, color guard

We can do hard things

bingo

Instead of New Years Resolutions, we went with bingo boards this year. Mindy sent me a video on Instagram that a bingo board would be more fun, and she’s not wrong. My bingo board is full of fun things. There’s too much wrong and hate and anger all around us right now.

So I have a bingo board with fun things – not to deny the sh!+ in the world, but so I don’t go completely off the edge into depression with trying to deal with it. I will resist and rebel by sharing fun and love, and having a good time.

I tried to be small and specific. I don’t have “read X-number of books.” I have read this book: “Madsi the True” by Sam Taylor. I don’t have “make X-number of recipes. I have make this recipe – savory scones with ham and sundried tomatoes. They are so tasty, and I never make them! Adam and I made them once a long time ago to go with soup, and we never got around to making the soup. We ate the whole pan of scones to “sample” them, and then we were full so that was dinner. I bought sundried tomatoes a couple of weeks ago from the store, now I need to make sure we still have ham in the freezer.

I don’t think I can finish a single bingo row until the summer, because I have stuff like swimming and camping and going to downtown DC to some specific museums and the monuments. I figured out that if you go in a circle all the way around the monuments from the Lincoln to the Capitol and back, it’s a five-mile walk.

I also made a bingo board of touristy stuff to do around DC that we haven’t yet. We always say, “What do you want to do this weekend?” and never do anything, or we go to one of the same Smithsonians again. (American history, Natural history, or the zoo.) This will get us out around the city more – Native American, African American, a home that is now a museum about the women’s suffrage movement, hike the monuments, top of the Washington monument, tour the Capitol … The White House is not on it because I don’t want to go there for awhile, and we just went a month ago. A friend had extra tickets to tour the White House in November, so Aster and I went. And I got tickets through our Senator’s office clear back in the fall to see the Christmas decorations in December. That is definitely a bucket list check-off.

All the kids made boards too – Aster: learn to drive. Marnie: volunteer at the library. Jenna: take AP classes. Tenley: fill up two sketch books. Josie: audition for the school play. So they have hard stuff, not just fun stuff. They also have fun things, like win Mario Kart races.

My writing/working goals are:

  • 50 blog posts this year – free write on a 15 minute timer with a single word prompt.
  • Write and submit three articles/guest essays to publications
  • Write 12 newsletters on Substack
  • Complete the 12 week “The Artist’s Way” book
  • Outline my “Ma’s Eagle” memoir about Scouts – I have a couple of different ideas that will affect how I write the whole thing.
  • Publish 12 interviews on the LDS Women Project
  • Finish and publish Cherish 3: The Study of Our Mother in Heaven and that will be a wrap on this series of books. It has been amazing to work with Ashli and McArthur AND it’s been hard. We spit out three books in just four years – three Mother’s Day years in a row (2023, 2024, and this year 2025). I’m feeling pulled to work on other things now, so I just want to get this done and out the door.

reading list: 2024

Books read in 2024:

Reign by Katharine McGee – teen fiction if the US had maintained a monarchy for the past 200 years. Wealth and cell phones and SUVs while saying “your Majesty” to the President of the United States. (Hmm … maybe not so much fiction anymore …)

The Patron Saint of Liars by Ann Patchett – never on any reading list I’ve put together, but it was banned in Florida so I read it out of spite. And the main character was very spiteful. I didn’t like her at all, so I didn’t really like the book. But that’s still no reason to ban it.

Of Time and Turtles by Sy Montgomery – grabbed it from the New Books shelf at the library, who knew that an animal hospital for turtles could be so fascinating?!? For real!

A Most Tolerant Little Town by Rachel Louise Martin – my Black History Month read for the year, which took me until April because it was a hard read. A high school in Tennessee was the first to desegregate in 1956, before Little Rock. It got a lot of publicity at the time, and two years of fighting later, the entire school building was literally blown up. The Black students were traumatized to the point of going silent, and all the white people buried the story. It is only recently resurfacing in the 2020s. The last line of the entire book is the kicker:

“When I talk about school integration, I often call it a failure, but what I really mean is that it is an experiment we have yet to try.”

Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, Finding Joy by Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant – a psychology book mixed with memoir.

Book Lovers by Emily Henry – random adult romance fiction because sometimes you need some brain candy. It appears that sex scenes are now called “spice.” There’s spice in this book.

The Way of the Rose: The Radical Path of the Rosary by Clark Strand and Perdita Finn – a religious book about the Divine Feminine, this couple says they are not Catholic but have found deep spiritual meaning and connection with rosary beads and Mary, the Mother of Jesus.

If the Tide Turns by Rachel Rueckert – fiction based on Cape Cod 1700s mythology of a pirate who was real, a woman accused of witchcraft who may or may not have been real, and a story connecting the two involving a shipwreck. The shipwreck was real – there’s a museum with artifacts recovered.

A Fever in the Heartland by Timothy Egan – I need to try this one again because it’s about the woman who “took down” the KKK in Indiana, but I’m not seeing how that claim comes to fruition. Maybe that’s because it hinged on the fact that the woman was basically murdered and people were offended by that, and I don’t think the general population would give a damn now.

Dust Tracks on a Road by Zora Neale Hurston – part of my Black History challenge, from the Harlem Renaissance. Hurston was a major writer during that period, and this was her memoir.

The Truths We Hold: An American Journey by Kamala Harris – if only she had been elected President … and that’s all I have to say about that …

  • Total: 11
  • Editing projects: 2 – finished Cherish 2, did most of the work on Cherish 3
  • Fiction: 4. Favorite – If the Tide Turns
  • Memoir: 4. Favorite – The Truths We Hold
  • Religion: 1
  • History: 2

I haven’t read anything since the first of November because election shock was pretty overwhelming. I’d like to get my brain back to proper function and that involves books rather than the incessant rage bait of social media.

Reading goal for 2025: always, to fully read 24 books. Specific targets: The Artist’s Way, Madsi the True, and The Law of Love.

50 states: North Carolina

We needed to get out for a few days, so we went to the Outer Banks in North Carolina – I can see why the Wright Brothers chose it to learn to fly gliders because it’s WINDY there. We had a great time with kites!

The waves on the beach were really something else – it had been a good number of years since I’d been to a beach along the open ocean, outside a sound or bay of some kind. The Connecticut beaches are protected by Long Island so the waves stay pretty low. Getting out onto the barrier islands on the NON-barrier side … towering whitecaps, obvious V’s of riptides, crashing volume, mist reaching up to the dry sand … Beautiful, but even in the last week of March it was COLD.

We visited the Kitty Hawk national historic site for an entire day. The experimenters literally jumped off the top of a dune with gliders to see how far they could go, and there’s a monument at the top now. Along the beach flats, there are markers for the first four from-the-ground flights and their distance. The first three were fairly close together, with the fourth a good distance farther. The plane in the visitor’s center is a replica – the original is in the Smithsonian in Washington DC.

We also visited Roanoke Island – the national park there has information about the lost colony of Roanoke and markers for the original site on a walk around the property. This was also where a freedman’s colony of Black people stayed when they escaped from slavery during the Civil War and shortly after it. I have lots of things to study now.

We can check off requirements for the Citizenship in the Nation merit badge – we visited two historic sites and learned about what happened there.

can we just DO SCOUTS?

In December, we had a transition in our troop to a new scoutmaster, which Adam and I were excited about. We had a hard time working with the 2023 scoutmaster – he would ask us to do things, like run an activity or take care of some logistics, but then get angry with us when we did them. He’d get nice for awhile and I’d let my guard down, and BAM! Out of nowhere, he would get angry again. I could never keep track of what was going on.

He and I also seem to work in complete opposite frameworks even though as far as I know, we had the same training. (Maybe he just did it a long time ago?) When I think things should be “scout-led” with little adult direction, he micromanages and talks nonstop with giving the scouts lectures. When I think there should be adult intervention in a situation, he leaves the scouts to flounder on their own and tells me to not get involved because it’s supposed to be “scout-led.”

So a new scoutmaster team that is all women – !!! That’s awesome for a troop of girls! I am one of the assistant scoutmasters – ASM – and the lead SM is former military, very experienced in the outdoors, and gets things done lightning fast. It was great … at first … She was supposed to start in January but the minute the previous SM announced right after Thanksgiving, she immediately took over. Maybe that should have been a hint but honestly, I was so glad to be done working with him that I didn’t really care.

We’re only four months in with her, and there’s already conflict. Again. SIGH. Adam is supposed to be taking over in June as Committee Chair, because the current CC has been saying since we started a year ago that he wants to step down. So Adam is doing groundwork to take over that spot – getting to know people and figuring out who does what … and we are realizing very quickly that Madame SM does EVERYTHING herself and does NOT want to be questioned EVER. That’s really, really not how Scouting is supposed to work. The SM focuses on the Scouts themselves, the committee does all the logistical support. This SM does not want logistical support or to ask for approval or anything, and if you question her, you are disrespectful. She is furious at Adam for wanting to … well … do his job. His cardinal sin was that he told her No about something.

She’s also rough with the Scouts. If someone does something to get out of line, she never lets it go. Already. She made my youngest scout cry at the first campout – the FIRST one! – by threatening to send her home if she didn’t eat RIGHT NOW. I was sitting right there, I’m her mom, I can take care of her eating patterns. I looked at SM in total shock and she backed off. My middle kiddo did have a moment of frustration that got out of hand at a meeting, but since then, Kiddo can’t even give a “wrong” expression without being pulled aside and reprimanded, which has happened multiple times now. Kiddo comes to me – “What did I do? Why is she yelling at me?” Nothing, and I don’t know. Neither of them are having a great time with her as the leader – this is not going well.

We really don’t know what to do with this, but we will continue to go forward as best we can. I’m just here to DO SCOUTS. Can we just DO SCOUTS? I don’t know what this is – a really expensive outdoor program wearing BSA gear – but it’s not SCOUTS. Scouts is supposed to be fun learning and camping, not all this anger and power struggle.

On the flip side, Adam and I went to the University of Scouting adult training day in February and I really enjoyed it. I liked networking with people who know what they’re doing and are enthusiastic about Scouting. It was SCOUTS. When Adam and I arrived, we ended up at a locked door into the building and the guy who opened the door for us said he’d let us in only if we promised to register for Wood Badge. We laughed – Adam took Wood Badge nine years ago in Connecticut and I am registered. Delighted to meet my “Scoutmaster” for my training!

Wood Badge training starts next week. Adam keeps talking about the “ticket” and setting goals and projects, and I’m not clear on it all yet. I guess I’ll find out next weekend at my first training campout! I’m actually excited about it.

We’ll see how this ends up as a book later, I guess.

scouts: 2023 summary

In January 2023, I wrote this here on the blog:

You know how sometimes a person decides to do a crazy big project that’s completely out of their element, and blog as they go, and then publish their adventure in a book? I found my crazy, big, long-term project to write into a book: I’m going to earn my Eagle. Yeah, the Boy Scouts Eagle. Scouts was created for teenage boys, which I most definitely am not. Let’s just be blunt. I’m a 50-year-old woman who is 50 pounds overweight and a total wimp. Not exactly Scout material here. … …

Four years ago [in 2019], at long last, BSA opened enrollment to girls. I was STOKED. My girls could do what I could not! We would have located – or formed – a girls’ troop and registered them immediately, except they didn’t want to do it. … But we have more kids … Last summer on a road trip, we watched the old Disney movie “Follow Me Boys” and our 4th kid – who was now ten (and had been too young at the initial announcement) – said, “I want to do that. Can I be a Scout?” Why, yes you can! As soon as you turn eleven. “I want to earn every merit badge!”

Kid Four went to one meeting by herself with Adam, and came home ECSTATIC about how much fun she had. The whole troop thought this tiny 11-year-old was the cutest thing ever and were so excited to have her join. The next week, One and Three went along and were looped in immediately, and Five was registered for Cub Scouts because she was not yet old enough for the troop. This was going to be so fun for Adam to do with our girls!

Also, during that month, I learned there are no co-ed troops – they can share a committee, but girl and boy troops are separate entities. A girl troop is required to have at least one female adult leader at every single weeknight meeting, activity, campout, service project, everything. I was encouraged to register so I could rotate with the other moms for campouts. I said okay, but really, this was for Adam! I would do my own thing of “earning the Eagle” on the side, with the kids teaching me all the knots and whatever, and cheering me on. It was our family joke.

That didn’t last long. The troop was led by one scoutmaster and two assistant scoutmasters (ASMs) – two men and one woman, Taylor. Taylor pushed hard to recruit me to be an ASM but it felt weird – I can’t just walk in and declare myself an ASM, don’t I need to be invited by some higher-up, like the Committee Chair? Yeah, yeah, we’ll get to that. Taylor asked me to cover the Monday night meetings for February because she had to go out of town for work. Fine, no big deal.

Except she never came back. It’s now over a year later, and she never. came. back. She pops up every now and then – she’ll show up at one meeting, tell everyone what to do even though she’s unfamiliar with what’s happening, and then we won’t see her again for 2 or 3 or 6 months. So I’ve been the ASM for a year now, kind of. I wasn’t included in any of the scoutmaster meetings or communication for 2023, just Taylor, even though she was never at anything.

There has been a lot – A LOT – of anger and turf war and conflict among the adults. It’s the most bizarre thing ever. Adam and I are here to help and people get mad at us for it – we don’t get it. The scoutmaster was out for a number of weeks to recover from a health issue and Adam offered to step in to assist until he was healthy again. It was all of one month before random people claimed he was trying to “take over” and stirred up a lot of animosity. So Adam literally just stopped going. I could write for a really long time about all of it, but how much of that do I really want on the internet … I’ve done some writing about it but it’s not even in a Google doc with online access. Offline Word only. Needless to say, my scout experience has not been pleasant, and I question regularly why our family is even doing this.

Well, we’re doing Scouts because the program itself is a good thing – Adam and I want our kids to learn the values of servant leadership and integrity, and the outdoor skills certainly don’t hurt and are even pretty fun. I haven’t figured out any memoir outlining yet, or even how I’m going to EARN MY EAGLE!!!! My kids want me to do it. We should get on that.

We are in North Carolina right now – spring break in the Outer Banks. We’ve spent a couple of days going to the Kitty Hawk and Roanoke Island historic sites, both count as field trips for the Citizenship in the Nation merit badge. So there’s something we’re doing! It’s an Eagle required badge.

The scout activities for 2023:

  • April: district camporee for wilderness survival skills – our troop got 2nd place in the competition. Adam was the troop adult lead, all three kids went.
  • May: Introduction to Leadership Skills for Troops (ILST) campout – this was my first outing with the troop. ILST is supposed to be done at least once a year, and we’re not sure if this troop has ever had it at all. The campground was fairly close to home, so Adam came during the day and taught it. Henry and I were the overnight leaders.
  • June: whitewater rafting – I had my own adult training the same weekend (IOLS), so Adam had to stay home with the non-scout kids. We sent the three Scouts off by themselves with other adult leaders and that was … eh … they had fun rafting, but it would have been helpful for one of us parents to be there.
  • July: summer camp – it was a really good week! Definitely the best week of the year for the Scouts really coming together as a group. My three kids invented a medley of camp songs that they performed at the whole-camp final campfire and it was a hit. I was there the entire week and Taylor showed up for about 36 hours, “I knew Trina was here so I didn’t need to be.” No, you don’t need to show up and do your ASM job at all … *eye roll* One, Three, and Four all came home with four or five merit badges completed – their first ones! They all did art classes. One loved the rifle range. Three knocked out Swimming. And Four did great in archery.
  • August: the beach campout – Adam was the adult leader again (we switch off – if he goes, I’m home with the other kids) and it was just too dang HOT to do anything. Even the water temperature in the ocean was getting close to 100 degrees (and did surpass that measurement in Florida).
  • September: bike trip campout along the C&O canal – a 15-mile bike ride is one of the options for the Camping merit badge. Two other adults rode it with the scouts, Three was the only one of my kids to go. I stayed at the campground for the weekend as the backup adult in case something happened, which it did … One of the scouts got sick about halfway through the ride and came back to the campsite, and one of the adults had a family issue and their spouse asked them to come home early. Good thing I was there …
  • October: due to a large conflict involving one of our kids and a pretty nasty exchange in a meeting, our family took a six-week break from the troop. We were persuaded to not quit entirely – which we definitely considered – because the adult leader in question was moved to a different position. It would be safe to return.
  • November: the Cub Scout recruitment campout, which wasn’t much of one because it was the Caudles and just a couple of other scouts, and a couple of Cubs. It was also in the dark, because it was after the daylight savings time change. Fortunately there was a small lodge where we could hang out after dark, when we still had four hours to go before bedtime. We played card games to pass the time.
  • December: historic ships in Baltimore harbor and a walk-through of Fort McHenry. They got to sleep on one of the ships! Three and Four went with a trusted adult leader, Adam and I couldn’t go because it was the same weekend as the Christmas music program at church, and we were singing.

Ranks: One and Four finished 2023 at the Tenderfoot rank, and just signed off with Second Class. One turns 18 in May and will age out – the goal is to get to First Class before then. All the skills ranks accomplished!

Three rushed all the way to First Class with one of her friends and they earned it together in August. They both ranked up to Star in January. I think she needs to slow down a little and make sure she’s actually learned the skills instead of passing them off quickly and forgetting them, and frankly, I wonder if she actually did all the skills requirements in the first place. Getting to First Class in six months is too fast.

2024 has its own set of challenges – that’s another blog post.

putting down the armor of God

I read a post on the Exponent II blog the other day, Putting Down the Armor of God. The writer no longer attends LDS temples and wrote about not wearing temple underclothing anymore.

Before I even read the post, the title caught my attention. I knew it was about the temple, but that’s not how I connected with the concept.

My “putting down the armor of God” is different: I’m thinking about actual armor – metal breastplates and shields and swords and all the imagery of the Knights of the Roundtable. And I am all about putting that down.

Summer 2021 was the shift. First, it was an Instagram post quoting Sheri Dew – that women are “the Lord’s secret weapon.” First of all, umm, how am I a weapon? I was a Relief Society president who spent the 2020 Covid quarantine sending cutsey cards in the mail, and did ministering interviews at Panera to just visit with the women. That’s not a weapon – I don’t think there’s a less aggressive way to be an RS Pres. But secret … well, I frequently didn’t tell the women it was a ministering interview. We were just friends going out to breakfast! But weapon or no, doesn’t that kind of defeat the purpose of sharing God’s love if we’re a SECRET? I thought a lot about how I’m NOT a secret weapon for anyone, even Jesus.

A month later, an Instagram post again, this one by Emily Belle Freeman (who later became Young Women general president). She shared a beautiful story of a woman who made her home into a refuge for her family and friends – a place to get away from stress and angst, and just be loved. It sounded great! But then she ended it with “calling all warriors!” to … build loving homes … wait … as WARRIORS? The fighting people? I’d been reading along and picturing a peaceful place, and that word was a harsh splash of ice water that ruined the whole image for me.

Another month – for real – these things happened in June, July, and August right in a row – and a third Instagram post alerted me to Elder Holland’s “musket fire” speech to BYU faculty. He used an appalling gun analogy to discuss how he wanted BYU faculty and staff to respond to LGBTQ students – “building the temple with a trowel in one hand and a musket in the other” to fight off opposition. It was especially tone-deaf since just the week before, a gay couple had gone camping in southern Utah and later both were found dead from being shot.

Strike three, and I’m out. Not out of the LDS Church, but out of the war analogies with all their insinuations of enemies and violence, out of the oppositional fighting mentality. If “defending the faith” and “standing for truth and righteous” means that I have to view other people as enemies that are out to get me, then I put down the armor of God. I’m not playing that game anymore. It makes no sense to me to share the love of God as a military unit, barricaded behind mental and emotional walls away from connection and community.

I will never have a trowel in one hand and a musket in the other. I have homemade bread in one hand, my Visa card and keys in my pocket, and nothing in my other hand to put my arm around your shoulders as we walk to my car and go to Panera for breakfast, or an ice cream shop in the evening.

I am not a warrior. My home is a sanctuary of peace where LGBT teens and anyone else will always find a bowl of popcorn and games on the Switch, where disaffected Mormons can talk freely about their frustrations, and we all work harder at being more loving.

I am not a weapon, secret or otherwise. I’m not in the Lord’s battalion. I won’t even sing militaristic hymns in church anymore, with words like warrior or battle or fight or any other word with the same connotation. If any word like that is even in one verse, I will not sing it.

I have put down the armor of God, and I do my best to share the love of God. Isn’t that the whole point of the Two Great Commandments? Love God, love your neighbor as yourself. That’s it. No warriors, no armor, no muskets or other weapons.

reading list: random

The first three books I read in 2024 were not on any book list I’ve ever looked at or compiled myself – they were absolutely random.

1 – Reign by Katharine McGee – it’s a teen romance novel that one of my kids got from the library. It’s set in modern times with texting and SUVs, but as if the USA had made George Washington a king and stayed with royalty terms, such as the Duchy of Texas, and GW’s descendants were now the King and Queen of America. That could have been really interesting, but no, it was not – just lots of uber-wealthy and privileged teenagers and young adults drinking and sleeping around, and deciding who would eventually end up with whom in a relationship. And this was book FIVE of a series, the conclusion. This goes on for FIVE books? Ugh. I’m glad I just read the last one.

Why did I read it? Because sometimes I pick up my kids’ books to see what’s out there and what they’re absorbing. Meh – the same “rich people are amazing” fantasy stuff I read as a kid, just with smartphones.

2 – The Patron Saint of Liars by Ann Patchett – set in the 1950s/60s at a Catholic home for unmarried but pregnant young women. Again, I didn’t particularly like it because the protagonist was a mean and selfish person. The whole thing was kind of depressing.

Why did I read it? Because I read online that it’s banned in Florida, thank you to book banning whackheads that are trying to take over the entire US education system, so I got it from the library and read it for sheer spite.

3 – Of Time and Turtles by Sy Montgomery – yay! A book I liked! It’s a memoir of … a person who writes books about animals – I don’t even know what to call her. I don’t think she’s a scientist, but she interacts with people who are, and this time, it was a “turtle hospital” in Massachusetts, either on or near Cape Cod. I also liked it because it made me think of New England. (I like being in the DC area, but I miss New England. It’s both/and.)

Why did I read it? Because I saw it on the New Books display at the library and picked it up on a whim. I started flipping through it and one of the turtle stories got my attention even though I’ve NEVER been interested in turtles. So I checked it out.

submitted article

About a year ago, I submitted an article to a hard-copy magazine printed by an LDS group – not an official church publication, but in support of it. My article was accepted but before that issue was printed, the magazine was very abruptly canceled in favor of other projects. The theme of that issue was being strong in life’s opposition, and I need reminders more often than I care to admit about how that strength should be demonstrated.

P.S. Yes, this really was a dream I had during college. I got up the next morning and wrote it into a poem, and I’ve thought about painting it.

STORMS

I had a dream once. I saw myself standing alone on a rocky cliff above the ocean with wind and rain raging all around me, while the waves crashed high enough to almost reach me. I saw many shades of gray – the sky, the water, the leafless trees, even the cabin in the distance. All gray. The only color was my purple fleece jacket, getting darker as it absorbed more water from the rain and the ocean spray. 

I just stood there, legs braced, feet actively pressing into the ground. I didn’t try to dodge or hide from the storm, but confronted it straight on – my face was turned into the wind and my tangled hair blew back. No shaking, no weakness. I was part of the stone mountain. The storm was all around, but I didn’t need to move. The sun would come out eventually. 

And then I woke up. It’s been more than two decades since I had that dream, but the mental picture comes back to me again and again. 

I see myself on that stormy cliff every time I hear the hymn, “How Firm A Foundation.” I remember so much gray with a speck of dark purple when I read Helaman 5:12 – 

Remember, Remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall.

I am reminded of my dream again when life is a storm … which means it is in my mind’s eye pretty much all the time. 

Our entire world seems to be in a hurricane of hatred toward people other than our chosen team. Fury and fear swirl around us constantly – anger about others’ choices that we disapprove of, meanness over innate differences such as the color of one’s skin or sexual orientation, an angsty desire to contain our children in a bubble free from opposition. Some days (most days, if I’m being honest), I want to lock up in my house with my husband and children and hide away from it all with our books and fuzzy blankets, our art supplies and board games, and extra snacks. We do not want to encounter the hatred in the world. 

But whether we want to or not, we must engage with it because hate, left on its own, continues to develop. Hatred cannot be “fought” in the metaphor of great battles, with swords dramatically wielded by ancient military battalions. It also cannot be fought with today’s weaponry, people literally arming themselves with guns, guns, and more guns. Even the perception of fighting only feeds hatred more – helps it grow and makes it stronger because it pits person against person as enemies. Protection against hatred doesn’t work in a warrior mentality either – no bunkers or shields can keep it away, because hiding from fear also inexplicably enhances it.

Hatred must be overcome by being outnumbered and outmaneuvered by LOVE, and that doesn’t need a metaphor – just real-live basic action by real-live basic people. Protection against the storms of hatred is as simple as filling our souls with love. The containers of our hearts cannot carry hate when they are overflowing with kindness and good will toward the people around us, especially people who have different patterns of behavior, different child-raising methods, different political opinions, different understanding of gospel principles, so much different. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus reminded us that everyone loves their friends and that’s not a big deal – the higher law is to love those who are rude and mean to you. 

I know it’s difficult to do that, which is why my all-time favorite scripture is Moroni 7:48 – 

Wherefore, pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love, which he hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ; that ye may become the children of God; that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is; that we may have this hope; that we may be purified even as he is pure.

This protection of love is not something we have to generate within ourselves through sheer force of will. The Lord will give it to us when we ask for it, and that gives me so much hope. We can quite literally get on our knees and say, “I really don’t like that person. Please help me to see them and love them as You do.” I know this works because I’ve done it. 

I always imagine a massive ceramic pitcher above my head, pouring the living water of God’s love over me. This is not the time to get out an umbrella. 

And then I get up from my prayer and put on my purple jacket, to go out into the gray of the storm and share the love of God. Love is the answer to protect from the storm, and it will also calm the storm. Sympathy and gentle answers to confrontational questions ease the winds of rage. Quart jars of hot chicken soup and plates of fresh cookies cut through the cold. Smiles and hugs light the path.  

Here comes the sun. And here comes the Son.

behind the scenes with Cherish: part 4

Part 3: Waiting

book launch event at a home in Holladay, Utah, Thursday, May 4, 2023.

Chapter 4: Utah

Tuesday, May 2, 2023: Adam and I left our kids with his sister Naomi and flew to Salt Lake. It took the entire afternoon and evening, with a layover in Denver – when we landed in Salt Lake and his best friend Walter picked us up at the airport, it was 10 pm. Dinner at Five Guys anyway.

Wednesday, May 3, 2023: I had breakfast with Cynthia Winward and Susan Hinckley, hosts of the At Last She Said It podcast. I worked with them when they wrote one of the chapters for Richard Ostler’s second Listen, Learn & Love book. They are LDS feminists who are active members but are basically fed up with patronizing patriarchy in the Church, so they’re saying the things.

In the afternoon, Adam and I went to the Light of the World Garden at Thanksgiving Point, which was amazing. It’s a collection of larger-than-life statues of Christ depicting scenes from the New Testament stories and absolutely beautiful. Most are of Christ’s interactions with women. It was a good place to sit and get centered for the Heavenly Mother events.

The woman touching Christ’s hem to be healed, Light of the World Garden, Thanksgiving Point, Utah

Thursday May 4, 2023: Ashli and I FINALLY met in person for the first time. We decided to go out to lunch together before our first event – the Jordan River Temple grounds were an easy and central location for Adam to drop me off, Ashli drove me around for the day while he hung out with Walt, and Adam met us at the last event.

As soon as Adam and I got in the car to drive to the temple grounds, a text came in from McArthur – WE HAD A LIVE LINK TO THE BOOK. I knew Ashli wasn’t going to get the text right away because she was driving, so I spent the 20 minute ride posting as fast as I could on Instagram and texting people. I walked in circles around the temple fountain waiting for Ashli and the first thing I said to her in person when she was still 50 feet away was, “Did you get McArthur’s text? We’re LIVE.”

Ashli and me meeting in person for the first time, after working together for a year and a half.

We had three events that afternoon/evening, all in people’s homes. We met McArthur at the first address and at each one, we spoke in front of the group – McArthur did most of the talking with Ashli and I filling in our bits and pieces of the story, and then a lot of one-to-one conversations with the guests.

Most people were lovely and kind but a few looked at me like I’d crawled out from under a rock, so that didn’t help my overall feeling of imposter syndrome. I asked Adam to join us for the last party, expecting it would be a mixed group of men and women but nope. It was a huge women’s meeting and I felt awful for him because he was so out of place and just stood off to the side the whole time. I wasn’t much better – all of my conversations were awkward and superficial, and ended very quickly. Hmm. Hope the rest of the trip goes better.

Friday May 5, 2023: Adam and I spent the morning and early afternoon visiting friends and attending the Provo City Center Temple. The one Friday event was speaking at the Writ & Vision bookshop and art gallery in Provo – friends and family were there so it wasn’t a sea of strangers, so I was more relaxed. Hooray! My parents were in town and came to the panel, my sister who I hadn’t seen for a long time came, and friends from different phases of my life were there. So good to see them and have their support! And it was a much nicer event for Adam to attend, because it was a good mix of men and women – not a girls night that he accidentally crashed.

The most important part of that event was WE GOT THE BOOKS! Once the sale link was live, BCC rush-shipped three copies of the book to Utah. Ashli picked them up in Salt Lake and brought them to Provo, and we opened the box together. So when doing our panel, we had the books actually in our hands. It’s so little and sturdy and full of beautiful things. Love it all. I thought McArthur was kind of nuts for wanting a 4×6 inch book but it was the right call.

WE HAVE BOOKS!!!!

Saturday May 6, 2023: We started with what became my favorite thing of the trip – a brunch for the contributors of the book. I asked everyone who came to sign my book and it made my copy that much more meaningful. I’m going to keep carrying this around on other trips to Utah because if I meet more contributors, I will ask them to sign it also. Anyway, we literally sat for hours talking, and then went outside to take a bunch of pictures individually and as a group.

So many awesome writers and artists and scholars – best part of the trip!

The most memorable greeting was when I met Alyssa Wilkinson – she said her name and my reply was total reaction, no thought. I practically yelled in her face, “OH! YOU!” … an instant of terror for her … “You wrote my favorite poem! I want to print and frame it on my wall!” And then we talked and it was great.

Two more speaking events that afternoon and evening, which went much the same as the others but with more and more people. At that point, everything was starting to blur together a bit because in less than 72 hours, we’d had seven different events. The imposter syndrome went in waves – sometimes it was there, sometimes it wasn’t. It went away when personal friends were in view so I was grateful for them!

At the last one of the evening, some friends came and stayed for only about 15 minutes, and that’s how I learned Wife is really into the doctrine of Heavenly Mother and wanted to be there, but Husband was with her and he really does NOT like Wife’s interest in Heavenly Mother because don’t we know that this is apostate … so they left. Big, big sigh of disappointment because come on, Husband, I know you and I know you can do better than this.

Sunday May 7, 2023: Ashli flew home to South Carolina on Sunday morning, and McArthur and I spoke at two more events Sunday afternoon and evening. At the last one, I talked with a woman who had a story to share of connecting with Heavenly Mother … which became the first submission for a SECOND collection of Cherish poetry, art, and reflections.

Post trip: BCC Press told us that we set their record for the highest number of book sales in the first ten days. We gave away our author copies to the contributors through a drawing, and immediately jumped into prepping book 2, which is a whole other story for another day.