Wait, My Health Should be a TRIANGLE?

I am a rock, I am an island.

Simon and Garfunkel are great, but they don't always describe my life accurately. If I were to rewrite the song line to fit my current feelings, it would go something like this:

I am unstable. I am a brick veneer.

And my inner emo is showing. Sorry about that. I've just been thinking about where I am now and where I would like to be. And at the risk of stating the obvious, they aren't exactly the same place. In my high school health classes we learned about the different aspects of health (physical, social, mental/emotional) and how they form a triangle that we need to keep in balance. I don't feel like I currently have a triangle—it's more like a line. Or a point. Yep, unbeknownst to everyone else, as a result of my stay-at-home mommery, I have a point of health. I think this means that I eat, breathe, and sleep just enough to survive.

I've been trying to remedy this. For example, lately I've been trying to do some workouts. It was during this escapade that I discovered that I can no longer do a sit-up. The televised work-out leader had us all put our feet together so that our legs formed a rhombus and told us to sit up. And I couldn't. She said “If you can't come up all the way, that's okay! Just come up as far as you can.” So I stared at my stomach and said “You heard the woman. Just come up as far as you can . . . yep, come up . . . NO, COME UP.” And my shoulders stayed on the ground while my stomach continued schlepping.

See, I used to be out of shape, but now I'm OUT OF SHAPE. But I look fine. So people have been asking me “How do you look so good so soon after having a baby?” I think this is a hypothetical question. Scratch that. I HOPE this is a hypothetical question, because I don't have an answer, except that I seem to come from a great gene pool. I think the real reason my belly looks so “good” after having a baby is because in addition to delivering a baby, I seem to have delivered my abdominal muscles as well. That's why there's nothing there. I don't so much care about how I look as I am about being healthy. I mean, this could end up being a matter of life and death. If someone were to put a gun to my head and say “Do a sit-up, or else!” I'm toast. Gotta make some changes.

I don't even need to tell you about the social side of my triangle. Like many other stay-at-home moms, my main interactions are represented by a few smiles, “goos,” and cries from a three month old. Going anywhere is hard when you have to schedule it around feedings and diaper changes. I get to see a few more people now that I have a couple of piano students and I've befriended the Jehovah's Witnesses, but on the whole, I don't get out much.

Mentally? I feel very little control. The hormones of pregnancy and nursing have left me exhausted and ready to cry at the most ridiculous times. Yesterday, I discovered that Melody, Alex, and I were all wearing items that needed mending because they were coming apart at the seams. Some sort of metaphor for my life right now? Perhaps. You be the judge, but first, let me say that I almost fell apart yesterday when I found out that instead of the expected three hours of church meetings (that I was already wondering if I would make it through) we had six hours of meetings. I got tired from the beginning just thinking of meetings to come.

As pathetic as admitting my physical, social, and emotional weaknesses may make me sound, they are the easiest to confront. It's when I think about my spiritual health that I start to feel the worst. And yet, I gain a little hope because of a promise found in Matthew 10:39. Trying to get myself together by starting at any other point is going to be counterproductive. I have to start with my spiritual health first. If I can get myself where I need to be in relation to my Father in Heaven, the rest of the frustrations I'm experiencing are going to be naturally resolved—or I'll realize they aren't as critical as I once thought. This is much easier realized than remedied, but I'm hoping that admitting that I'm not as strong as I look is a good step toward humbling myself and starting my recovery.

So this is my confession. The transition to being a mom, while worth it, is a little tough at times. I'm not a rock. But I'm not an island, either. And while I may not feel like I'm where I need to be now, I can get there eventually. If I put my Heavenly Father first, He's going to lead me to where I need to be and He'll be with me as I go.

REST RANTS. (They're Gonna Catch On.)

While driving home from Spanish Fork after a particularly long day involving hours in traffic due to an accident (not our own, thank goodness!), Alex and I were venting about how stressed and tired we were. Suddenly, as we approached Nephi, Alex pointed off the right and said, “Hey, maybe we ought to go there!” I wasn't very excited to stop the car for any reason before we reached home (No, not even food; I was done with the trip.), but I looked anyway and saw that he was pointing at a restaurant. Except the lights for the “a” and “u” were out, so it claimed instead to be a “REST RANT.”

(For those of you who may not get it, I will explain—although, I want you to know that it won't be as funny now. The reason we laughed was because we were 1. tired and 2. complaining. Hence, we were in need of both a rest and a rant.)

This ought to be a real thing. I think it could work. Places with comfy chairs and listening ears. I think it could work a bit like some churches have confessions: you walk into a small booth, and with complete anonymity you can say whatever you want about whatever is bothering you. Then you can leave.

I think everyone wants to be heard, at least occasionally. I know I do. In fact, I frequently get the urge to yell like Tarzan when I'm in a large, noisy group. (I know it's weird; I just don't know why it happens.) Anyway, REST RANTS Patent Pending (Psh. Like I'm that tight with the patent office!) would be a great way to remedy this. There could even be complimentary stickers (that you would end up paying for in some “hidden” way) that said ridiculous things like “Somebody listened to me today!” and “This mouth was made for talkin'!” in order to validate people in their quest to voice their opinions, no matter how irrelevant and rambling they may be.

The downfall to this is that only very special people would be able to work there for more than say, a day and a half without beginning to gripe to the customers. There are people who would fit the bill, but they're already called therapists and they charge more than the menial amount most people would pay for service at such a venue.

I guess there's also the teensy detail that grumping about problems doesn't usually make them better. One of my favorite (because it's so well-put) but also least favorite (because it's a well-put way of reminding me how I shouldn't be venting) quotes on the matter comes from Neal A. Maxwell's talk “Murmur Not” (a good one for when you're feeling like you just wanna whine a bit): “Letting off steam always produces more heat than light.” *Sigh.* He's right. No REST RANTS for me.

It's a shame this idea wouldn't work out. It kind of upsets me. In fact, it's almost the type of thing that makes me wish there were somewhere I could vent about it. What would upset me even more is if somebody were to steal my idea and get rich off it. If it happens, you'll know where to find me.

REST RANTS . . . Coming to a Blogspot near you!

"Sex Sells" and Other Offensive Gimmicks That None of Us Ought to Buy

I'm jumping on a band wagon here. Actually, I've been on for awhile, and I think I'm here to stay because I find this to be a very concerning issue. The issue to which I refer is the sexualization of women and the recent backlash that Carl's Jr. has experienced as a result of their offensive ads. I haven't seen their most recent ad. I thought about looking it up, but then realized that was a stupid thing for me to do. I'm familiar enough with the concept, and if it's truly as awful as everyone else is purporting, then 1. I don't want to see it, and 2. I don't want to offer any sort of attention that could be misconstrued as positive press for the company and marketing that I'm so against. So, I'm not going to make this about Carl's Jr. I won't detail their ads or tell you about their food or the fact that I'm a third generation “We don't eat at Carl's Jr. because of their advertisements” kind of girl. (Okay, so I'll mention those things briefly, but it's not my main point.) My reason for writing this is that this is about more than a company with offensive commercials. This is a pervasive mentality that is harmful to both women AND men.

While offensive commercials make me sad, what makes me is sadder to view the embodiment of the philosophy that “sex sells.” I find this idea to be revolting. The worst part? Hard as it may be to avoid offensive commercials, they can be turned off. What can't be ignored is the fact that there are people in this world that think that the best way to sell their product is by exploiting the fact that men are naturally attracted to women. So they are. It's actually worked to my advantage that my husband likes the way I look. HOWEVER, he likes me for much more than that, and I get a little upset by other people and things that try to steal his attention from me. I find it disgusting that in addition to insinuating that prostituting the beautiful relationship between husbands and wives is the best strategy for marketing, companies utilizing this method are reducing both men and women to shallow stereotypes.

There are claims that Carl's Jr. hasn't responded to complaints from women about their advertisements because women are not their target market. Sick. This tells me that they think very little of women—and even less of men. While relegating the worth of women to the attractiveness of their bodies, marketers are simultaneously sending the message that men aren't worth much more than their ability to drool over a woman's body and buy a burger. Neither gender deserves the reputation being offered; we're better than that.

Saddest of all is the resignation that many have to these attitudes and their pornographic portrayal in movies, pictures, magazines, and commercials. Yes, there is a great deal of smut in the world. No, there is no way that it can all be avoided. I will certainly be on guard and teach my children how to handle such images and opinions. I try not to get enraged by images that offend me because forming an emotional connection makes it harder to forget. But I'm not going to sit back and allow these awful things to be said about me, my husband, my family, and my friends, and I don't think you ought to be okay with it, either. They're reducing women to their bodies and men to their hormones. Male or female, don't buy it.

Halfbacks, Quarterbacks, and Flashbacks

With high school football season starting and Fall just around the corner, I've been struck by this funny excitement. It's funny because I'm not a particularly avid sports fan. I can take them or leave them, but having been raised in a family that has spent a certain amount of time watching games, I value this time not because of the sport so much as the memories and lessons that I have in connection with the great sport of quarterbacks, tackling, and touchdowns.

My dad is a football coach. Although he has never played the game, he has spent many years watching games and studying to the point that he could coach. Because of that, I've always had football memories. When I was young, we would watch BYU games at my grandma's house. (This really meant that we'd eat cookies until my mom told us to stop, then we'd go outside to play in the leaves.) Since my dad didn't get his boys until later, he taught his girls to throw a football with a perfect spiral and how to protect the ball by holding it tight to the body with one hand on each point of the ball so that if we got tackled we wouldn't fumble the ball. He talked football to us like we understood, and somewhere in the middle of Xs, Os, and Wing Ts, he would stop and say something like “You don't have any idea what I'm talking about, do you?” I didn't, but I didn't mind, either. In fact, I enjoyed it.

When I got to be a Freshman, I became more interested in football and decided to start going to games. (Actually, I think I just imagined that it was something that normal high school students did and that if I followed suit, it would make me more of a normal high school student. For those of you wondering, it didn't work.) I tried going and sitting—actually, it's more like standing—in the student section, but it wasn't really my thing. Since my dad was typically on the sidelines, my Grandpa George became my football buddy.

We hit most of the away games for a couple of years. Sometimes it would be just the two of us, like the time we went to Beaver and it was raining like crazy. Grandpa led the way to a couple of seats on the Beaver side, and while ignoring my protests that we couldn't sit in the opponents' side, sat down to watch the game. Pulling out a large garbage sack, he proceeded to poke arm and head holes in it so that he could use it as a rain poncho. In front of everyone! As I stared at him while trying to avoid looking like I was staring at him, he pulled out another trash bag and offered it to me. I politely declined and assured him that I had a jacket. He took one look at my light jacket that was cute, but didn't shed water, and told me I was going to get wet. Then he started yelling “SCORE ONE FOR THE REF!” in protest of a call he disagreed with, as he was wont to do. I just knew in my teenage mind that every person in the stadium was looking at me and my trashbag-wearing, ref-berating grandpa sitting on the wrong side of the field. Even if they had been, grandpa never would have cared.

Sometimes grandpa's friend, Sheldon, rode with us. On these trips, I'd usually sit in the backseat, listen as they talked, and wait for the inevitable moment when they'd start their sing-a-longs. They'd encourage me to join in (again, I would decline for fear of what they would think) and start singing some songs that I knew and some that I didn't. One of my favorites was Irving Berlin's “Play a Simple Melody.” (Which I have since heard my dad singing to my daughter Melody on several occasions. It's cute, guys.) It has two verses that are sung first separately, then together. I liked hearing grandpa sing the second verse because as he sang “Musical demon, set my honey to dreamin', won't you play me some rag?” he got this little bounce in him and he would tap his hands on the steering wheel in time to the music. He looked like he was having fun. And always, without fail, he would turn to Sheldon and say enthusiastically, “We oughta sing the 'Wreck of the Old '97'!” when they'd finished. And Sheldon would say “Aw, I can't remember the words.” So grandpa would say “Oh, but it's a good one! Wish I knew the words. Now, let's see . . .” Then he'd start bouncing in time as he tried his best to remember.

“'He was comin' down the hill goin' 90 miles an hour, when the whistle began to scream. He was found in the wreckage with his hand on the throttle, and scalded to death by the steam. Oh . . . ' Hmm. Yep, I just wish I could remember the words. Only know that little bit. But it's a good one. It's a good one. . .” Then he'd hum to himself and sing a word here or there as he remembered it. For a while, I didn't believe that “Wreck of the Old '97” was a real song, but that maybe he just made up parts and mixed up various songs to make a new one. But lo, and behold! I Googled it, and it is an actual song. Sung by Johnny Cash, no less. (Not originally, though. It was originally sung by one Vernon Dalhart. Just so you know.)

Anyway, that was grandpa. While others may be concerned with appearances and what others thought, he bounced along and persisted in his own way, with little care for what others may think. And though I may have found it humiliating or obnoxious at times, I now find it to be one of the things I admire most about him. I think it's why I enjoyed sitting with him at ball games more than with the other students. (That, and Sheldon would share Almond M&Ms with me.) I learned more about football and had even more experiences when I became a manager for our high school team, but my best football memories were with my grandpa. As he gets older—as most of us do—and the memories are fading, I value my time with him even more. That's why I get a little thrill when I think of the beginning football season; it's not so much about what's coming as it is about what has passed.

Build Your Food Storage With Crispy Fries and Snack Cakes

While everyone else is excited about chicken fries, I'm going to share another type of fry with you.

As the result of a free food event, Alex and I were introduced to CRISPY FRIES. Now, for those of you who may not know, these crispy fries of which I speak are a certain potato chip brand's attempt at expanding their snack food repertoire while apparently rescuing stale french fries from being thrown out. I don't want to name this brand because I don't want them to sue me, but this I will say: contrary to their brand's tag line, these fries do NOT have ridges.

They're all-American. We may be the only country that can't settle for either french fries OR potato chips; we've gotta have both. I'm not sure why this hybrid needed to happen, but here it is. To quote Alex's response when he tasted one, “It tastes like one [french fry] you would dig out of the seat of your car.” Yum. You know you want one. 

I think the real advantage to these fries, in addition to uniting the American definition of chip with that of the English as the back of the bag proudly claims, is the fact that really, these things would probably last forever. They have the freeze-dried feeling of astronaut food and enough salt to ensure that they will never go bad, even though they have a “guaranteed fresh by” date for some reason. In the event of a nuclear holocaust, plan on eating crispy fries and those little cream-filled yellow snack cakes that sometimes dress as cowboys because they will remain unchanged regardless of circumstances.

Unfortunately, immediately following Alex's car seat statement, I found myself nodding and popping more in my mouth. “Yeah, you're right,” I agreed, and kept eating. At the end of the bag, I still thought so. But I ate them. Why? Well, it could be that I like astronaut food. It could also be that I ate many forgotten fries from the car as a small child, so it didn't faze me to eat them now.

But my point, aside from showing you that I used to (and still do) eat just about anything, is that crispy fries are a somewhat edible, but passing fad that will fill your food storage wonderfully. If you, like I, enjoyed eating french fries from the backseat of a mini-van, stock up and enjoy the nostalgia while you can!

The Grace of Lovingkindness

Consider how I love thy precepts: quicken me, O Lord, according to thy lovingkindness.

Psalms 119:159

Words have meaning—even words in the scriptures. Whoops! I mean, especially words in the scriptures. I've often come across scriptural language that made me think, “Well, why didn't you say so?” but as I become more familiar with the language of the time, I see that is exactly what the authors were doing, and so beautifully, too! One of my favorite words as of late is lovingkindness. I think it's such a tender word, quite perfectly suited for its use.

The word was recently called to my attention by my grandma. She mentioned that while reading scriptures, she and my grandpa had come across a “funny word.” And while she tried to remember what it was, I thought of all the funny scriptural words that I could. Firkin. Whithersoever. Sackbut. Heh, sackbut. (I know it's a musical instrument, but it gets me every time!) I was surprised when she finally remembered. “Lovingkindness. Isn't that kind of funny? It's so long!”

So I spent the next little bit trying to figure out why my grandma would think that lovingkindness was a funny word. I concluded it was because it was an interesting combination of words that we don't typically use anymore. I mean, it seems somewhat superfluous. Is it really necessary to have both words? Doesn't kindness presuppose love? Aren't we kind to people we love? And then I thought of families, and both my questions were answered.

But really. How many times do we mistreat the people we love? Far too often. And yet, at the same time, we go on being kind to others that we don't love. We do this for various reasons. We may feel it's our duty to be kind. We may be behaving because people are watching us. Whatever the case, we are human; therefore, for us, the connection between love and kindness must be made so that there is no mistaking our Heavenly Father's role.

Isn't it wonderful that we can know that God is kind to us because He loves us? It's not simply because it's one of His Godly duties to treat us well. But because He is God, we can be sure that He will love us perfectly. Kindly.

Lovingkindness. It reminds me of an institute class I had in which we discussed tender mercies. The teacher explained that the Lord has given us many mercies. And then there are tender mercies. Some of his examples were “It's a mercy that God created this earth for us. It's a tender mercy that He made it beautiful,” and “It's a mercy that God blesses us when we have obeyed His commandments, but it's a tender mercy that sometimes, He just blesses us.”

I really love Isaiah 54. It begins with the Lord promising us that while we may have made mistakes in the past and sometimes feel as though He has left us, He has not forgotten us. Verse 10 reminds us that permanent as we may see the mountains and other geographic features, they will change. What will not change is our Father's everlasting kindness. Due to His lovingkindness and tender mercies, He is able, as verses 11 and 12 show us, to “lay thy stones with fair colours, and lay thy foundations with sapphires.” However He does it, He trades our hardships for precious stones. This is something that I just can't do on my own. I try, but I mess things up. I can harden my heart to stone, but that is of no value to me or anyone else. Somehow, though, He does it. He makes me into a “precious stone”-type person who is fit to live in this “precious stone”-type place talked of in Revelations 21 (especially verses 18—21).

To bring this back to my original verse in Psalms, let me explain why I find this verse to be particularly awesome. Did you know that, in addition to the “go faster” definition we tend to think of for the word quicken, it can also mean “to give or restore vigor or activity to; stir up, rouse, or stimulate,” “to revive; restore life to,” “to become more active, sensitive, etc.,” and “to become alive; receive life”? In pregnancy, quickening occurs when it becomes clear that something in there is alive. So, as a blessing for obeying the Lord's commandments, because of His lovingkindness and tender mercies, we can be more sensitive, revived, and restored. I find that to be lovely, and it makes me want to develop my own lovingkindness.

Cheap Yogurt and Hypocrisy at Walmart

Walmart is an interesting place. There are people who will smile back at you when you smile at them, and there are people who won't. We all come together in this one place to purchase almost anything we could want or need, and we all respond to that opportunity differently. Sometimes we get stressed about how many other people are doing the exact thing we are: just shopping and minding their own business. I often catch myself hypocritically feeling like I have a right to be the only one in the store. “WHY DOES EVERYBODY ALWAYS HAVE TO SHOP AT THE SAME TIME I COME?” *Ahem.* Please excuse my outburst(s).

My grandma likes to tell me about how she enjoys psychoanalyzing people according to the contents of their carts. She invents stories about what kind of people they are because they have healthy/unhealthy food in their carts. Well, as much as I may judge people in my head, I try not to be too harsh because I know my cart must be giving healthy people a laugh heartier than their oatmeal. And I always try to keep my judgments to myself.

This is a lesson I learned while shopping at thrift stores with my sisters. No matter how ridiculous the item you are mocking, there WILL be someone who comes up right after hearing your “Who would buy this?” who will pick it up and buy it. Always. So, I try to discreetly whisper about how silly certain items are, instead of broadcasting it to the entire store. And though the local DI's sales have dramatically decreased, my embarrassment has followed suit. I consider this to be a win.

Unfortunately, a lady in the yogurt aisle today had not learned this lesson. I was minding my own business and making my way toward the cheap, store-brand yogurts that are, I know, less nutritious (but also much cheaper) than name brand yogurts that are all-natural with great probiotics and such. As I approached, I listened as a woman loudly explain to her children that she would be buying GREEK yogurt, and that they could have some. Her children evidently didn't want Greek yogurt because they continued to pester her to have a different type of yogurt: “But moooom, look, strawberry banana!” To which she replied even louder than before: “NO. Those yogurts are full of sugar and artificial colors!”

So, I paused for a second and tried to decide what to do since I was heading right for some colored sugar myself. Should I grab a more healthy yogurt? Just because some stranger lady was berating her children in the dairy section? No. I'm better than that. I would have my cheap, inferior yogurt.

I toyed with the idea of walking past and circling around again after the yogurt aisle was deserted, but decided that was taking the easy way out. Not to mention it would be utterly ridiculous! I don't know why I found it so intimidating to just walk up and get my darn yogurt while a woman argued with her children about the nutritional downfall of normal yogurts, but I did. For just a second. I mean, it's not like she made an example out of me after I left by telling her kids “See, what happens to you if you consume sugar and coloring? You'll be like that girl!” If anything, she probably just judged me quietly, like my grandma would. I mean, what kind of person comes home from Walmart and obsesses with people they saw in the yogurt aisle . . . ?

And thus the hypocrisy continues.