Cataracts, Part I

This is a really bad image, but I suppose that takes down the gross factor, right?

I'm sitting in the eye clinic, watching my dad's eye surgery.  They have a monitor all set up so I can watch the live feed of everything they are doing.  It's pretty interesting... to anyone who didn't get squeamish during high school biology classes.  Fortunately, I never did.  I poked through the pig carcasses and cut apart the earthworms and dissected the crayfish while my partner gagged. Not even the field trip to the university cadaver lab got me down,  although the smell threatened to do me in as we approached the building.  Formaldehyde and I don't get along well. So a bloodless eye surgery is no problem for me - I watched it while munching on my breakfast muffins.

I've learned some good life lessons while working with my dad and his failing eyesight these last few months. After his retina surgeries in December and January,  his cataracts got worse.  He can barely see shadows out of his left eye and his depth perception is laughable.

I'm grateful for my eyesight.  I'm getting older and my eyes are bad and I should get bifocals, but I can see.  I can see!  Clouds, birds, a beautiful sunset, the adorable faces of my children,  my husband's grin - I can see them and I'm thankful for it.

Mission Monday

Not long now until Alec comes home!  That seems really wild to me. Has it really been two years?  And at the same time, hasn't it been nearly forever since I last saw him? There are a dozen emotions running in and over this mother heart of mine, but mostly love. 

I love this boy and am so grateful for the chance I've had to be his mother and to learn the lessons the Lord had for me through him. I'm definitely a better person because this boy, my strong-willed firstborn, has been part of my life. I'm looking forward to getting to know him as an adult.

And while I'm thinking about boys coming home, I got the official on Ben's plans. He had been thinking about extending his mission and staying for the summer. It's been a tough decision to make, with lots of pros and cons. This boy has always had a hard time making choices. He was the one who would cry at the toy store because he knew that choosing the toy he really wanted meant he had to not choose all the other toys. But he made the decision - he's coming home on time, at the beginning of the summer.  Now I have to figure out where these two boys will be sleeping!

See what they are up to lately on the South Africa Mission blog,  and the Madagascar Mission blog.

Where Do You Put Your Feet?

I play the organ every week at church.  I'm proficient, but not splendiferous at it.  My mother, who had a 40-year tenure as the ward organist, taught me that the two most important parts of accompanying hymns were to begin the song together, and end when they end.  So I do, and anyting more than that is icing.

Now that's not to say that I am a terrible organist who is limping along.  On the contrary, I have played for many years myself and am quite comfortable with most of the hymns in the book.  Most, but not all.  So I practice.

I know what the hymns are at the beginning of the week, more or less.  The idea is that I practice them a bit every day and then I'm ready when Sunday rolls around.  Reality lives in a different world from my ideas, unfortunately.  I think about my songs at the beginning of the week, and then forget in the busyness of daily life.  About Thursday I start feeling panicky and by Friday I actually haul out the hymnbook.  I practice a lot on Friday, intend to practice more on Saturday, and brush the hymns up on Sunday morning.  And some weeks I actually do better than that!

I was practicing the other day when David came into the room.  He watched me play the songs for a few minutes, and then asked how I could practice the pedals when I was playing on a piano, not an organ.  I showed him where I put my feet as I practice, and how I pretend that the pedals are there.

I've been thinking a lot about that ever since.  How can I practice when I'm not really practicing?

First of all, I know the organ.  We had an organ at home when I was a child, and I really learned to play as a teenager.  I know that the D below middle C is directly in front of me as I sit at the organ.  I know that the F is just to the right of my right foot as I sit naturally, and that I have to stretch to the left about a foot to reach low G.

My feet feel the pedals as I play.  Officially, an organist wears special shoes while playing the organ, with a specific low heel and soft leather soles so as to feel the pedals beneath your feet.  Organ shoes are pricey, and I could never justify the expense, so I haven't ever bought any.  I remember my mother buying tap shoes and unscrewing the noisy taps for her organ shoes, but I just play barefoot. The pedals are arranged in white and clusters of black keys, just like the keyboard, and  I can feel where the pedals are, and where the black (or darker) pedals are in relation to the white pedals (which are usually light wood toned).  Low B is on the left side of the break between the the sets of black pedals, and F is on the right side of the next break.

Mostly, however, I practice the crud out of my hands before adding the pedals.  Mistakes are crud, right?  I want to practice the hand parts well enough that I don't even need to think about where they are going.  I need the brain space to pay attention to what my feet should be doing.

As I have been thinking about playing pedals, some other things have also come to mind.  I have some potentially stressful situations coming up that I've been worrying about. How can I prepare for those?  The same way.

I need to know me.  I've lived in me a long time, and I know where my boundaries are.  I know what comes easily, and what kinds of things I have to stretch the accomplish.  I need to respect myself and my strengths and not be afraid to shine.

There is strength in being sensitive.  I am able to feel out a situation, listening as I go, to play the right parts and correct it when it gets disharmonious.  I need to trust my gut feel.

Mostly, I need to make sure that the other parts of my life are in harmony.  Do the things well that I know how to do well.  Keep a schedule.  Get enough sleep.  Eat nourishing food.  Read my scriptures and do the things that fill my heart with happiness and goodness.  Then I will have the space to think and respond to new things as they come up.

Thanks, David, for asking the questions that helped me to answer my own wonderings. Love this family and the things I can learn from them!

And maybe I should even go to the church occasionally and really practice on an organ.  For real.

Mission Monday

We've had some bad weather lately.  It's been murky and foggy and the air has been bad.  I'd rather not have to chew my air before I breathe it, thanks.  After about a week of this, it snowed lightly for a day, and then the sun came out!  We hadn't had sunshine for a while, so the sunshine felt so good!  Sometimes we have feel our way around in the dark before we appreciate the light again.

Ben wrote this week about how we can shine in the dark and be an example for each other.  It's a good lesson, and a good reminder.

Catch up on our missionary rambles from Madagascar and South Africa!

Happy Valentine's Day

We were cleaning out some storage areas, where my mom had kept all her holiday decorations.  I'm not sure what happened to the valentine wreath, but we found Christmas wreaths in this box.  Most importantly, we found this love note on the box.

My parents were married nearly 45 years before she passed away.  As I'm helping my dad with his history, he glosses over tough areas (whether intentionally or he really can't remember, I don't know) and highlights his love for my mother.  I know there were hard times - some I witnessed, and some my mom told me about later.  I remember going to my bedroom at night after there had been some negative feelings and pressing my ear to their door in an attempt to see if their murmured voices were having an argument.  I couldn't ever tell.  They never fought in front of us.  

No relationship is without its ups and downs, but I'm glad they stuck it out together.  Still in love is an inspiration.  

Happy Valentine's Day, you sweethearts.

Desire and the Dangerous Doughnuts

I ate a doughnut last week.  No, that isn't telling the whole truth.  I think I ate four or five of them.  Trent brought home a whole tray full of day-old doughnuts as a treat for the family.  There were so many that we  - I mean the kids - oh, and my dad - and Trent too - couldn't eat them all up in a day.  So he put the leftovers in the garage, where it was cooler than the kitchen and there were more places to put a big old tray full of doughnuts.  I am grateful that he didn't leave them on the kitchen counter, but in the garage wasn't much better.

You see, they were calling to me.  They know my name.  And they whisper and cajole and tempt and sing siren songs of sticky sweetness to me.  It is so hard to resist!

I am on a special diet because my body isn't functioning properly right now.  I CAN eat fruits and vegetables and whole grains and a little meat every now and then.  I can even eat a tiny bit of fat occasionally!  That's new and I'm happy about it because it means I'm ok for some nuts or avocado or coconut.  I'm nuts about nuts, I admit.  When I eat the things I know my body tolerates, I feel better.  I have energy.  I don't have mood swings.  Life is happier.

But there are some things I still need to stay far, far away from.  Like sugar, of any kind.  And yeast, white flour, and anything processed.  More than just a smidge of plant-fat will do me in.  And no dairy.  A list like this means I need to make all my food from scratch, all the time.  And I need to be really, really careful to keep my guard up.

The doughnuts did me in.  I can only resist goodies for so long, and they were so alluring!  It was bad.  I ate one, and then another.  There may have been a third.  One was a powdered sugar mound of crispiness embracing a raspberry filling.  Another was actually a moist lemon cake disguised as a muffin-top, laced with delightfully tart frosting and peppered with bits of tangy lemon peel.  I savored every morsel, then sucked on my fingers so as not to miss a single atom.

As expected, I got a bad stomachache.  But the next morning there were still doughnuts!  Calling me, taunting me...  I picked up the three holdouts, tied them tightly into a bag and buried them in the garbage.  I didn't care who thought it was wasteful.  Out you go!

But throughout the day, somehow that bag worked its way back up to the top of the garbage and fell open.  And one at a time, those delicious doughnuts fairly jumped into my mouth.  I'm not sure how it happened, but every delicate nibble was delectable.

Payment was extracted over the next few days.  My stomach hurt - for days.  My guts endured all kinds of gastric distress that I'm sure you'd rather me not detail.  I got grumpy.  Normally I'm pretty easy-going, but with sugar I'm downright mean.  I caught the cold that the kids were passing around even though I rarely get sick.  I was discouraged and devoid of energy.  As long as I'm already feeling lousy, I might as well eat one of the cinnamon rolls Trent brought home, right?

That one gave me a bladder infection.  I was so miserable that I ate white bread, which induced a yeast infection.  And I'm still grouchy.

Last night, I even dumped a lengthy laundry list of complaints on my sweet husband.  Poor man.  He's been trying to cope with the kids and an irrational wife, all while adjusting to the learning curve of a new job.  I'm grateful he's so patient with me.

It takes about two weeks to get the sugar out of my system, to replace the cravings with vitality.  Until then, I'm grumpy that I don't get to eat any treats.  I'm trying not to see all the goodies the kids brought home from their Valentin's parties, and failing miserably.  I will continue to attempt to convince myself that the pizza Trent is bringing home for dinner is poison to me.

And I'm begging him to never bring doughnuts into the house again.

Making Faces

I was laying on the couch this afternoon when Freddie said he wanted to snuggle with me.  Normally I welcome such offers, but at that particular moment I was just getting up for a little trip to the restroom.  No, it isn't a restroom - the room I was resting in was the rest room.  It isn't a little girl's room either, because there are so many more boys around these parts.  No powder in there either, so it's not a powder room.  There is a bathtub, so I guess it's a bathroom, but it doesn't sound as nice.  Boy, we have a lot of euphemisms for our waste system requirements, don't we?

Anyway, Freddie insisted that we snuggle.  I told him I'd be happy to - for 10 seconds.  He laughed and then we started counting.  (Together) 1. 2. 3. 4. 5...  But when I said 6, he went back to 1 to start over.  Silly boy!  Guess he wanted more snuggles!

After I got back - and after the snuggles - Georgie brought up a game to play.  I got them this game for their last birthday, and it's a favorite.  No, no affiliations, I just like the game.  It's about the same as Go Fish, but in order to ask someone if they have a particular card, you have to make the face shown on the card.  They love to play it and I love to watch them.

I asked them to pick out their favorite cards so I could take a picture.  How funny is it that they picked out cards that matched their own shirts!  I love these boys so much.