Public Service Announcement: February Motherlode!

This is just a public service announcement. There is a Motherlode giveaway on Dear C. Jane and it's pretty romantic (in case you could use some saucy in your life). That is all.

Just looking out for you.

The Buffet

On our way to a Saturday morning breakfast at Communal I felt sour. Here it was the precious weekend, having two hours alone with my husband to eat and relax, and I was irritable. Negativity presents itself as vanity in my life, if I don't explore my mood, it will translate into disparaging thoughts about my looks.

My hair, body, skin, clothes . . .

I prayed as we drove downtown--a gray, cold morning with ticker-tape type snow. I looked in the car mirror to assess the situation. A white, colorless face stared back at me.

I don't want to feel this way. Please help.

The response to my prayer was immediate, Your head is empty of thoughts. When you starve your intelligence there is nothing to digest but the empty space. Fill your head again.

This answer wasn't something new, but something I routinely forget. If I don't feed my spirit, I start to feed on my looks and those thoughts are a feeding frenzy of imperfection. Those thoughts are empty calories and low fuel. My greatest beauty hope is a head full of new thoughts, a cache of exploration, a pallet of new ideas.

After a slow meal of scones and eggs, Chup took me to the bookstore to sample some words. I tasted travel books, cook books, narratives and some really horrible diet guides. Finally, I decided on a book about clearing the mind and allowing for positivity and peace.

It was like I had fueled up my brain on premium. We were good to go.

"Hey there woman," Chup called out to me as I found him reading about cars in the magazine section,"can I take you home?"

"Alright," I blushed.

Sunday Guest Post Series: J. Scott Bronson's Playing Catch With Jesus

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Cancer.

The big C, to some.

A terrible fright for most.

Not so, for me. Not any more anyway. And all because of a little game of catch.

The first time I got cancer turned out to be a nearly year long event that began in the Fall of 2000 with a discovery and ended at the beginning of September 2001 with something less than a resounding victory. Yes, we felt we’d won–or hoped it at least--but it took nearly dying to accomplish it. Chemo was not fun. Turned me into a great big Pillsbury doughboy. Minus the chef’s hat. The thing with chemo is that it’s a three way race to see if chemo can kill the cancer before the cancer - or chemo - can kill you. Apparently it was a close race in my case. Someone told me that I looked like death warmed over. A cliche, yes, but apt, I think.

Through it all, though, there was little fear or dread on my part. If it was my time to go, I felt ready for it. I was relatively calm. My wife and kids on the other hand...

The second time I got cancer...I was not ready to die. I had spent nearly a year recovering from the first ordeal and making plans for being a survivor. I was attached to those plans. I wanted to see them through. Cancer was a huge impediment at this point. And what’s more, for some reason this time, it was also quite terrifying.

I was in a situation at work that was untenable and there may have been some other things going on that made the situation at this particular time all so anxiety-ridden, but I can’t pinpoint what those things might have been; the fear of cancer is paramount in my mind as the one great enemy of my days then.

After many days of this anxiety, I finally made a heartfelt appeal on my knees. I told God that I was fairly certain of the process for making His son’s atonement work for me in the expurgation of my sins, but that I was at a total loss as to how the atonement worked in the deliverance from the pain and sorrow and grief of every day heartaches and other illnesses of the soul that come, not because of sin or rebellion, but because of ... well, just because.

“I am unaware of any process to put into play here, Father. How is it accomplished? I’ve been taught that the atonement covers this sort of thing. But how? What do I do? What do I do?”

After a bit of consideration, I said, “Here’s what I think–I hope–will work. I’m going to take all this worry–this pain–this anxiety, all this fear and terror, and roll it all up into a ball and I’m going to toss it up to you. Will that work? Is that all I need to do? Because I don’t think I can get through another day like this. I’m kinda goin’ crazy here and I need to get rid of this stuff. So, here–here it is, take it. I’m tossing it as high as I can. Please catch it. It’s yours now.”

And I did it. I rolled it all up and threw it into the air. At least I pictured myself doing that. Then I took a deep breath and went to work.

And then it was as if a gentle rain followed me everywhere I went that day. The mud and muck of fear and uncertainty dissolved under that warm and friendly downpour slowly but persistently as the day went on. And by the time I went to bed that night my heart and my mind were calm and peaceful. And have been–on the subject of cancer–ever since.

I’ve had cancer two more times since then. Without concern or worry. At all. This August it will have been seven years since the last recurrence. Each year the odds decrease that the cancer will return, but it doesn’t matter. I just don’t care any more.

Turns out, Jesus is pretty good at a game of catch. But it’s a short game. He doesn’t toss the ball back.



J. Scott Bronson is a (slightly past) middle-aged man from San Diego with one wife, five children a mortgage and a cat (to which he is allergic). He is an actor/playwright/director, a cancer survivor and a couch potato. He loves most kinds of music and Big Macs, pizza and Cap'n Crunch. And it shows.

Vlog: Best Blogging Week Ever Feb. 20-25

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Do not watch this vlog. We shot it late last night when my brain had turned into bananas.

Ok, if you must watch this vlog, please know this is not me in real life, this is me when possessed by my inner demons. Yes, I have more than one.

Dear Friends of New Zealand, we dedicate this strange vlog to you and send out our best wishes for recovery. Sorry it's strange.

Dear Editor at the Des News Who Came Up With My Mormon Times Headline, I am sorry I make fun of your title, Blogging Is Hard!

Ample warning, and a few preemptive apologies, and we're off!

The Great Two Years

Yesterday my nephew Alex went into the Missionary Training Center (MTC) where he will learn how to teach the gospel and speak Russian. After a few months there he will be sent to St. Petersburg where he will live for two years. In those two years, he'll be able to write and email his family, and call home four times (Mother's Day and Christmas).



Alex was due to enter in the MTC at 12:45pm. Because they live three hours south of us, the family decided to come up, sleep-over at our house and say their good byes in our living room. (We live minutes away from the MTC.) Good byes have to be done prior to dropping off your missionary, there is no park and hug. You just pull up, your missionary jumps out, MTC helpers take his luggage and they're gone for two years.

(Sisters are gone for 18 months.)

(My parents, who oversee all the missionaries like Alex in one designated area, are gone for 3 years.)



We know Alex is so excited to be a missionary, but we also know that he is a lifelong Mama's boy. All morning long Suze was picking the lint off his suit and urging him to take Tylenol if his sore tooth was acting up later that evening (when she wouldn't be there to remind him).





Then she looked at me and said, "You will go to sleep tonight and wake up in the morning to find that it's
The Chief's day to go into the MTC. That is how fast it happens."

I didn't like that thought much.

(But then my son started screaming at me from the den and I briefly reconsidered...)

I remember when my oldest brother Steve, Alex's dad, went on his mission to Peru. We bawled for months. We faithfully wrote him every week, sent him tapes of us talking and packages with pictures and candy.



It had a huge impact on my family. After Steve, four other brothers went on missions (Chile, Finland, Spain and Puerto Rico), and Lucy and I also served (England and Canada). (Chup went to Japan.)

After a lazy morning of jokes, visitors and donuts it was the appointed time to load up the luggage and take Alex to his mission. That is when the good byes started.

It was sad. Sad and exciting, but mostly lots of crying.

Us Mormons, we get called crazy a lot. Crazy, weird, strange. And when I think about this day in my future, me sending my nineteen year-old son out into the world to experience all sorts of emotions--dejection to jubilee--without so much as a daily phone call I think, They're right. We are crazy.

But, it's two years of service, two years of growth, two years of learning, compassion, and experience--for the missionary and the family back home. Many would say the sacrifice is worth the blessings in return.

Until we meet again, God be with you Alex. We love you!



You can read more about missions here.

Dual Citizenship

Photo Jed Wells (in our guest bedroom).

The plan was to be a Stay At Home Mom. Being the homebody that I am, I took a lot of comfort in the stay at home part of that job description. But I've noticed an alarming pattern in my life, anytime I make "a plan" fate brazenly decides against it. I mean, it's either fate or the possibility that I even rebel against my own decisions.

For the most part I am at home, but frequently I attend business meetings, idea meetings, community service meetings and fund-raising meetings which incidentally are all meetings where I make a huge fool of myself. I trained for SAHM not Business Talk 101.

For instance I said "penis" in a fund-raising meeting I had yesterday. As soon as it fled my mouth I tried to recapture it, but you don't just pretend you didn't say that word (of all words). I should be fired by now. Somebody fire me.

And I am always late to these meetings, mainly because my children are smart about me leaving. Yesterday as I was showering (and for the first time this winter: shaving my legs) Ever skillfully crept into the bathroom, tore open the shower curtain and, with her best pirate impression yelled "Ahhhhhrrrrrrrr!" It scared me like a college prank. I jumped three feet in the air and landed on the slippery tub.

Out of the shower and back on dry ground, I decided to speed up the drying of my hair with a blow dryer. My children had never seen one before (in my training of SAHM I skipped the course called, "How to Still Look Lovely Doing the Dirtiest Job in the World") so as I commenced blowing my hair my two children went crazy. The Chief continued to unplug it, "I want that gun!'" and Ever wrapped her body around my leg in an attempt to crawl up and examine the fascinating mechanical contraption in my hands.

You should have seen my hair when it was all over.



By the time I arrived at my second meeting yesterday my entire mane looked so puffy and rat's nest-y that I pulled back what I could into a ponytail:



I carried on like I was bringing back something the 1700's forgot to pass on.

When all of the meetings were over yesterday, the house looked like it had been dumped upside down and rolled around like dice to a giant. Stuff everywhere. Food, clothes and toys littered the floors and dirty dishes barricaded the kitchen sink. And so I took off my boots, put on my apron and got back to work.

Later when I was putting The Chief to bed I cuddled up next to him and told him I loved him. "Wuve you, Mom" he whispered back to me. Moments later he was softly snoring, and I wasn't far behind.

This lifestyle is busy and sometimes entirely taxing, but I know it's the life Heavenly Father wants for me. Once you turn your will over to Him there is no difference between God and fate.

Into the Date Night

Photo of the Vegas Roll thanks to the Baltimore Sun.

It was date night.

Chup and I took full advantage of his visiting parents and left Grandma and Grandpa in charge of our dependents. First, sushi at our favorite little spot. The place was crowded, we were lucky to get a table squished up against the back wall. It was such a tight space, our server tripped over my chair and landed on her knees. But before I could maneuver to help her up, she scurried to the back of the restaurant and out of the way. I couldn't tell if she was embarrassed or in pain. Probably both.

The sushi was fantastic.

The place was so well packed, Chup and I spent ample time people watching--not staring mind you, just brief glances around our atmosphere. To our right there was a couple who repeatedly fed noodles to one another with chopsticks. Props to their agility with Asian utensils, but that wasn't the most interesting thing about them, he looked less like a romantic partner and more like her father. It looked sorta like a Daddy Daughter Date or like the daddy bird feeding his baby bird the morning worms. Endearing.

A woman waiting for a table had the most glorious coat wrapped around her shoulders. We discussed, vintage or made-to-look vintage? How I love having a husband who will engage me in such important debates. I conclude with my opinion: made-to-look vintage.

The booth to our left held a couple with a newborn baby. From his well-shielded carseat the baby started screaming. The husband, a handsome blonde, who had been talking passionately about their kitchen remodel stopped mid tile-and-grout exploration, took the baby from his wife's side and out of the restaurant. When she was alone in the booth, the wife started to cry--a kind of sobbing the postpartum warriors of this world can understand. It took everything I had not to get up from my own table, slide into the seat next to hers and cry with her.

"Oh, I know how that is," I said to Chup feeling it in my chest. So I sent a little prayer over to her, and left her alone.

I wondered what the other patrons would say about us. I can't believe that lady tripped her server.

When dinner was over we discovered the rain outside was blowing in horizontal sheets. Being the chivalrous man that he is, Chup ran to the car so I wouldn't have to get my hair wet, or anything wet for that matter. By the time he returned to pick me up in front of the warm restaurant, the temperature had dropped and replaced the rain with furious snow.

We drove to downtown Provo with busy windshield wipers. There we met up with our friends at a late night lounge. Something about the storm and having well-placed babysitters (FREE TOO!) at home made us totally comfortable. We talked well into the early evening over fizzy drinks and piles of appetizers. It had been a long time since I  looked one o'clock straight in the eyes and defied parental tiredness.

Beat that One O'clock! I'm not afraid of you!

(Oh but the next day . . .)

Earlier this week my family took our children so Chup and I could spend a Valentine's night at the Zermatt Resort up the canyon. That experience, coupled with Saturday night's marathon date made me say to Chup,

"Something is around the corner. Heavenly Father is giving us all this time to be alone together. Makes me suspicious,"

"And when it comes we'll be just fine," Chup assured me.

We shall see.

Stay tuned.

POtW - Fortress of Solitude

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I Need A Job Chart

I was just watching the short video for My Job Chart (really smart idea by-the-way teaches working and money ethics to children). I have this fire in my chest about teaching my children to be hard workers. In my perfect parenting world, my kids would exit Camp Kendrick knowing how to get on their hands and knees and scrub a toilet, a tub, a Cheerio-encrusted kitchen floor, whatever.

So far I am failing. But at least I am humble.

I can get The Chief to put his clothes down the laundry chute, but what two year old doesn't love that job? To send objects flying down a small hole in the floor is as entertaining as it is mesmerizing. I suppose I should count it a small success only that I have to pray every single day that he doesn't send his little sister down that small hole in the floor when I am not looking. Also, sometimes I find random objects in the laundry collection basket in the basement--cars, trucks, my hair dryer, feminine products, my phone and family heirlooms.

One time I had set out Ever's clothes for the day and before I could put them on her, The Chief sent them down the chute when I wasn't looking. The quick disappearance of her clothes left me thinking I had honestly lost my mind. That dress was just here one second ago! I am losing it. I am losing it. I am losing it.

Imagine how happy I was when I found the outfit a day later piled up with the dirty laundry three flights down.

I had big dreams about teaching my kids hard work (and still do, I am not giving up) before I had children. In fact, allow me to send you to this post called "Like the Top of the Chrysler Building" which I wrote in March 2008. Warning, it includes chemicals and one Mormon-friendly swear word.


Click here (read the comments too, hilarious stuff.)

This is the MJC video I watched:

Mumford & Sons Tavern Performance

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There I was, standing on top of a dusty piano in an old timey tavern. To the best of my ability--which was surprisingly very good--I was singing along to some salty tunes with the handsome members of Mumford & Sons. I rattled a rusted tambourine, shook my untamed hair and moved my liquid hips.

It was blissfully wild.

Then, as the chorus was about to get rousing with the banjo beating out an intricate segue, the lead singer turned to look up at me from his spot on the piano. I returned my vision towards him in anticipation of a show of vocal prowess. With his gaze shooting up at me, his forehead crumbled into a jumble of wiry wrinkles and out of his mouth came a terrible wail. It  was a painful bellow, a sobbing of sadness. He wasn't singing, he was crying . . . like a baby.

I woke up.

Down the hall Ever was in her crib screaming. Something was wrong, she sounded desperate. This is my baby who sleeps for hours at night never moving, never waking, just a rock of slumber. I jumped out of bed and moved down the hall. When I got to her she had curled herself up into a fetal ball and while trying to keep her soothing finger in her mouth she huffed and cried and huffed some more. I rubbed her back and sang to her a little until her breathing was deep and peaceful.

Then, I shuffled back into bed hoping desperately I could pick up the dream where I left off. I closed my eyes and tried to recall the happy scene my mind fashioned for me before. My dress? What color was it? The music? How did it sound? But the more details I tried to recreate the more they vanished into the recesses of my subconsciousness.

But I was having so much fun, I complained into the portals of the dream world.

Then, down the hall came more screaming. Angry wailing from my upset baby. Again I got up and headed down to the nursery to soothe her. This time I picked her up out of the crib, wrapped her tired body in her favorite silky blanket and rocked her in the old rocking chair. Her wet face adhered to my chest and after a couple outbursts of discomfort, she finally relaxed and fell back to sleep in my arms. The room was dark and silent, except for the creaking beat of the wicker rocking chair rolling back and forth, back and forth.

A sleeping baby and one-half of a dream; these are the luxuries of motherhood.





Just in case you are the last person in the world to hear about Mumford & Sons (which is cool with  me):

IT MUST BE MADE

p

Chup here -

I'm a bit of a watch hound. So, when my friend Cheyanne sent me the link to her husband's kickstarter page and I saw this:

I got just a little excited.

Right?

It's a braille watch. That sighted people can learn to use as well. I think it's dead sexsay. Kills current solution's designs in so many ways; just go watch the video. If you like it, back it. Give 'em some cash, spread the word, tell your rich uncle.

I pledged $25.

For that, I get a t-shirt and one of those cool Haptica bracelets.

So I can practice and learn to use the watch that I will buy as soon as it's available because everyone will give them a donation and IT WILL BE MADE.

Amen?

-Chup out

Sunday Guest Post Series: Lisa Valentine Clark's Valentine's Day: It's Your Special Day!

I think saying that St. Valentine has cursed me is a little dramatic (which I have been accused of being on some occasions), but I definitely have a non-romantic history with Valentine’s Day.

My maiden name is Valentine, which I now use as my middle name, so I feel I have some ownership when it comes to Valentine’s Day. When I was little, Valentine’s Day was simple, fun, and full of candy and gifts, which are my love languages. I also got a lot of attention on Valentine’s Day with people saying “Hey! It’s YOUR SPECIAL DAY!” or “This must be fun to have your OWN holiday!” or “You must have special plans for this SPECIAL DAY!” Which builds expectations that are easily crushed. Cruely.

Because suddenly, in junior high somewhere in between Aqua Netting my hair and putting on Silver City Pink lipstick, I realized that I suddenly had expectations. I’m expecting things to happen like romantic Valentine’s delivered anonymously to my locker, or giant plush teddy bears and a bouquet of red roses or a tap at my window in the middle of the night from a lovesick boy holding up a boom box playing Peter Gabriel. (Coincidentally, now that I have a junior high son of my own, I wish I could go back in time and tell my 12 year-old self there’s NO WAY most 12 year-old boys are thinking up romantic gestures. They are thinking up fart jokes.) And now, instead of clarifying the pronunciation or spelling of my name by saying “You know, ‘Valentine,’ like the holiday!” I find myself saying “You know, ‘Valentine,’ like the massacre.” Oh, teenage angst.

After a few failed Valentine’s Days, where I didn’t get anything from anyone except my mom, Valentine’s Day lost a little of its excitement and people would still say “it’s your special day!” which only made it worse. All my subsequent relationships started right after Valentine’s Day or ended before. It became really funny. Super funny, awkward relationships, none of which ever landed me a heart shaped box of chocolates and obligatory bouquet of red roses on Valentine’s Day, made me the gal I am today.

Here are some of my “rules” of Valentine’s Day :

1. You get one shot. There’s no “lets celebrate it on another day” kinda thing you can get away with birthdays and anniversaries. You celebrate it on February 14th, or you don’t.

2. Valentine’s Day is really for the children. All expectations, frivolity, and planning should be light and fun. If you try to make it too romantic, you will be accused of, even subtly, caving into the desires of candy makers, greeting card companies and the Illuminati, and not being spontaneously romantic (Don’t underestimate the power of being romantic on a random Tuesday.)

3. Everyone wants to be remembered on Valentine’s Day. Even if she says she doesn’t want to celebrate Valentine’s Day, it would still be nice to get a box of nice chocolates. I’m just saying she’d eat them. (Or buy them for themselves. . . Hailey Smith, I'm looking at you.)

4. Decide ahead of time what your expectations are. My friend Kacy doesn’t celebrate Valentine’s Day romantically, but she and her husband really go all out for their anniversary. I respect that.

Flash forward to 1995, and I found myself in a serious relationship with Mr. Christopher Clark. Valentine’s Day 1995 came and with it came a romantic Valentine’s Day including a funny song he and his best friend Ben wrote and sang on a tape (remember cassette tapes?), roses, and a romantic dinner. And it ended with a flat tire and a rescue from a friend who needed us to talk with him for 3 hours about how depressed he was. Oh, sweet Valentine’s.

Topher proposed a week later, stating that it would have been too obvious to propose to Lisa Valentine on Valentine’s Day, and I appreciated it. After all, I didn’t want to ruin my awesome nonromantic Valentine’s curse tradition.

Now, because of Topher’s career, he’s been out of town every Valentine’s Day, at a regional acting competition every year we’ve been married (except that year in England) which is 16 years.

Except this year.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Lisa Valentine Clark is raising five little Valentine-Clarks and that's it. Don't ask her what her hobbies are, or she'll start crying. She lives by her motto: "lowering the bar and being awesome." Her husband has been out of town directing for a month and a half now, so she hopes to get some dark chocolate in all forms (frozen, bar, truffle, liquid) and a really long nap for Valentine's Day. She also blogs at Almost Famous.

PoTW - This Place Is Going To The....

Karen E. to cjanemail:

I love your Vlogs, and my puppy loves you too! I think Chup rocks, and I think it's great he helps out on the blog as a guest!

Karen in Ojai,CA


Sent from my iPhone 4

Vlog: Best Blogging Week Ever February 7-11 [Valentine's Edition]

Didn't catch the original?
Provo, Ut Girls.



Extra special thank you to Scott Wiley from The Studio with No Name.

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Happy Social Media Awareness Day!

Oh sure, Chup and I have our disagreements.

Like last night when I put Ever in her high chair, plopped a big blob of mashed potatoes on her tray and let her have at it! Approximately 70% of those potatoes ended up on her actual body, the rest consumed somewhere in it. She had mashed potatoes in her hair, ears, nasal cavities, neck folds and somehow, in between her bitty toes. Contrary to the photo above, she was having the time of her life (a la Dirty Dancing/Black Eyed Peas).

I couldn't stop laughing. It was the best show.

But Chup? No likey.

He doesn't like the mess. Messes are really hard for him to navigate. He's not like me, he doesn't find putting the dirty baby in the kitchen sink to soak (the easiest post-dinner clean-up by-the-way) a perfect solution.

"I don't know what your problem is," I said to him as he sat stoic eating beef tacos, "I usually do the clean up around here."

And that was the wrong thing to say because he pipped right up, "That is not true. I always clean up."

"Sure, you always clean up. But only if I ask you to."

I don't know if this conversation could get more predictable, but true to the acused, Chup was not having it.

"I clean up without you asking me to all the time."

The conversation was at a stalemate, so Chup suggested we go for a ride to run some errands. I cleaned all the cracks in our little mashed potatoed butter ball and dressed her up warm. We kept the conversation jovial, until we started to (somehow?) talk about Twitter.

"MC Hammer tweets thirty to forty times a day. I saw it on Oprah," I informed Chup.

"I would unfollow him, I couldn't handle that many updates from one person," he replied.

"I want to take that challenge. I am going to have a Social Media Awareness Day and tweet thirty times."

"I will unfollow you."

"For one day? You couldn't handle it for one day?"

"No."

"I am going to do it anyway."

Then, we dropped that conversation as well.

Sometime in the very early morning I woke up and realized we didn't take the garbage out to the curb for collection that morning. I say "we" but really this is Chup's job--but remember? only if I remind him. Which I had not.

I quickly got out of bed, and with nothing but my underwear and a ill-fitted coat (like, really ill-fitted) (like, what is the point of even wearing it?) I crept outside, made sure there wasn't a soul insight, and dashed that garbage can out to the curb. The morning was dark and cold. When I turned to sprint back inside I caught the eyes of a passerby directly across the street from me.

Deer in headlights. (Him, not me.)

"Oh geeze," I said, pulling down on the tragically small coat trying to make it cover the important parts. Then, I sorta crab-walked back up the driveway cursing at my husband all the while.

"Really Chup? I don't have to remind you? What is this? Me, cold, stupid coat, indecent exposure, public nudity..."

I retreated to the kitchen and for a glass of water. The whole ordeal made me parched. That's when I noticed the cleanliness. Sometime in the middle of the night Chup had slicked up the entire kitchen, dishes, counter tops, floor, Ever's potato-encrusted high chair. And unless I was sleep-talking, he had done it without my request.

As it turns out, after my bodily sacrifice, we missed the garbage collection. But I was willing to let that one go, because the kitchen was sparkly. That is until Chup said this,

"I would feel apologetic for not taking it out, but the thought didn't even cross my mind. So it's not like I meant to do it and didn't."

"Oh so I am supposed to apologize for not reminding you?"

And it begins all over again.





Friends, today is the day I am going to tweet 30 times. My twitter updates also post on facebook (yes, I am a twofer in the social media realm). If you would like to follow me to see if my husband will accept the torture and keep following me for this entire Social Media Awareness Day you can follow me on twitter here or facebook here. And please, for the safety of this blog, try to contain your excitement about this thrilling announcement.




p.s. Chuppy Pie, love you my Hot Sugar Rocks Cooled From Heaven's Gentle Breeze. Let's make it eternal!

Kenya 1

Troy with Ever & me last October at Basa's HQ.

When it was my turn to speak I didn't know what to say.

Our first meeting about our trip to Kenya was overrun with talented people. Mindy talked about singing with the children in the village schools. Toni discussed helping the women write and express their stories. Chup offered to document the journey with his camera. Troy explained how he likes to help the mothers enhance their business ideas. I thought about Page--who is also coming--I thought about how she could play soccer with the kids. Then everyone looked at me.

"What do you think you can do while we are there?" Troy asked me with his arms stretched towards my direction.

"Um," the answer I wanted to say didn't seem very helpful. And the point of going to Kenya is to be helpful.

"You could dance," Troy suggested smiling at me.

Yes I love to dance, but I am not especially favored in that capacity. It's mostly for laughs that I dance, and sing and, well, do anything in my life. Even my prayers are said with a light heart. When I think about it, I am only serious when I am tired, worn out, frustrated or DONE. So where does that lead me?

I stalled for a minute asking more questions about specifics, and then when the conversation came back in my direction, eyes blinking, throats clearing, I decided to...ahem...get serious.

"I am going to Kenya because I want to learn. I want to observe and listen and look and feel. I am hoping to be educated on living with less."

"It's true. They are the happiest people I have ever met," my cousin Lisa (Troy's wife) blurted out at me. "You will see, they have nothing, they don't covet, want or know jealousy."

That's what I want to learn. A life without want, covet or jealousy? TEACH ME PLEASE!

I hope it's not too much to ask, but I am going to Kenya to understand simplicity. From all of the stories, pictures, ideas we've studied in our preparation to go, I cannot think of one thing I would want to bring other than an open mind and a desire to learn.

First up, dance lessons.

*photos and video of CCF women by Troy Holmberg

In April I will be going to Kenya with Basa Body to meet the women of Coast Coconut Farms--producers of pure coconut oil. The hope of this venture--Basa Body and CCF--is to help mothers provide for their children in the face of poverty (Trade Not Aid).




Do you want more sensation for Valentines day?
Basa has a package for you. Wink, wink.
See here.

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Weather or Not

I know why you came to C. Jane Enjoy It today. You came because you wanted to know about Utah's weather.

How's the weather Ceej? you ask.

Well let me tell you, it's been weird.

Back in November forecasters predicted we'd have the STORM OF THE CENTURY. There was complete panic. People ransacked grocery stores and went into their bomb shelters and hugged their loved ones tight.

And well, here in Provo there was some wind. Like a atmospheric fart. And folks, that was it.

It wasn't the STORM OF THE CENTURY as much as it was the LET DOWN OF THE CENTURY.After that we've had the usual weather patterns, snow, rain, ice, long cloudy days. Nothing much to blog about.

Then, last week this happened...

Waking Up in California

In response to this.



San Francisco 2002



Matthew 6:33 But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.


I discovered it was all a lie the summer I got divorced.

In an attempt to catch my breath I flew from Salt Lake to San Francisco to spend a month living with my sister Page's family. I hoped a dalliance in the sunshine and an atmosphere of ocean would cure my beaten spirit. If not, my red-headed, freckled nieces and nephews would surely do the trick.

I found purpose in taking over my sister's daily laundry mission. When it was nap time and the house was quiet, I'd remove damp clothes from an over-stuffed washer, wrap them over the balcony facing west and let the California lazy sun do the drying. Then I'd fall into a lawn chair, cock my head toward the light and meditate on what was left of my life.

In that month my sister Page and I had intense conversations about the energy crisis in California. We debated whether her constant stream of laundry was part of the problem and, if so, would we do better to ease the burden with large loads of slow cycles or small batches with a shorter wash time.

And we talked about love.

"All my life," I explained to her one day, sitting a slate-colored wooden bench in the front yard, "I thought the ultimate experience as a human was to find love and feel loved. I lived my whole life to this point thinking it was all about this."

It was a conversation that silenced my strongly-opinionated sister. I remember her clad in comfy Birkenstocks, her sharp, pixie-cut hair throwing little rocks into the landscaped rock pile as we talked. She was the mother of five babies, my sister who had married a passionate newly returned missionary with auburn hair when she was just twenty years old. They were beyond fortunate, living in a beautiful home off a secluded street in the heart of the peninsula. Her kids would romp around in the surrounding foliage and find all sorts of bugs and snakes. There was dutch crunch bread and breezy dinners on the deck.

I was twenty-four years old, living back at home with my parents after leaving my nine-month old marriage. I graduated from college that spring and was at a loss for what to do next. I wasn't hopeless, but I was resentful about the culture I came from that had told me my problems would be resolved once I was attached to a man.

"If getting married is all there is to this life, if sex is the ultimate reward, then I have failed and there isn't hope for me. But I don't believe this message anymore. I see now that the reason we are here on this earth is to achieve a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. That is our true path, and only lasting ecstasy. Anything else is just a cherry on the top."

The lie wasn't being fed to me in the doctrines of Mormonism. This was a cultural deception, full attack on all sides. It told me sex was all there was and if it came with a price--a bad marriage stuffed into a small apartment--it was worth the cost. It told me that no man would care about intelligence when there was a warm body to touch. It told me that a woman was only as good as her successful husband and children. I was disillusioned--in attempting "the dream," I discovered the tragedy.

If being loved by a man--physically, emotionally--was all there was to this life, it disturbingly short changed the capacity of womanhood. Sex is stationed to enhance our understanding of God--a ritual celebrating who we are, where we're from and who we can become. It is a means of communication, procreation and repentance but sex is not all there is, there is so much more.

Page looked at me and nodded her head. In her personal cornucopia of blessings--spilling over into a giant vat of life experience--her belief in our religion was soul-consuming. Here she had everything I wanted, everything our culture promised as perfection and yet, she was good enough to agree with me. All of this could be taken away and she'd still have Jesus.

Mormonism teaches that we are on the earth for two main reasons, to get a body and to learn to be like God. In the process we seek out knowledge, agency, good works, faith, repentance, charity and hope. We celebrate family because we believe it is the safest place to learn these virtues. And at a time in my life when I should have felt alone, I turned to these truths and instead felt alive. I was bruised, embarrassed and angry about believing the wrong message, but could not deny a gorgeous hope swelling around inside of me.

Being without both marriage and sex wasn't as bad as I thought it would be--I had power I never knew existed. But I understood God wanted me to marry again.

A year later I brought back my tall, kind, soon-to-be husband. We decided to celebrate our engagement with a trip to the bay.There were a couple days spent at the beach with the Page and the kids (now six!) combing though the sand for snippets of beach glass and watery shells. I imaged a family--from us--to take to the beach with sand castle plans and sandy freeze tag. It was much easier the second time to believe in marriage because I didn't feel like it was my defining success. I was a woman who knew God loved her--and that would always be my greatest accomplishment.

Sex is powerful, my religion is true. Sex without my religion isn't worth it to me, and sex with my religion is divine. A woman can seek after her heart--ample laundry, a house full of  children, a husband to kiss home each day, success, power, poetry, beauty, but there will never be any woman more alluring than she who knows she's a daughter of God.


Page with her family, San Mateo, Ca. 2002



See Emily Dyer's response Mormon & Single: science projects, lunch money & picking teams go here.

Sunday Guest Post Series: Angela Hallstrom's It Is Better to Speak

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In my late twenties, I decided to go back to school and get my Master's in creative writing. I'd quit my job as a high school English teacher, moved to Minnesota with my husband and two young kids, and I was lucky enough to find an amazing MFA program at Hamline University that allowed me to take only one class a semester. I knew I needed the outlet; I knew I could fit the part-time class work into my schedule as a full-time mom; I knew having a Master's degree would open up future opportunities when and if I decided to go back to work.

What I didn't know is if I could actually do it.  Actually write. Then put that writing out into the actual world and let actual people read it.  The thought was terrifying.

I remember sitting in my very first class surrounded by people who wore funky glasses and multicolored Peruvian scarves, people who went out together after class to attend poetry slams in artfully decrepit Minneapolis bars, people who were (obviously!) much cooler than me. Me: a scarf-less Mormon stay-at-home mom who'd never been to a poetry slam in her life. 

A few weeks into that first class, the professor asked me to read aloud a poem by Audre Lorde called "A Litany for Survival." I read the first stanza confidently, affecting nonchalance as I attempted a musical rhythm and an almost-a-pause-but-not-quite-a-pause at the end of each line, like a real poet. But then, at the beginning of the second stanza, I read this: "For those of us / who were imprinted with fear / like a faint line in the center of our foreheads . . ."   I read that line and I felt it coming on, unstoppable: the pounding heart, the shaking hands, the tight, high voice that meant my carefully constructed veneer of dignity was about to crack.  But this wasn't happening because I was afraid.  This was happening because I began to feel overwhelmed by the power of something true. I like to call what I was feeling the spirit, but whatever you choose to call it, we all know what it is: God (the Universe, Your Best Inner Self) tapping you on the shoulder and telling you to pay attention.  And I don't know about you, but when I feel that feeling, I can't help it. I cry.

My voice trembled as I continued to read, my face flushed with the humiliation of it all (there's no crying in grad school!). Tears rolled down my face as I spoke the final few lines:

. . . when we speak we are afraid
our words will not be heard
nor welcomed
but when we are silent
we are still afraid.


So it is better to speak
remembering
we were never meant to survive.


As I read in that cramped, drafty classroom, embarrassed and surrounded by strangers, the spirit almost knocked me over with its power: You, young lady, it was saying, need to speak. It's not going to be easy or even fun, it's not always going to be pretty, and you're going to be scared to death half the time. But you still need to do it.

I realized then and know now that the reason God wanted me to speak wasn't because he had grand plans for me to become a rich and famous author. No, God wanted me to speak for the same reason that I believe he wants all of us to speak, in whatever way that "speaking" expresses itself in our lives: because our world needs truth, and honesty, and beauty, and when human beings speak and other human beings listen, we all develop charity.  And God is a big fan of charity.

For the past five or six years I've been involved in helping Mormons speak through the medium of literature as an editor and creative writing teacher. I've also tried to do a little writing myself. In that time, it's become very clear to me that "Mormon literature" is a misunderstood genre -- misunderstood by those inside and outside the religion. Many people think all Mormon fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction is being produced for the purpose of either converting non-Mormons or convincing those who are already LDS that because they’re Mormon, their lives will have the sparkly, pastel look and feel of a Thomas Kinkade painting.  While such Mormon writing definitely exists, and I'll even concede that it does have its place -- sometimes we'd all like to escape into a sparkly, pastel world, wouldn't we? -- it isn't necessarily "literature," and it isn't the type of writing I've been trying to promote. 

The type of writing I'm most interested in is committed to exploring truth and beauty (with the paradoxical understanding that truth does not always equal certainty, and beauty isn't always pretty). Writers who are interested in tackling truth or beauty -- or preferably, both -- have their work cut out for them, because such writing is really, really hard to do. The beauty part is hard because beautiful writing entails mastery of the craft, and such mastery is exhausting and time consuming. The truth part is difficult, too, because it entails exposing your inner self, and exposing your inner self is both scary and risky.

In my opinion, it can be particularly challenging for Mormons to write such literature, because doing so requires the writer to go for a good long walk down a murky, mossy, ill-lit internal path.  In one of my favorite books on writing, Bird by Bird, Anne Lamott says, "You can't get to truth by sitting in a field smiling beatifically, avoiding your anger and damage and grief. You anger and damage and grief are the way to the truth. We don't have much truth to express unless we have gone into these rooms and closets and woods and abysses that we were told not to go into."  This doesn't mean that all good literature must by definition be dark, or that there's no such thing as a happy ending.  But writing truthfully does require a willingness to acknowledge that there is, in fact, "opposition in all things."  This is scary for all of us to do, but Mormons, in general, can be especially leery of poking around in the abyss.

Fortunately, I do know many Mormon writers who are willing to take those longs walks down the path. And they are nice Mormons, generally happy Mormons (just because you poke around in the abyss doesn't mean you have to set up camp down there), church-going, faith-seeking, put-your-shoulder-to-the-wheel Mormons who also take the rigorous requirements of art-making seriously. Writers like Jack Harrell, Kathryn Lynard Soper, Stephen Carter, and Todd Robert Peterson write about Mormon life with artistry, honesty, and care.  Such writers can also be found in the pages of magazines like Irreantum and Segullah, and in the anthology of short stories by twenty-eight LDS authors I recently edited, Dispensation: Latter-Day Fiction. 

And many of these writers are blogging, too. Sometimes I think blogging can be the most terrifying genre, since not only are you exposing your personal life to scrutiny, but that scrutiny sometimes winds up in the comments section when "anon this time!" feels moved upon to declare that you 1. need a haircut and 2. are going to Hell. Despite this, bloggers by the thousands are choosing to speak, and the best of them, like Courtney (who may not delete this compliment!), are brave and vulnerable and real. Which is why we love them. Well, all of us except "anon this time!," but she's been having a hard few months, so we'll give her a pass.

Writing is scary and writing is hard, with or without anonymous commenting, but I am forever grateful to those who have the courage and fortitude to do it well, because we all need each other’s stories.  This quote by the author Richard Russo in the 2007 edition of The Best American Short Stories explains one of the reasons why: 

“The study of literature has had what I believe to be a salutary effect on my own character, making me less self-conscious and vain, more empathic and imaginative, maybe even kinder. Perhaps it’s an oversimplification, but as I’ve gotten older I’ve come to wonder if maybe this is what reading all those great books is really for — to engender and promote charity. Sure, literature entertains and instructs, but to what end, if not compassion?”
 
Good essays, good novels, good poems, good blog posts: they're necessary in this world.  I believe God wants us to write them and to read them, to speak and to listen, because by doing so, we learn how to love each other better. And that, I’m quite sure, is the work God put us all here to do.




Angela Hallstrom (www.angelahallstrom.com) lives in Minnesota with her husband and four kids. She's the author of the novel Bound on Earth, editor of the anthology Dispensation: Latter-Day Fiction, and serves on the editorial boards of Irreantum and Segullah.  

PoTW: I don't know. I just like it.

Vlog: Best Blogging Week Ever Jan. 31 to Feb. 4

Yikes. This one? Not our best. But there is a special guest and I suppose that carries it a little.

A little.

Plus, a treat for our friends in Norway!

And just by way of warning, there is cleavage (at least it's not in 3D).

Visit me on facebook.
Or twitter.
Or email, cjanemail @ gmail .com
Wanna talk advertising? email Chup at christopherbeans @ gmail .com

Popularity Contest

Chup here-

Have you ever made a friend...and at first you're just friends and it's great.

And then you slowly realize how their cool exceeds your cool?

And then you start to obsess a little?

And then you don't tell anyone how cool they are because then that person would want to be friends with them and boy, one thing we do NOT need is competition.

You want to keep them alllll to yourself. Happy, safe, neurotic. Fine.

Except for Wendy and Tyler.


image: Blue Lily Photo

Wendy and Tyler are super cool. They dress well. They eat well. Wendy and Tyler's children are attractive AND well-behaved. Wendy and Tyler are amazing photographers. Wendy and Tyler smell good. Wendy and Tyler are famous.

Wendy and Tyler are Blue Lily.

Heard of them?

See what I mean?

Which is why I can't keep them for myself.

We've been friends for awhile, and I always thought they were fun and funny and wished they lived closer. And I loved the pictures they took of my family, so when the opportunity came up to attend one of their photography workshops, in San Diego, on the beach...I packed my bag.

Impending root canal be damned.

So, I had to share them with 11 others for the weekend. That's ok.

I knew them first.

Petty jealousy aside, it was pretty awesome.

Jump to Dear C. Jane for my review, my photos and my sentimentality.

- Chup out

Janna Dean, Healthy Body Image for our Children

For several years (and many different scale weights) I've been seeking to heal myself of body image discrepancies. I have found a higher source in my friend and neighbor Janna Dean. Her thoughts are radically different from Yahoo's Front Page news sources on Losing Weight and Being Healthy. But in listening to her ideas I have come a long way. Janna will be writing monthly posts for me this year, we hope to help others who might have the same challenges. Enjoy!  -C. Jane
 
 

Since the last post showing the dieting battle many of us feel trapped in (when diets don’t even work) I have considered several possible topics for today.  There are so many important, interrelated facets to this issue. . .  Do I talk about the obesity scare?  Do I write about the destructiveness of our media?  Or how weight and food have become, strangely, not just about nutrition and health, but about one’s morality? Or perhaps I should discuss the fat prejudice among our culture?  And then I knew.

This week I sat in a conference listening to a presentation about body image that revealed one of the most horrifying statistics I’ve heard on the subject.  The presenter stated that “14% of 5-year-old girls diet.”  I was stunned.  I am stunned.  I know our culture is unrealistic in its expectations—impossible even.  I know we have an “obesity epidemic” on our hands.  I know we have serious distortions about what it means to be healthy. . . . But dieting at 5 years old?! 

For a long moment I was unable to focus on the presentation and instead thought of my own wonderful, brave, mischievous, innocent little 4-year-old daughter (turning 5 this April).  I felt saddened by the world she is exposed to despite my attempts to shelter her.   And then my thoughts turned to her twin brother who is similarly victimized by our world (as is his 17-year-old cousin who has indeed lost himself and his dreams to the world of body building and supplements).

5-year-olds are not afraid of being “fat” because of health concerns; they are afraid of being fat because they have already learned that this word is not only a description of one’s body but one’s character and worth.  This is not something they intuitively believe—they learn it through observation of the media, peers, and adults who are supposed to protect them.

Take for instance the research that shows children (and adults) would rather lose an arm than be fat.  And studies that show young girls are more afraid of being fat than they are of nuclear war, cancer, or losing both parents.  These children are growing up to become young women who would rather be run over by a truck than be extremely fat and who are reporting they would rather be mean or stupid than fat.  

42% of American 1^st to 3^rd grade girls surveyed want to be thinner than they are.  (6 to 8 years old!) And one half of 9 to 10-year-old girls feel better about themselves if they are on a diet.

50% of 9-year-old girls diet.

80% of 10-year-old girls diet.

90% of high school girls diet regularly—while only 20% of them have BMI’s that might be viewed as concerning. 

These are not girls who “need” to diet—remember, diets don’t even work.  These are kids who have learned to be so afraid of being fat that being a normal or average weight isn’t even acceptable anymore.  We wonder how this has happened to our children but fail to recognize we expect the same impossible standards for ourselves.

We have become so lost in the body-obsessed world that we are now leading our children down the same path of discouragement, depression, and self-loathing we are following while teaching them it is the way to happiness and love!  We are so lost that we don’t recognize what is wrong with measuring our worth by the wrong scale.  We don’t recognize how we make continual moral judgments about others based on their body shape.  We don’t recognize the destructiveness of the messages we send when we have or pay for our children to have breast implants, tummy tucks, or plastic surgery.  We fail to question the belief that we are worth more if we are smaller. 

I understand that more Americans are obese than ever before.  I understand that health risks are associated with obesity.  But I do not believe continued emphasis on weight loss and dieting is the answer.  There is a direct correlation between the amount of dieting one does and the amount of depression one experiences.  Allowing disparaging remarks about your body or your children’s bodies is harmful.  Children who are teased by peers are 36% more likely to consider suicide than their counterpart and children who are teased by peers and parents are 51% more likely to consider suicide. 

Children are fed so full of this glamour and dieting propaganda that they need our help to sort through it. 

I cannot nor should I keep my children in a bubble.  I cannot keep them from the messages that bombard them.  But I can teach them to think critically.  I can arm them with truth.  I can model self acceptance and I can create a safe haven—a place where they can talk and be heard, a place where they can question, scrutinize and still find acceptance.    

You can too.

1. Encourage balanced eating of all types of foods in moderation; encourage eating in response to body hunger. 
2. Get active as a family (not to lose weight but to use and enjoy your body—moderate exercise increases self-esteem and helps to lift depression).
3. Speak up when you hear family members making comments about a person’s body shape or weight—don’t allow this kind of talk in your home (even from grandparents).
4. Encourage and model critical thinking of messages we are exposed to.
5. Do not dismiss comments from your children about their bodies.  Allow them to talk about it; ask questions; have conversations.  Simply telling someone they “look great” or “don’t need to lose weight” will not change how they feel about themselves.  But it will encourage them to stop talking to you about it.   
6. Examine and if necessary, modify the appearance expectations you have about your own child. 
7. Work toward openly loving and accepting your own body.  In doing this, you will give your children permission to do the same.  On the other hand, if you refuse to accept your own body, your children will receive the message that they must look a certain way to be loveable.  

Here's something to think about as well:
 "You can't control or dictate the quantity of food your child eats, and you shouldn't try. You also can't control or dictate the kind of body your child develops, and you shouldn't try. What you can do, and it is a great deal, is set things up for your child so she, herself, can regulate her food intake as well as possible, and so she can develop a healthy body that is constitutionally right for her."   Child of Mine: Feeding with Love and Good Sense by Ellyn Satter




Janna Dean LCSW is a practicing therapist specializing in treating eating disorders and other addictions. She is the mother of two four-year-olds, loves camping and making cookies for her neighbors. Her neighbors really appreciate it. Cause they are good cookies.

Ode to Groundhog Day & the Usual

Six more weeks of winter?
Doesn't matter to me, everyday is Groundhog Day.
At least I felt that a year ago,
when I wrote this.

February!

photo by Jed Wells

These days I wear muu-muus. I slouch around my house barefoot with wild hair and an overuse of chapstick. I propel myself into housework, inviting the gorgeous little people at my feet to join. They don't help much. There is always music, always humming of some machine helping me with my effort. These days I organize closets or vacuum the stairs or throw out wilting food in the fridge.

Yesterday morning The Chief and I made pancakes. He stirred, I cracked the eggs. When our cakes were round and golden we sat at the table where I let him douse his stack with syrup like a fireman's hose to a flame. Ever stuffed her cheeks with clementines and sticky pancake residue. Most of it ended up three feet below--a buffet for later, an unsanitary reward for the proficient house crawler.

Lately we've been staying inside until the sun is the warmest in the sky. It is then we wrap our bodies in warm layers and venture out for a walk in the neighborhood. But if we aren't speedy, or too careful about engaging passerby neighbors, we find ourselves racing the sun down the street. The Chief signals the warning,

"Cooooooooldy."

When the western horizon's pinks and blues turn into greens and dark we are home again making noodles and dancing off residual energy in the front room. We hop in the bath and scrub little parts clean. We warm up nightly bottles and sippies. Prayers, scripture reading, lights out.

This is my ode to February. A month of staying inside, of sun worship at the window, of muu-muu wearing and concentrated house cleaning. A celebration of stability, lovers and home.