8/60 Love, Faith, and Growing Up: Finding an Angle of Repose (and I finished Educated . . . so . . .this is basically a novel . . .reading glasses might be required)

I know things come easily to people. I've seen it in my own children.  Reading for example:  Some children you point to letters, say their sounds, and they almost immediately know how to read.  Others, it's honestly like banging your head against the wall.  They simply don't get it.  Reading makes zero sense to them and no matter which way you teach it, they can't figure out how to make all the sounds turn into words.  It just doesn't click.  And then, one day, one year, everything falls into place and clicks and they literally know how to read overnight. More often than not, they start devouring books and you wish a little that they never learned because that's all they are doing (but not really, because . . . oh the stress of having a non reader . . . blah).  Everyone has their own time table for waking up and learning things.

Reading did not come naturally to me. I knew what the sounds made but putting them together seemed so wrong.  These squiggles on the pages, they didn't form into words like they seem to for everyone else.  To me, the were alway separate sounds that required great effort to slowly sound my way through.  My mother, my teacher, would literally put her head down on the table in frustration.  I felt horrible about myself.  I hated having to read out loud anywhere--especially at church (the only place I was asked to read).  I could not begin to sound out such unfamiliar wards that were found in scriptures.  They would whisper about me, the children around me, how I was homeschooled and that's why I couldn't read.  And maybe, probably, I was just born stupid. I wondered if they were right.  My mother had seven other children to worry about and I ran away every time she tried to work with me, so she let me be.  Until I was 10 years old, I literally couldn't read.  

Oh, look, . . . it's 10 year old illiterate me . . . 

I lived in fear of being asked to read.  

I felt like a freak. 

I was less and I knew it.

My mother told me I may never read (she came from a place of love, I know.  And really I would not read so . . . ) and that was ok.  There was a world out there where I could thrive.

This all changed the fall of my fifth grade here.  My sister told me about a book she loved so much called The Blue Sword by Robin McKinley.  She told me about it and I wanted so badly to read it, I literally felt like crying.  

I went to my mother and said, Mom, will you take me to the library?  I want to get a book out.  

And my mother, bless her, literally ran to the car to take me.  I checked the book out, thick and full of all sorts of big words.  

My mother saw the book and blinked at me.  Are you sure you want to read that book as your first book?  It's very long and thick.

Yes.  Mom, I will read this book.

I'm pretty sure she was making mental bets in her head about the odds of me finish it . . . I'm pretty sure the odds were 100 to 1 (or maybe way more).

She should have bet on me, because I totally read it.  Every single page.

Not only that, but I somehow managed to learn how to read in those three weeks of reading.  It was my click moment and then, well, it began my wild passion for reading.  As par the course for me, I didn't really go back to Children's books.  I went straight to Judy Bloom and Margaret Mahy and Diana Wynne Jones and then to Ayn Rand and Thomas Hardy.  Jane Eyre literally kept me up all night.  I feel lost without a book to read.  Words, as one of my graduate English professors said, are the building blocks of writing and to be a writer, you must love them.  And I do, because I know how stinking hard it was to learn this language of words.

This is how faith and religion and love is for me.  None have come naturally to me.  

I was born a skeptic and doubter.  If I could not see it or feel it, it was not real.  I would listen to my parents and church teachers talk about things like the "spirit" and feeling "burning" or "knowing" things and I never felt any of it.  In fact, to be honest, I HATED church.  When I'd wake up and realize it was Sunday, I would literally moan in my bed and yell at my mom that I wasn't going.  Somehow she always go me into the car and I would be pretty much horrid all three hours.  I can so clearly see her sitting on the pew, still and silent, holding it together barely as we hit each other, yelled, and were in every single way the type of children everyone prayed wouldn't show up on Sunday so they could finally hear what was being said.  I think the word my mother would use may have been mortified on how she felt every single week.  But she kept bringing us.  Bless her good heart.

This went on through my entire childhood.  Hellion, I think was my nick name from my primary and sharing time teachers and as an adolescent and teenager, rebellious and irreverent may have been thrown my way.  I was.  I was all those things.  I couldn't take it when teachers told me how I should feel. I was in my own skin and the only one would could say for sure what and if I was feeling anything, thank you very much.  Nine times out of ten, I wasn't feeling anything but hungry, bored and caged.  Spirituality was about suffering and anguish and hardness.  I wanted to want it, but for reals, it seemed like a journey into hell.  Joy?  Where was this said Joy everyone was talking about?  I couldn't see it anywhere.

There was this moment, one of my teachers (who, incidentally, I actually loved and love to this day) who did theis attention getting activity where she drew a stick figure of a young woman on a wooden board.  She pulled out a hammer and nails and went to town nailing in these nails all over the stick figure like some mad voodoo ceremony.  And it worked, she had everyone's attention.  Then she pulled out the nails dramatically.  

Look, she said to all of us, see these holes . . . that's what happens when you sin, you can be forgiven, but you'll always have scars and holes in your life.

You could hear a pin drop.  We were all horrified.

And then, irreverent, rebellious me, who came from my parents who read scriptures and talked about them like most people talk about the Bachelor.  I knew those stories and words by heart and the scripture in Isaiah came to me, "Though their sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow."  It's one of my favorite scriptures and had been most of my life.  The imagery . . . feeling that there is nothing too dark, or wrong with you, that can't be fixed and made right.  I believed that.  I didn't know much about anything else, but I knew that inside of all of us, there are always new beginnings possible.  

So, I told her and everyone in my class that what just happened to that sweet damaged stick lady was wrong.  God would never do that to us.  It made no sense.  How could he promise that he'd make us pure as snow?  There's no, there will be a few drops of red left in that scripture.  No, it clearly said, WHITE AS SNOW.  That means there was no nail holes left.  So . . .   

Oh, the drama I created.  I think I might have been sent out of the class to go talk to the Bishop . . . who happened to be my dad.  Bless his heart.  I'm telling you, people, how my parents survived me, I have no idea.  Luckily, my dad, he and are are way too much alike (sometimes this is a bad thing, but that day, it was a good thing).  I told him what happened and my response and he, and I'll always remember this, said, Mary, you are totally right.  There is nothing we can ever do that will make God stop loving us.  And there is no sin that isn't forgivable . . . (and then we may have talked about murder and incest and all sort of stuff that could cause that forgiveness to be hard to get . . . but I was back to thinking about boys and kisses so I don't really remember it--see? horrible child).

Another time, when we were at the Hill Cumorah Pageant in upstate New York where Joseph Smith went to the Sacred Grove and had his vision that started the whole religion, I had another great moment.  We spent the week learning our parts (actually one of the most fun things i did in my life . . . like THE BEST) and running around wild and crazy with kids our ages.  The second week, when things were calmer, they'd let us go to the Sacred Grove and have our own spiritual experience.  Usually, that meant my best friend (who I only saw at Pageant) and I would run around and try to find the boys we had crushes on and we'd go find the soda machines and flirt until it was time to go (it was literally my favorite activity of the summer . . . three hours to be with the boys we like and no adults--again, horrible child).  But this year, Amy didn't come or she wasn't in my group and for the first time, I thought, well, maybe I should figure this stuff out for myself.

Oh, look . . . it's Amy and me!  And I'll bet we are skipping Study Group looking for boys who make us "Spontaneously Combust"--horrible horrible delightful us

The leaders took a few minutes to read us a few scriptures from The Book of Mormon and then sent us on our way to have our own religious experience.  As par for the course, the place I found to "pray" was strangely enough in the dirt behind the bathrooms where crows were hopping around eating garbage (why? why didn't I move?  I'm telling you, I was not the brightest bulb in the bunch).  I was hot, tired, my knees hurt from the rocks and I couldn't stop wondering which boy I liked better, John or Tyler.  I decided, well, let me just have one quick prayer and then I'm heading to the bus and sit in the shade.  

For the first time, I think I really did open my mind to all this religious stuff.  I let God know that I had serious doubts about Joseph Smith, I believed he saw God and Jesus, but the rest, I had a lot of trouble with the whole church history stuff (and I'm going to remind you, I knew what I was talking about.  My home growing up, this was our world.  We read and talked about everything.  There were no wrong questions--they may not have liked them--and we figured stuff out together) and I did not like a bit of all that polygamy stuff.  I just didn't know . . .

And I waited.

And waited.

The crow cawed literally next to my face and I jumped up and ran out of the hot sun and owchy rocks on my knees.

And got my answer.  

I know, seriously, I am twisted and everything happens opposite of how it's supposed to with me.  But in that moment when I was running for the shade, laughing at me and praying the crow didn't go all Birds on me, I felt God laughing with me.  I felt the juxtaposition of this request for a divine answer and getting a crow almost attacking me.  

It doesn't really matter, does it, God, I thought  as I ran.  It's all crazy town.  We are all trying to make sense of things that none of us understand, but inside, when I think about You existing, it feels right.  When I read and read these books of yours, I'm calmer, more patient and I see people around me a little better.  The details, the people, the facts, they are all skewed anyways, aren't they?  Ok, I'll keep doing this and hopefully, You'll send me some help now and then, Ok?

And I swear to you, I heard an Ok . . . or it may have been the crow.  Who knows.  

But that's where I started.  And with fear and trembling and trepidation, I skeptically learned to hear how God talks to me.  It's not how He (or she or it . . . how ever you see him, her, it) to you or anyone else.  It's how He talks to me.  Mostly, I think, He's like, Girl, you got this.  I trust you.  I made you, so I know how strong and resilient you are.  You want to see me and know me?  Go get out there and lift those broken hurt hearts.  You'll see me.  Listen to the kind eyes and hearts around you, they're speaking my words.  And most of all, fill that heart I made with Love.  That's all I ask.  Oh, and there isn't one right way to do anything.  All of us are perfect but we go about learning a different way.  It's ok. It clicks differently and at a different time for everyone.  Be patient.  Be kind.  I got you.

That's what He says to me.  And I think all of us hear probably basically the same thing when we think about it.

I've found in this religious path I've chosen, so much peace and comfort and hope I can't even tell you.  It's been a long road.  I've had and will continue to have serious doubts and questions and fears, but then again, I have those about everything in my life.  It's called living.  We cannot grow or learn anything if we don't question and push for more.  Most of all, I've learned to live with dichotomy.  There can be great men, who have done wrong things, and still be good men . . . and the same with women.  

My favorite story of the Bible is when there are men stoning the adulterous woman.  Jesus walks up to them and begins to write things on the ground (I'm going with little secret sins in those mens hearts), he looks up and says, "You . . . you without sin . . . YOU cast the first stone."  

They all drop their stones and one by one leave.  

This story, it's beautiful in two ways to me.  First, it reminds me, every time I am ready to stone (cast a pretty harsh judgement) someone in my mind, that I need to take a pretty close look at my own life before I go doing anything extreme.  EVERY.  SINGLE.  TIME I find the stone of my judgement slipping from my fingers.  And second, that Jesus, he loved that beautiful sinner.  He stopped from his journey or teaching or maybe even eating to save her.  Even at our worst, I think he does that for me.  I'm still worth love, knowing, and having hope for a good future.  Hope.  He gave her and through her, me, hope that there can be new beginnings despite my past.

That how I work through my doubts and questions and concerns about this religion I've chosen.  When I get caught up in the judgement and doubt, I remember this story and think, how can I judge anyone when I myself am so far from sinless?  If my life were written out and examined from all angles, how would I come out?

One word (only I'll use a nicer word): BAD.

So I need to give a little space and forgiveness and charity.

It's not easy for me.  I make a choice every day to believe and as I make that choice to trust and have that great and illusive thing called faith.  You can't touch it. You can't quantify it.  You can't prove it.  You can only let go and let it fill up all the spaces of doubt.

It's like love.  I think every human being in existence wants a way to measure love and figure out how love looks or what it is or how to catch it or train it or . . . in any way learn to control it.  But it's impossible. You can't.  Honestly, I think it's like a humming bird (my favorite bird EVER), you can get your sugar water or a flower or bloom filled with sugar and just hope it comes by.  And sometimes, it only comes for one second at a time.  You can't make it stay or stop ( I think it may die if it stays still for too long . . .), it has to have freedom to move around.  You could never cage it.  You just get to enjoy it when it's there.  Maybe this is a horrible comparison . . . it sounds like I'm all about swinging or "open" relationships (and if that floats your boat . . . OK for you).  Oh heavens, I'm horrible at this.

What I'm trying to say . . . I think . . . is that love isn't something you can force or cage, it's a gift.  A precious marvelous gift that literally changes your life and your heart.

This summer, my sister asked me if I had a great regret of my life.

I thought about it for a long time as we drove into Jackson Hole, the mountains and green planes flowing past us.

Yes, I told her.  I do.

What is it? she asked.

And here is my open shame I'm sharing with all of you . . . 

I regret, I told her, that I didn't love John like he deserves to be loved sooner.  I regret that I put so many conditions and stipulations on my love.  I withheld my forgiveness.  I judged him.  I looked at him for what he wasn't often instead fo all the amazing things he is.  I made our marriage hard for years.  I chose that.  When I could have just embraced him just how he was in all his beautiful imperfections.  

Twenty-three years of marriage, and I'm just beginning to understand how lucky I am to have this man in my life.  

I am so glad he has stuck with me. 

He's given me endless years of grace and forgiveness.  He knows my ugly, he knows my crazy, he knows my manic and he hasn't run away (bless his heart).  Instead, he's held me when I thought I'd break into a million pieces.  He's held me when we lost the hope of babies when I couldn't stop shaking. He's breathed hope into my panic, manic mind.  He still kisses me and tells me that I'm beautiful when the mirror is telling a whole different story.  He never lets a day go by that he doesn't thank me for taking such good care of him and the children. 

Of course he's not perfect. He's sometimes bat crap crazy and we all just have to hold on while he storms around.  But who isn't?  Really?  Who can cast that first stone?  Not me.  NOT ME.

I'm not living that way anymore.  I'm giving him my whole fluttery mad capped heart.  Yes, he's crazy for wanting it, but it's his.  There are no rules, no parameters, no conditions.  And i know, I might not get that open heart back.  I'm giving this without asking for anything back.  It is enough, I have finally realized, just to be allowed to love.

And what freedom I feel.  I don't worry or count if it's fair or not or if I should be mad or offended or hurt.  I just am what I am and then decide right away I'm letting it go.  I'm choosing love.  I'm choosing grace.  (I'm not saying that you should let any abuse--mental or physical happen--I still stand my ground and state--loudly sometimes--my view).  I'm choosing for my own self to not hold on to anything, to let it all go.  I believe in new beginnings.  I believe in forgiveness and love trumping everything.  It is a gift I give John and everyone I'm with, but it's also, most of all, a gift I give myself.  

And that brings me to Educated.  Oh, people, Tara has walked a long and lonely road. She is so brave to write her story and expose all her hurt and anger and fear and triumph.  My hope for her, after I finished her last page, is that some day, some how, she will give herself the gift of forgiving her family, her God, and herself for the wrongs she was dealt.  I think it might take a minute or two.  Those were some big crap things that happened to her.  And if she never gets there, well, I don't blame her.  She lost her family, her faith, and her community.  And she's not only survived but thrived.  I am so glad for her.  I am proud of her.

These things, love, faith and accepting that our parents and siblings and leaders are far, far from perfect, are hard to trust and understand.  Sometimes they shake us to the core and when we are betrayed or feel betrayed by love or people or religions or leaders, we doubt there is anything left to believe in. We feel adrift and bitter.  Our hurt and doubt and fears, they grind us right down to nothing.  

But we are all Phoenix . . . we can all rise from the ashes.  

Don't give up.  You will learn to read or trust or love.  

Where there is breath, there is hope.  

Have faith.  Have hope.  

Trust in the intangible.  

Hands will catch you.  You are not alone.  

And for reals, if horrible child, doubting fearful, angry, resentful me could find forgiveness, love, and faith, you're 150% sure of find it. I promise!