Too Many Secrets

I love Sneakers with Robert Redford. Have you seen it? Remember when the company name
ends up spelling out in Scrabble tiles "Too Many Secrets?" It's smart and suspenseful - and of course the good guys win! There's the big heist. And for a little terror? Yeah. Whistler the blind guy driving the truck; oh, and a blind date goes oh-so wrong ending with the bad-bad guy shooting to kill...

Okay, you might've had to be there. By today's standards it's tame, but still my fave.

This week I'm reading the first book in Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn fantasy trilogy - The Final Empire. It too has Too Many Secrets... Dan and Brad and Scott have carried on about this guy and this book and the other two The Well of Ascension and The Hero of Ages for weeks now. And have finished the trilogy. Scott's even started Book One again on audio book while he drives.

Fantasy. I wonder as I open to the prologue what...? Do I really want to read this? On the heels of my feel-good Mitford series? I used to read fantasy ages - absolutely years -  ago when I was twenty-something, and I guess that compared to this today is tame, urbane even. The boys grin when they talk about Mistborn saying it's good; good, and watch out mama, there's action in it. Well, yeah! Lord Tresting and his house is annihilated by the end of the chapter and peasants are running for their lives.

I Googled (link) and found what Sanderson says about his book.

I came into this book with two big ideas for the plot. The first was that of a heist story, like SNEAKERS or OCEAN'S ELEVEN involving a gang of gentlemen thieves who each had a distinctive magic power. I wanted to tell the story of how their different magics and abilities worked together for them to pull an incredible caper.

The second idea was to write a story about a world where the good guys lost. I wanted to take the standard fantasy story I'd read a dozen times—that of a young peasant hero who went on a quest to defeat a Dark Lord—and turn it on its head. What if the Dark Lord won? What if, in the final climactic moments, he killed the hero and took over the world?

Wow. I have no idea what's going to happen really...



I may have to post later that, indeed, this book is too high-powered for me. I'm 119 pages in, four or five chapters, and am intrigued by the capers and magics and am loving my gentlemen thieves and their leader... I so don't want the hero to die. So far he can't: he's the Scarlet Pimpernel isn't he. Scott grins. Invincible like that, and swashbuckling and high flying, Errol Flynn. Brother Robin Hood. He wouldn't go down. Not without a fight for sure and - ouch - in this genre it's what I'm leery of. But I'm in for a coupl'a more chapters.

Come, follow me

Isn't this a beautiful picture! Recognizable as the Bountiful Utah LDS Temple . . .  Kent and I have been set apart as workers in this temple and have worked now two days in two weeks. Or, I have; Kent missed last week being out of town and will start back up this week.

As workers we arrive at the temple one day a week early to prepare for a training- and prayer-meeting, then work a five-hour shift during which we greet and aid members of the church entering to worship. For members who come, worship and service in the LDS temple is a reverent and uplifting time. I want to write rich with promise! It is, though that sounds high. You come, learn of Jesus Christ, commit to live His ways and return home happy.

HOLINESS TO THE LORD is the inscription on every Latter-day Saint temple, each building dedicated to Jesus Christ and his saving work. Christ served when he was on Earth. His ministry was love, his audience the individual - his invitation was Come, follow me. I believe what Christ has spoken in the scriptures concerning the purpose of mortal life and the possibility of Eternal life with Him and the Father, so it is particularly joyful to enter this House of the Lord - this holy place - every week, there to feel close to Him and serve as He did.

Coming together

Mom's and Dad's place is coming together. They're in. They had a slew of people visit yesterday, us included though we were fourth in the queue. Friends who'd volunteered to bring Dad's office chair from the house and stay please to hang bedside lamps and a clock; Marcia and Brent and Katy (and Tyler maybe?) and their three, including two month-old Annie who we haven't seen yet except on Katy's blog and who must've popped over for a visit before Dad's sister and her husband arrived from an hour away. Then us. We ourselves trucked in a floor lamp for the living room and small storage unit with drawers for mom's closet. A resident resting on the front porch on the glider who always is resting on the front porch on the glider when I come - and doubtless she's a cousin as Mom is informing me how many here have their roots back on Dad's side of our family; what? - shouted, "Who are you still moving stuff in here for?"

3:30 in the afternoon and within an hour of them needing to wash up and go down to dinner, Dad offered Kent a tour of the place. Never moved from his chair as Kent stepped around the 538 square feet with all good things to say. The floor lamp was put in its place between the two recliners and the swivel arm positioned. The shade's yellowing, is on the ratty side, and I patted my purse and said I have a piece of paper folded inside with the measurements listed top-to-bottom and side-to-side of this lamp shade, and have been looking for a new one. Dad smiled and said, "Lowe's."

Like the floor lamp, I was put in my place - for talking loud. At mom's home up by us I've learned through the years to unload the dishwasher without clanking the china and glass on the granite - too, too noisy - or rattling the silverware; I handle them softly, oh so, in that home. I'll be learning the same trick with my voice inside these thin walls. Think whisper and all will be happy, most especially the neighbors. Says my father. Was it to Sarah when she was visiting here in April that Mom mentioned talk softly and laugh inwardly? Yes... and Sarah aced it then and will do fine in this place in a month when she's here.

They're doing well. Mom can get turned around in the new place but it's little different here than it's been at home for a while. Dad watches out for them both. They went downstairs one day to view the scheduled entertainment, which turned out to be spectacular. A guy who sings and plays piano, all Broadway! They told me about it and then Dad said they'll be attending again in a month when the entertainer comes back. Mom sat up in her chair. "He's coming again?" she asked, eyes sparkling, staring at Dad. She hadn't known, or had forgotten.

It's been a week

"What day is it?"
"It's today," squeaked Piglet.
"My favorite day," said Pooh.
— A.A. Milne

 

A Week Ago:

→ Kent left for Idaho for two days to visit his parents, then came home for a day then flew to Georgia to work three days. He worked two actually and went to the Atlanta Botanical gardens and to Mark and Valerie's yesterday. Spent the night and will be at the Atlanta temple today and visiting friends who we worked with there. Home tonight.

→ I did my morning walk finishing by catapulting down a hill watching a woman ahead of me probably a tenth of a mile walking as fast. I followed thinking, hm, who is that? (It's getting where I think I need to know all the ladies in the ward to do a good job in my calling . . .) Who is she? I saw only the back of her; she got to the bottom and turned the corner and it was Marcia! My sister home from New Zealand for six weeks. (I knew she was getting in late the night before; she lives in the building next to me and I'd hoped we could walk together some mornings but had no clue she'd be up early this morning.) Good grief! I shouted and ran and she turned and we grabbed each other in a hug. How we'd gotten on the same street without knowing the other was out walking is a weird story but we walked home together talking a mile a minute.

→ Dad received a phone call from an assisted living center he's been looking into for him and mom (if they should need that), and from there has

explored

talked and thought about

decided on

signed up for 

and 

fairly suddenly pushed through 

a move to an apartment in this place that has come available. Thank goodness Marcia and Brent are in town while Kent hasn't been. It's taken sweat equity from every one of us including Laura and Sharm and their kids to make mom's and dad's new place a snug home. Little it is; just right - they'll eat in a dining room and not have to prepare or cook or clean up after meals. Little it is and just right, as they were using only a couple of rooms in their home up here anyway. It's independent living there, they come and go as they please.

→ Jenny's friend Robert arrived. She likes him and he likes her. He's stayed six days, part of the time visiting with me. He invited me to dinner with him and Jenny one night, and enjoyed a meal and Family Home Evening on Monday with Dan and Amy and the kids over; him and Jen lounged on the furniture with me occasionally watching tv or talking. He prepared omelets in my kitchen two mornings! There were flowers for Jenny every, every day - so the kitchen island has become riot of color. Just yesterday we hung the first dozen roses upside down to fully dry and I watered and dead-headed the hot pink cyclamen. I keep sticking my finger in the orchid's soil to test for moisture and have rearranged and refreshed for Jenny two vases of wildflowers. The roses in the last vase are just now dropping their heads.

Irises

It's late for the irises to be blooming but now they're everywhere!

We're havin' a party!

For Andrew, who's four.

His mom does the best cakes - this year, Woody.

Jen, Dan, Joseph (left) and the birthday boy.

Scott kind of growls when I point the camera. But he's a nice guy.

Andrew's mom, Amy. 

Joseph launches himself up tree in the backyard . . .

  . . . and says, "Nana, watch me!" through the branches.

There were about twenty-seven pictures like this of Andrew opening presents. 

Out to play with his new glove. Dad pitches and Drew runs after the ball in the garden where it pretty much lands ('stead of in his glove) and lobs it back. Winds up and throws sideways!

Cake!

Reunion

Saturday last we scooted to Logan for a mini-reunion with Kent's parents and one of Kent's brothers, and that brother's children and grands. Kent and I are climbing the Family Tree I guess into the upper branches now; getting up there in age. It's true our four parents are still living so we're not that old, but look, we've got brothers' and sisters' and in-laws' childrens' children who we don't know.

Yesterday we drove with mom and dad to Santaquin for Birch Larsen's funeral. Another Saturday, another reunion. This morning my head's whirling over that event and the people we saw. I posted last week about being with . . . "these are moments when I know that love - family - is just wanting to be with you" . . . surely the kingdom of God is big enough to hold us all and surely our memory and heart will not each be peanut-size as mine is on Earth, subject to serious forgetfulness over time; but big as a barn with high rafters to garner all the memories and love we'll share in that place. I think these thoughts on purpose as yesterday felt so like heaven might be, but without the headache from smiling and bawling and the overfull, palpitating heart.

At the funeral the Larsen kids grownups who as children were my playmates spoke and/or prayed, pouring themselves out. A former missionary serving under Birch when he was Mission President in Spain spoke; the daughter of one of three men baptized in Brazil by young Elder Larsen when he was on his own mission told what has become of her family and one of the others through the years. Birch was honored for these early missionary efforts which clearly affected a whole nation as one of the men he baptized became the first Stake President in the first stake in Brazil; not to mention the changes that came after a time to the valley in South Texas in the seventies, and where he served in Spain as Mission President in the eighties, because of his total dedication. Birch's three brothers, all near 80 or over I might guess, and a sister-in-law sang "How Great Thou Art" - it was tremendous; I think one of them used to sing opera. Former missionaries and grown grandchildren enough to fill the entire stand sang "Stouthearted Men," Birch's favorite song. Dad spoke toward the end. Birch wanted dad to speak at his funeral. Dad has a sore, sore knee and I wondered a week ago when he heard Birch had passed away if he could make it actually - he's been blessed, though the trip there and back was painful for him. You're not surprised that what he said to the family and congregation was doctrinal.

I got to hug and say hello to just about everybody who's anybody from the early years in South Texas. I turned from surprise greeting to surprise greeting introducing Kent right and left and was often in tears and smiles. My face hurt as I came away. It was a long haul there; a long funeral; and too long since I've seen these friends. I wonder, whirling it around in my head again and writing it how long it may be before I see them again, if not - indeed - on the other side.

Love

Father Tim, 69, writes a love letter to Cynthia, his wife in "Shepherds Abiding," the eighth Mitford novel:

He tucked the note in the pocket of her robe as she took her morning shower. Somebody had done a study with six- to eight-year-olds, asking them to define love, and he'd run across the results on the Internet.

When you love somebody, your eye lashes go up and down and little stars come out of you.
When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You know that your name is safe in their mouth.
Taking you to dinner Wednesday eve. Yours until heaven and then forever, T.

P.S. He calls HIS sheep by name, and our names are safe in His mouth.

------

This just struck me somehow.

A sore site for eyes

They're moving earth across the street from us. They, yellow and orange dozers and diggers, three, driven up a few days ago on a ginormous carrier, itself a thing that barely, hardly, fits on our street but did come on up, offloaded its stuff, went around the block and descended, grinding, from our neighborhood in low gear. On the 12% grade yeah in low, low gear.

This is a sight for sore eyes.

Naw, a sore sight for eyes. These months - though in the middle distance one can observe the green, green valley and at night lights that twinkle and swim in your vision like constellations, a beautiful thing; and far off (almost to Ogden) the hills with their neighborhoods, traffic, sun and shadows undulating in the haze; these months - the near view looks a darn mess.



'Tis a construction zone. You've seen it in any of the pictures (↑) I've posted recently.

And now the earth movers are at work. Surveyors have been on site the last couple of days leaving around orange-flagged pickets. See them, Kent says to me the last two mornings. Within which the machines are clawing the ground, grinding, clanking, shimmying like dancers (I'm watching them!). Their drivers are good; deft, and should keep their day job.



One more building like this one (below) is going up on this site. It'll block a bit of our view. A chunk. All the parts of the valley and mountain I want to see . . . we knew it when we moved, and we'll live with it. But it's a while til this is over and a mess and a half til then.




With the hel-of-a-copter working above us in the mountain and dozers moving the earth below, it's sure gonna' be a sore site for eyes for awhile.
-----------

Because I choose to

Something like fifteen ladies and me sat together for scripture study at my house this morning. We do this every Tuesday at different houses . . . great ladies, and great subject: Matt 2 and Luke 2 today, the birth of Jesus Christ. I love studying with the ladies. I'm also in the habit of reading scriptures with Kent each morning; and I do it on my own.

Why do I do it?

To affirm what I know.

Elder Christofferson has said

The central purpose of all scripture

is to fill our souls with faith in God the Father and in His Son, Jesus Christ—

faith that They exist; faith in the Father's plan for our immortality and eternal life; faith in the Atonement and Resurrection of Jesus Christ, which animates this plan of happiness; faith to make the gospel of Jesus Christ our way of life; and faith to come to know '"the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom [He has] sent." (John 17:3).

(I don't re-read novels but I never hesitate to read the Bible and Book of Mormon over and over. Because novels are story and scriptures are truth. Story will evoke an emotional/psychological response in us, but scripture elicits the spiritual response. Conversion, commitment . . . an inward confession that what is real lies herein.)

For my family.

President Monson teaches

a study of the scriptures  

 

will help our testimonies and the testimonies of our family members. 
Our children today are growing up surrounded by voices urging them to abandon that which is right and to pursue, instead, the pleasures of the world. Unless they have a firm foundation in the gospel of Jesus Christ, a testimony of the truth, and a determination to live righteously, they are susceptible to these influences. It is our responsibility to fortify and protect them.

(Amen.)

To keep the gift of the Holy Ghost.

From Eldar Bednar:

And whoso treasureth up my word 

  
shall not be deceived.  

Joseph Smith-Matthew 1:5, 22, 37

Obedience opens the door to the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost. And the spiritual gifts and abilities activated by the power of the Holy Ghost enable us to avoid deception—and to see, to feel, to know, to understand, and to remember things as they really are.

And because I choose to.

You come too

You'll think this all a little sentimental maybe.

I prayed in my morning prayer for ones I want to fast for today; for ones I'm grateful for; for who I love. I randomly sorted through our family's blessings thinking of how often I yearn to be with Jenny and Erin and Brad and Dan and Scott and their families. How I love being married to Kent. I lingered, thinking about mom and dad and Kent's elderly parents who we saw yesterday. Mom H and I sat at the mini-reunion in a room out of the fray talking about what if she was to come live with us . . . what if, is all . . . and we shared like schoolgirls and hugged each other.

These are moments when I know that love - family - is just wanting to be with you.

I paused to contemplate reading where Father Tim ("A New Song," Mitford series) encourages his congregation,

"In the storms of your life, do you long for the consolation of His nearness and His friendship? You can't imagine how He longs for the consolation of yours! It is unimaginable, isn't it, that He would want to be near us - frail as we are, weak as we are, and hopeless as we so often feel. God wants to be with us. That, in fact, is His name: Immanuel, God with us."

I quoted this more or less to Jenny  yesterday while we chatted on the phone about this and that.

And there's this poem put to music by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir on their CD "Choose Something Like a Star" that changes so simply time and love as we measure it to the hope of "together forever." A little sentimental.

 THE PASTURE – By Robert Frost

I'm going out to clean the pasture spring;
I'll only stop to rake the leaves away
(And wait to watch the water clear, I may): 
I shan't be gone long. – You come too.

I'm going out to fetch the little calf
That's standing by the mother. It's so young,

It totters when she licks it with her tongue.
I shan't be gone long. – You come too.

A day of it

Yesterday we kept the boys. Amy's gone to visit her grandparents and Dan's being daddy and momma over the weekend, so this was a good thing to have them with us for a day.

Yeah, see the dirt mover in the background - we live just above a construction zone, may for a few years as they put up the second Bella Vida building and then homes around. Doesn't faze the kids.

We really did so some normal things like watch cartoons and eat lunch and play Thomas and Friends match game. Joseph played games on my iPad and Kent got to read his paper. By mid afternoon the kids were probably tired enough to laze around the house but we hiked 'em up the mountain.

You know we saw an ermine (might have been a baby but these things are little anyway; who knows) in the path - walked out of the grass into the dirt and stayed, looking.

Looked like this from the Internet but this is NOT our ermine or our mountain . . . never moved as we walked up to it, Joseph first, kind of near where the guys are standing in the pic below; just looked us in the face. I couldn't creep up close enough to grab a picture before a couple of bikers, a girl and a guy coming toward us, scared it off. It was the man that said, passing, it was an ermine. Cool!

We had a running race from here about a hundred yards. Grandpa Kent won but today is complaining about his knee. In a second race I won and surprised everyone! Andrew had to be carried to the car finally by me piggy-back and sang the alphabet letters all the way there to the tune of "Jingle Bells." I could have carried him on down the paved road all the way home he was so cute. But no . . . we drove in the car past the helicopter staging ground and along the base of the mountain where pipe is being laid to show the boys the big doings up here. The Chinook flies farther and farther over the mountains now delivering pipe - it's been two weeks since first we saw it - as the pipe company is ahead of schedule with their project. It's laying between here and Evanston for now. We hear the Chinook every day all day doing its work, it's not really an oddity anymore being in its flight path, but the boys were wowed.

Dan came over for dinner and when all the boys were full and happy they went home.

I laid on the couch and didn't move til bed time.

My walk today

You really want your camera on an almost-summer morning as the sun is coming up. I wanted mine this morning on my walk each time I looked at flowers and even flowering weeds on these hills; the clouds tinged with pink opposite light at the mountain top; a church steeple; the view as I stopped to catch my breath.

I take off walking the same direction any morning I go and today I went another way. To see where it leads and for the adventure.



So no, you can't see exactly here, but I start out on the left and wind along sticking usually (grrr, uphill) to Eagleridge, the main road. (The route you see on top on this Google Maps screen shot.) Today I turned off midway up and went south up, up, uphill and wound a bit northeast further uphill to at last intersect with Eagleridge near the golf course.

Now this walk to the golf course I blogged about last summer when I vacationed here and was hiking it. It made my middle Georgia flatlander calves moo, and does still. I was gushing then link about the sunrise and the beauty and years past, I guess. I'd gush about it today, but using my cAmERa shucks if I had it.

I leave in the dark and haven't yet thought to grab it up. Oh well.

Anyway, after coming near the golf course you can turn off Eagleridge either near or far and walk the back side of the golf course. Eaglewood Loop. I've done it. I did it this morning, backwards from before - continuing along Eagleridge to where you turn right at last and pull uphill past the clubhouse, then on around and against the mountain. Stunning back there! The houses go on up roads that hug the mountain without stopping from what I can see. I'd like to venture into these parts - but when I have buns of steel and calves that aren't bawling.

Anyway, I was in a high fettle. My camera would have shown you everything.You more or less catapult down Eagleridge coming home which I did, it seriously winding (as you can see) and giving me plenty of steps to take. Regina has pointed out to me in the past that we want to take 10,000 steps a day so we'll be "active." (Compared to less active or couch potato.) Coming down Eagleridge is easier only in that you're not gasping for air like a fish out of water. You really get going but your ankles and knees may take it on the chin.

Why did I do this crazy turnoff I ask myself now, looking at Google Maps. (To see where it leads, remember? How else can I know? Well look at Google Maps first, dummy.)  

Kent will you help me . . . Look at this  . . . Honey,is this a shortcut?

Well no. I went 5.30 miles today there and back taking the trajectory south and north. Aha, with a killer view though!

(From the Internet)

Pushing on around the golf course. Wonderful sights, though not sunny like in this picture. Turbulent this spring . . . clouds lurk always, with fat gray bottoms and the sun trying to find a spot to peep through.



Last time, going and coming as in a groove, where everybody goes, how it's done, the road most traveled . . . 4.10 miles.

Except for that I didn't have my camera with me, I'm satisfied.