Finding the Center

Just before Plantboy and I got engaged, he and I traveled from Utah to Colorado to spend a couple of days with his family over Christmas break from school. I had never met his family before. At the time, six of his nine siblings were married and there were several grandchildren ranging from 12 down. I spent the long car ride poring over a large-group family photo taken at a reunion the previous summer, memorizing names and grouping people together correctly. I was nervous, scared even. I knew that our relationship was serious; I also knew that he had said all manner of nice things about me to his parents over his Thanksgiving Break. We were 24 years old--really getting "up there" by LDS cultural standards--and I felt a lot of pressure to be really, really wonderful. His family wanted me to be "the one" almost as much as I wanted to be. 

Going to Plantboy's family was like finding sisters that I never knew I had. I was warmly welcomed by everyone and kept most of the names straight. Mostly, I found a warm and kind welcome from his mother, whom I had been most afraid of letting down. Despite not knowing me, at all, and finding a veritable stranger in her house for Christmas, she had put gifts under the tree for me. One of these tender presents was a little ceramic nativity set. The figures in are fat and cute and childlike. It was a gift I have long cherished, and my first Christmas decoration that was all my own. 

Even when the kids were little I always put out this set. Perhaps because the characters look not entirely unlike "Little People" characters, my littlies always had a hard time keeping their little mitts off the set. This was disastrous for the sweet angel in the set, but the rest have survived their sometimes rough treatment.

A thing I noticed, however, is that regardless of how I arranged the set, inevitably, my children would always rearrange it. And when they did, each figurine was in a circle surrounding the happy little Christ-child, as close as they can be. The little manger is crowded with smiling well wishers, all wanting to be right there.

This odd fact has always brought a bit of a smile to my face as I rearrange the figures in a more artistic and traditional way. The wisemen grouped and spread out as if traveling; the shepherds together with the animals respectively grouped near them; Mary and Joseph keeping watch, Mary slightly closer to her babe. the child and manger, of course, is front and center, slightly forward with other figures turned toward but at a respectful distance and making a nice tableaux for onlookers. 

Last week when I taught my little primary class full of happy six year olds, I brought the nativity. Each piece was wrapped in a little present that the kids would open. When each piece was pulled from the bag we sang a song or read a scripture and talked about the nativity. as each new piece was added, the nativity changed and took shape as kids arranged and rearranged the figures. I deliberately put the sleeping babe in a very nondescript bag, banking on my kidlets picking Him last. I was not disappointed. When Jesus finally arrived on the scene, there was a quick scramble and bustle of activity from my class, as they sought to rearrange the set to best suit this new arrival.

As they backed away, there it was again. That circling of the proverbial wagons around the Babe of Bethlehem. For protection. For worship. For eternal friendship and family. For each child of God to have an equal share in gazing on His face. Again, I laughed inwardly at the predictability of children.

Two nights later I did the same activity with my own family, taking a little more time with each piece and testifying frequently as I went. We discussed the realities of having a baby in a stable, Mary not being married, and the great distance the wise kings of the east must have traveled. It was a lovely night. My youngest, eight, was the last to choose his piece for the nativity. I had been arranging as we went, saving room for the arrival of the younger stranger so that it was artistic and lovely to look on when we finished. 

After he chose his figurine, he turned his back to me and bent over the nativity as I prepared to introduce our last song--Away in a Manger. He came back to join his brothers, smiling. As we sang, I glanced at the nativity to find the childlike familiarity I had seen so many times. Each figurine arranged in a perfect circle around the manger, each vying for equal time in gazing on the face of God. Mary's serene little features pondered in her heart, and this time I did too.

I was no longer laughing at the consistency and silliness of little children, instead I marveled mightily at their innocent insight. Of course this is the way the creche is meant to be arranged. 

From that evening until Christmas, whenever I happened to glance at the earnest circle of admirers--the humble and poor shepherds, the great and wealthy kings, the mother who loved Him most, the dad who sacrificed his reputation to guide this Boy through childhood and the animals of creation--I felt to rejoice in the simple lesson my sons have been trying to teach me all these years. 

The creche isn't some interesting artifact to decorate my home. It isn't merely culturally significant. It isn't even really art. It is a representation of something deeper and far more profound. It is the very thing I should center my life on. If we could all stand as equals, shoulder to shoulder, gazing on the face or our Savior, what might we accomplish?

I often speak of "finding my center." This Christmas I think I did.

This Post Should Have Been Written in March

For Spring Break this year we went to Southern California. The trip was a long time coming. We spent time with my parents at a resort-type place they own a share in that is basically next door to Lego Land. We dodged the Disney bullet, but Lego Land was pretty great. We also spent a day at SeaWorld, right at the heart of the controversy over the captivity of large cetaceans at such places. Shamu was still appearing then, but in the spirit of things-my-grandchildren-will-never-do, I'm glad I saw them one last time. Sort of. Even then my feelings were fairly mixed. Still, that is another story.

The two things I want to journal about from the trip were definitely lesser moments and certainly not expected, though their profundity has stayed with me through all these months. Both experiences were while we were traveling home.

Though March, southern California had a beastly hot spring and summer. We'd had lovely weather the whole time we were gone, and spent the last morning on the beach in San Diego. We drove through some really terrible traffic as we crawled our way north. Tired and stressed, we finally cleared the mountains north of Los Angeles on I-5, hours behind schedule. As we drove, late in the afternoon, finally making time toward our destination, we passed a stranded car.

A young man was standing with a sign reading, "Please, we just need a jack." I am not sure who suggested first that we stop, but it was only seconds later that we crawled to a stop. Plantboy and I looked at one another. The stranded motorists were certainly young. And brown. We nodded to one another, Plantboy turned on the hazards, grabbed the jack, waited for a gap in traffic and sprinted back to the car. I watched in the rearview mirror with a prayer in my heart that we had done the right thing.

After several minutes I could tell there was some conversation taking place on the side of the road. At the very least confident that there was no ploy to rob and murder my dear, generous-hearted husband, I grabbed a bag of oranges we had purchased that morning in San Diego and walked back to the car.

It wasn't a jack problem after all, the car was high-centered and the young men had done everything they could think of to extricate themselves from the problem and change the tire. Plantboy's broader experience, handy and creative thinking, and added muscle finally did the trick and the tire was changed. While working, one of the young men told me that they had been standing out there for three hours . . . two of them with the sign. They were from Arizona and road tripping to San Francisco when their tire blew.

Grateful for Plantboy's kindness, they offered us $20 for our help. The young man seemed apologetic that it wasn't more, but I'm sure it was nearly all they could spare. Plantboy said "no" and I told them to drive safe for the sake of their mothers and to help the next person they found in need. There was much friendliness and camaraderie all around. I've seldom seen such gratitude in teenage boys.

Three hours. Because they were young? Brown? People are busy? Afraid?

Fast-forward 24 hours. We went to Muir Woods in San Francisco. On a Saturday. If you you know this place you know why the Saturday thing is significant. I've never seen a national monument so crowded. For years, Plantboy has touted this place as one of his favorites, and our timing worked out to go there. However, as we battled difficult traffic for some miles and waited in a traffic jamb on a winding road to get into the park, only to have to park nearly a mile away . . . well, admittedly there were many times I re-thought our decision.

And then we got into the park.

To say it is lovely is a gross understatement. It is sacred, touching, vast. Its founding was a hat trick of conservationism, private ownership, and federal governmental power. For a couple of amazing hours I could almost imagine what parts of the west would have looked like before people came to it. There is one particularly remarkable stand of trees called Cathedral Grove. Signs on the trail ask for quiet within that particular stand of trees where people might meditate, ponder, and experience a degree of reverence.

What I didn't realize until I read the plaque in Cathedral Grove is that the UN charter was actually signed in that spot. Delegates had met in SF to hammer out the charter and then culminated their conference with a visit to Muir Woods.

Here is the text on the plaque commemorating the event:

Here in this grove of enduring redwoods, preserved for posterity, members of the United Nations Conference on International Organization met on May 19, 1945 to honor the memory of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, thirty-first President of the United States, Chief Architect of the United Nations, and Apostle of Lasting Peace for all Mankind

Roosevelt had died just weeks before the delegation met, and the event was meant to both honor him, and for those who met to pledge their sacred honor to a world where peace might be possible.

I read the plaque and cried. It had been a long week, and a very long 24 hours. As I stared at the large, overhead, monochromatic picture of the delegates--weary from war and desperate for hope--I felt overwhelmed by emotion I couldn't explain. "And in despair, I bowed my head, there is no peace on earth, I said."

I thought of those boys waiting three hours on a hot and dusty highway. A thousand cars must have passed them. Those delegates had hoped and prayed that the horror of the Second World War would not soon be forgotten, that we would find a way to be global citizens and to understand that damage and pain to one is a blight on all the rest of us. But they have failed. Miserably.

We have all failed miserably.

This is not about a UN thing. It is about a humanity thing. Our capacity to love and give is balanced in a most unsavory way by our capacity to inflict pain and act selfishly. In that moment, I despaired of the dark side of human nature winning.

I don't always feel this way. In July I spent a week at girls camp. For part of their week they spend an hour in our camp that is designated as "The Sacred Grove." The girls read scriptures, journal, pray and read a letter from their parents there. Near the end of our hour in the grove, some of the girls got a little bit restless and I felt impressed to speak. I told them about my experience at Muir Woods in halting words, the feelings of that day are still raw and painful when I think of them.

And then I told that that for all that many good men and women had tried to use the institutions of the world to make change, it could be that they were looking to the wrong grove. The grove of Joseph Smith is the place where we learn that God is personal--that He knows us as His children. In that other sacred grove we learn that the Savior died for us, and that peace only comes by knowing him and seeking truth. I knew in that moment, that if more people would go to the sacred places--in nature or those built by man, and truly seek to know God and do His will--the world would be really different.

I know this post should have been written in March; or at least July. But all these months out, it still stays with me. Particularly in this season of such joy mingled with such heartache. My Christmas lights and keeping my family huddled close are helping to keep darkness at bay. But I sense it, just outside my safe circle I have built for myself. There are those that would flaunt the rule of law and reject their Father in exchange for watching the world burn in a silacrum of true worship. As they do so, they wreak havoc and destruction on the children of the world, marking generations with their vilification of freedom and peace.

I want to act. I want to pull my car over and offer assistance without fear. I don't want to be one of the ones that just drives by while others suffer. But there are just such big problems--problems that cannot be fixed with the loan of a jack, a handy husband and a bag of oranges. The bit I can do seems so small compared to the scope of the thing.

My gratitude for the life I've been gifted with overwhelms me, even as I seek to understand how the inequities in the world can ever be made right.