Growing and Learning

One of my roles in life right now is that of Relief Society President.  It has been an eye opening experience.  I spend a fair amount of time worrying about the women in my ward.  The widows.  The divorced. The ones dealing with health challenges in their families.  The ones who can't say no to anything and are burning the candle on both ends.  The ones who won't say yes to anything because they are so wrapped up in their issues that they feel they have nothing to give.  The ones who are unhappy because life hasn't turned out how they planned.

I guess that is just about everybody!

But it is not.

What I have discovered is that there are a handful of women in my ward who can step past the issues in their own lives to live joyfully.  They are patient and kind.  They are quick to serve and to volunteer for anything.  They look for ways to lift others and they know who is in need because they are good listeners and observers.

They are examples for me of how I can grow and improve.  I am so grateful for the women that Heavenly Father has placed in my path.  I am grateful for the members of my "team" both past and present who have skills that I do not and see things that I miss.  I am learning, but it is slow and sometimes painful.  I had one of those situations today where I feel that I reproved someone with sharpness.  Before, her actions and words would have bothered me for a while, but one thing I have become much better at is letting things go.  Now I just have to figure out how to show an increase of love to this woman who probably really needs it.  I know that with some prayer Heavenly Father will help me find the best way to smooth things over.  And that's another thing that I have learned- more trust in my Heavenly Father.

Although some days are hard, I am grateful for my calling.

Path to President

In March I ordered some choir music for the church choir to sing  during the 2014-2015 school year.  Even though I don’t teach anymore, my life still seems better organized in school years than in calendar years.  When I ordered it, Ed looked at me and asked, “How do you know you will still be the choir director?”  I laughed it off, but I had had a similar thought. 

Towards the end of March we started trying to buy a new house down in the older part of Lehi.  The seller was not responsive to our offer at all, which was quite frustrating.  At the beginning of April we went on a cruise with the Rice family.  When we got home from our cruise, we put in another offer on the house (which was also ignored) but I had a weird feeling that I was going to get a new calling.  Not just any calling either- I felt like I was going to be called as the President of either the Relief Society or the Primary.  I didn’t say anything to Ed, because really, how do you?  That is not how things work in the Church, so I stayed quiet.

In May Ed made a third offer on the house- without telling me about it until afterwards.  I was pretty mad about it and still had the odd feeling, but if you are moving you are going to get a new calling, so I wasn’t concerned.  The house issue was eclipsed by my explosion about Ed buying a car off Ebay for Reed that we had also not talked about.  It was a rough week.  The offer was finally accepted and we started getting really excited about the changes that we were going to make to the house.  There were a lot of issues, but we felt like we could deal with them- despite the fact that the seller wasn’t being entirely honest with us.

One night towards the end of May we went over to walk around the yard of the other house.  While we were there we met one of the neighbors who gave us a lot of new things to worry about.  All of a sudden we realized that there were additional issues with property lines and access that might land us square in the middle of a family battle- since this property is the first one that will leave a huge block of family property.  As we were leaving, one of my former colleagues saw us in the driveway and stopped to talk.  She had another lady with her who, in the course of casual conversation, said that she had just been released as Relief Society president and was now the Primary pianist. I got a gut twist at that moment that maybe my calling wasn’t in the new ward.  Still. . . when your husband is totally committed to the idea of moving and you have agreed to do whatever he wants, how do you bring up that issue?

On Wednesday night of the last week of May, Scott Carlson stopped us out in the street to ask if he had permission to call Reed to the Stake Youth Committee.  We said yes- thinking it would be a short calling.  When Reed was issued the call a few minutes later, Brother Carlson specified that it was a two year calling.  We didn’t say anything.

On Friday night May 30^th Parker graduated from high school.  We had a party and the Egglestons were invited.  In true Cathrine fashion, it slipped out that we were moving.  I saw a stricken look on the Bishop’s face and thought it was weird that just a few minutes later I received a text from the Ward Clerk asking if the Bishop could meet with us on Sunday at four. Since the Bishop was still at our hosue, I knew it was an odd “coincidence.”  I was pretty sure I knew what was coming.

Sunday, June 1^st Bishop Eggleston showed up and looked quite nervous.  He said, “I’m not sure what to do.  This has never happened before.  I am supposed to call you to be the Relief Society President, but I know you are buying another house.”  I told him that I wasn’t sure what had taken him so long, but that he should hold off on making an official call until we could talk about it.  That was not an easy couple of days.  I knew what I was supposed to do, but Ed had his heart set on that house and Reed had his heart set on the new puppy I had promised him.  Ed was pretty frustrated because he felt like the call came out of the blue and was maybe an attempt to just keep us in the ward.  I felt bad because I had not shared any of my promptings, so although I was not surprised at all, he was caught off guard.  After Reed slammed around for a few days, I realized what the problem was and Miss Eleanor Roosevelt came into our lives.  Ed gave me permission to accept the calling saying, “How can I play “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go for prelude music and then not be willing to do it?”

We walked away from the house citing many of the concerns that we had that the seller had not been forthright about.  All of a sudden he was in a big hurry to fix things, but some of the items were much too big for a quick fix.

So. . .  five weeks after the original call, I am now the Relief Society President of the Cedar Hollow 7^th Ward.  I have great counselors in Jayme Anderson and Torey Forbush and two great secretaries in Heidi Markland and Marilyn Robinson to keep things moving in the right direction.  It has been a difficult month, but I feel that I have grown a lot closer to Heavenly Father and I am already starting to truly love each and every sister in the ward.   It is such a relief that it is no longer a secret- that was tough.  Now we can get to work.    

The American Dream

MANDI WRIGHT/Detroit Free Press

My mother would have loved to have been part of this election season. She loved everything about the presidency and looked forward to the day when a woman would be elected president. She was an avid supporter of Geraldine Ferraro and I am positive that she would have loved Hillary. She probably would have switched parties to support Sarah Palin. Let's face it. . . she was a feminist! Despite the fact that Barrack Obama is a man, she would be thrilled that an African-American man had managed to become President-Elect of the United States. She always rooted for the underdog.

We live in difficult times and although everyone seems to want "change", there are many different definitions of that term. It is my hope that Mr. Obama will be blessed to be able to do the right things for our country. It is even more imperative to me that the country will unite and support him. I have friends on both sides of the fence who all have strong opinions, but the one thing they share is that they want this country to be the best it can be.

History was made tonight. Our country has come a long way since the embattled 1960's. Heck, we just elected a black American to be president. Did you think that was possible even last year? It makes me believe that anything can happen if you work hard enough. And isn't that the American Dream?