Category Archives: Adventures
President Petersen is going to die.
When the summer comes again, and I am eating ice cream and laughing with friends beneath the glittering canopy of kerr lanterns, his wife will be a widow, bearing the cross that no mortal hand can lift.
And when I am taking my babies to the rodeo, to watch the cowboys ride and the cowgirls wave, he will be beyond the veil, with knowledge and understanding of those things you always wonder about, but can never bear to fully contemplate.
Today he bore his final testimony before us, the stake he has served so faithfully. His words were of optimism, and of joy. He spoke of the things he has tried to teach us over the years. His most emphatic point: “We are going to make it.”
He assured us that the good lives we are living will seal us to our Father as if we have our election made sure. He told us “we are made of the good stuff.”
He bore his testimony of the witness through the Spirit that he had of the Savior. He assured us that he is a defender of the faith.
And all I could think about was the journey he is about to take – the joy and the bitterness all in the same moment. When my baby is 50, with children and maybe grandchildren of his own, President Petersen will be a faded memory to the world, with few recalling that he ever did live.
But I imagine the Savior won’t forget, and I imagine his testimony will seal the work of his life and open the gates of exaltation to him and his posterity.
And I think that is the reason I felt so honored to be a part of our meetings today.
So I was going to write a “Tales for Tuesday” for her, and publish it on Wednesday. But Wednesday I forgot, I was participating in an online protest.
So today she shall have her story.
When Andi and I were eleven or twelve years old we would on occasion walk ourselves a mile down the road to the old Cottonwood Mall, where we would have lunch at TGI Fridays – chicken fingers, french fries and raspberry apple sauce. It felt very independent and very mature to be going to lunch by ourselves.
And the walk wasn’t so bad. There was water culvert to splash in on the hot days. There was a horse pasture where we could stop and pet an admiring Equine or two. And there was the Holiday cemetery – we never went in, but could entertain each other with stories as we walked trepidly past.
And on one such occasion we were about half way there – just past the pasture, coming up on the cemetery – when we passed by a giant raspberry bush, full and laden with the biggest, the reddest, the ripest raspberries you ever did see. They were just begging to be eaten – the hot sun reflecting on each perfect bubble of red deliciousness.
And so we helped ourselves. That bush was so full. I had never seen so many giant berries before or since, and have often wondered what particular species they were, they were so big.
We ate some. And then we ate some more. We sat down on the hot asphalt to make ourselves comfortable as we ate even more. And then, when we were sure we couldn’t eat any more raspberries, we decided to use our t-shirts as baskets, filling them with the remaining berries, picking that bush clean dry. We ate the rest as we walked home, abandoning our desires for any other lunch.
We ruined our shirts that day with big red splashy stains, convicting us of our guilt.
But of course no one knew a crime had been committed.
It wasn’t until years later — years and years – like just last year, that it occurred to me that those bushes probably actually belonged to someone.
So there they were, off on their way to work, or errands or where ever the wind was taking them that day, and they knew their bush was full and ready for them to come home and pick – ready to reap their harvest.
But when they returned not a berry was in sight!
And raspberries have been my favorite fruit ever since.
I’m going to try and write down memories I have – for my little lovelies who always ask “Tell me a story of when you were a kid . . .”
I’m going to call them “Tales for Tuesdays” – and will try to write one a week . . . unless of course something else happens. In which case I won’t.
You can read all “Tales for Tuesdays” here.
