Thursday the apricot tree was ripe and we picked them all, and the zucchini is coming in with more every day--they are SO good!
Today I thought I had what I needed for stew and got the meat on during church but came home and realized I had no potatoes or carrots. So, the kids and I headed out to the garden to see what we could put in our stew. I checked the russets, but they were tiny, like a kumquat. I went down to the reds, and they were perfect new potatoes, from an inch to three inches. Many of the pea pods were fat and ready to shell, so we set the kids to work on that. We took some of the 2" carrots that aren't even close to done, just so we could say we had carrots. The stew was fabulous. I never had a just-picked potato before and they taste so real and potatoey. It was just heavenly. Pics are coming.
I love work, the garden is great, the kids are happy and things are looking up. It feels so good to do something I am good at for once, and to be making a positive impact on our situation (also for once). I feel confident that we are on the path the Lord has laid out for us to answer our prayers--sometimes I guess the answer isn't always magic fairy dust but hard work. I feel truly happy for the first time in--so long I can't remember.
Oh, I have learned that although I seriously know hardly anyone here, all the women at church seem to know that I am working and some apparently have reached the conclusion that my husband is not working and is "making" me work so he doesn't have to take a job he doesn' t like. Of course they don't know all the details of our situation or that the bishop (let alone the Lord) are fully on board with our plan, but who needs facts when you've got interesting conjecture? It's amusing that people have enough time on their hands to form judgments on people they don't even know. Maybe they should get jobs.
I am honest when I say this doesn't bother me, but it is interesting to juxtapose my role and mega-activity in E.Pas. with my fringe status here. I didn't realize I was such a liberal--I was a conservative in LA., for heaven's sake!
Just wait two weeks when David is assigned to teach on righteous justifications to go to war as stated in the scriptures, where we learn our current foreign policy is expressly forbidden in the BoM. We're going to make a lot of friends with that one.
Today someone asked in Sunday School, "Who are some modern day Corihors?" (an anti-Christ in the Book of Mormon). And the first thing out of someone's mouth was the name of a recent democratic mayor of SLC. Oh BROTHER.
On that note, everyone I've met here thinks global warming is a hoax. Does that mean miles of ice lost off Greenland and the poles is a hoax? Or sea level rise? It's just weird. Sure, it's been politicized and most proposed solutions are ineffective, but just saying it isn't happening? That takes some real guts--or is it faith?
I saw The Dark Knight last night, you just can't go wrong with Batman. It was an action-packed film with lots of ideas to think about in the battle between good and evil. The question is, can you actively attack and conquer evil without meeting it on it's terms and becoming the evil you are fighting in order to win? Is there such a thing as attacking with goodness? In the global spiritual battle of good vs. evil, I'm thinking just being good and teaching good is the only weapon you can use that doesn't require you to take on some evil yourself, you can't actively go out and beat people over the head with goodness and make them good. The end result (of the film) was that the one doing the good thing will look to the world as if they are evil. There are many scriptures saying that will be true in the last days. It's an interesting thing to think about.
How come thinking hard just brings one to more questions? Well, the good news is God is in charge and there for us in a very personal way in this crazy world. We just can't get through this unscathed without Him. This is why the idea that we have a loving Heavenly Father who we can talk to anytime and anywhere is something we proselyte so heavily as a church--none of us are meant to go through this life alone. For that I am SO grateful.
Showing posts with label war. Show all posts
Showing posts with label war. Show all posts
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Monday, April 28, 2008
Alienation
We've alienated our country from the world, we've alienated our actions from our national values, we're alienating our soldiers from their lives, and I'm alienating many of my readers with this post.
My cousin Joel is serving his third tour of duty in Iraq. I now have the privilege of spending regular time with his wife and sister and learning first hand of what he's going through, and I just feel sick over it.
He's a changed man. He can't talk about what he's had to do there and who he has become because of it, and I really shouldn't talk publicly about the details I have. But suffice it to say that he had put his life on a good trajectory, had been sealed to his wife, had become activated in the church, and was becoming more of what he already was already, a decent guy. On his second tour, he was asked to do and chose to do things that made him a different man with a different trajectory.
As his wife talked about his life right now--driving convoys that don't stop for anyone or anything at anytime--hungry, hot, exhausted, pooping in a box in the back of the truck in front of all present, hot, and taking his showers every six days in contaminated, too-hot water--I felt sick, sad and angry. This is not a man who thought killing children would become part of his day job.
It's because I love and support my cousin and the troops he serves with that I hate this war. I feel "the devil and his angels laugheth"--along with military defense contractors and the ever-expanding Blackwater force, now building yet a new campus in SoCal.
Iraq has become a distraction and an exacerbator of the true threats to our country. Some of the the things we have done in the name of freedom cannot be justified through love of country or love of party (although I only have the former). The leaders changed the story, more and more information comes about how misleading the information and badly handled the tactics have been. Whether one favors the party that put those leaders in office or not, one is not obligated to buy faulty rhetoric from any party, and more and more people are less inclined to do so.
Yes, the media is stupid and doesn't help and it's hype oversimplifies and sensationalizes everything, but it doesn't change the fact that this is a horrific problem that impacts real lives in a horrific way--of soldiers and their families, of Iraqi families, and of those of us at home finding the hastening of our crumbling civilization. There is no good way out, and no real progress coming from staying in. The politicians and candidates have no good answers.
On September 20, 2001, President Hinckley said to President Bush, "President Hinckley stated, “I just want you to know, Mr. President, that we are behind you. We pray for you. We love this ‘nation under God.’ ” We all felt that way, didn't we?
In May, 2003, he gave a very thorough talk on the war, where he said,
He goes on to explain that we may and should fight for our liberty, and said, " In the course of history tyrants have arisen from time to time who have oppressed their own people and threatened the world. Such is adjudged to be the case presently, and consequently great and terrifying forces with sophisticated and fearsome armaments have been engaged in battle."
Such was adjudged to be the case, and we have had to assume our leaders saw clearly, and some still feel and hope they do. I'm losing that hope.
In 2006, Hinkley said, "When a man grows old he develops a softer touch, a kindlier manner. I have thought of this much of late. I have wondered why there is so much hatred in the world. We are involved in terrible wars with lives lost and many crippling wounds." He seemed pensive and sad as the war drew on when he spoke of it. I doubt he had lost his faith in his leaders and I am starting to, and I'm trying to hold on to the hope he had.
But I just wonder too much now. As oil tycoons and hedge fund managers sit on growing piles of cash and give corporations free reign to fill our food, water and air with their refuse, our economy is in the toilet and we have food shortages, poor health care, job losses and a housing crisis. Meanwhile, cash is ever-flowing into Iraq (yet somehow not into my cousin's food budget). And, although we've had no major attacks on American soil, I feel sick when I think of our heartless claim that it's better we fight them over there, as if the families and children on that soil are more expendable.
With sorrow for Joel in my heart, and anger at the egregious, arrogant smoke blown at us by those who we entrusted to lead us, I received this friendly email from my mom, created on 3trillion.org, which is her shopping spree she did for me using the money we spend on the war. I feel sicker than ever. Take a look at my "presents"---I got all of this for only $3 trillion--she even fit a hybrid car in there!!
End hunger and poverty related diseases
1 purchased for $195,000,000,000.00 each
New Clothing, Shoes, Coats, and School Supplies for Ten Million Children
1 purchased for $10,000,000,000.00 each
Buy a Hybrid
1 purchased for $21,000.00 each
Free, Fair, and Unbiased Media
1 purchased for $2,500,000.00 each
Plant 1,000,000 trees
1 purchased for $10,000,000.00 each
give every teacher a rai$e
1 purchased for $100,000,000.00 each
Increase sustainable Organic Produce in the US
1 purchased for $10,000,000,000.00 each
Sustainable Agriculture Education, Worldwide
1 purchased for $200,000,000.00 each
Healthy Food
1 purchased for $2,000,000,000.00 each
Kyoto Protocol Worldwide Compliance
1 purchased for $400,000,000,000.00 each
World Peace
1 purchased for $70,000,000,000.00 each
New National Power Grid
1 purchased for $100,000,000.00 each
Build 100 New Schools
1 purchased for $2,500,000,000.00 each
Free College for 20 Million Students for 1 year
1 purchased for $400,000,000,000.00 each
Wind Turbines to Power All of the United States
1 purchased for $1,000,000,000,000.00 each
End our Dependence on Foreign Oil
1 purchased for $500,000,000,000.00 each
Achieve Universal Literacy
2 purchased for $5,000,000,000.00 each
Universal Preschool
1 purchased for $35,000,000,000.00 each
Help all orphans
1 purchased for $280,000,000.00 each
Housing for America's homeless
1 purchased for $74,000,000,000.00 each
The house of your dreams
1 purchased for $2,500,000.00 each
Island in Bahamas
1 purchased for $15,000,000.00 each
Non-Violent Leadership Training (1 yr) for 10 Million Leaders
1 purchased for $300,000.00 each
Clean up Pollution
1 purchased for $160,000,000,000.00 each
Conflicted sorrow just doesn't say enough about how I feel today. It's time for some hoeing (and not the Big5 kind, there's too much of that coming from politicians).
Sorry, this is blog my ranting place, and you sure got it today. Hope you love me anyway.
My cousin Joel is serving his third tour of duty in Iraq. I now have the privilege of spending regular time with his wife and sister and learning first hand of what he's going through, and I just feel sick over it.
He's a changed man. He can't talk about what he's had to do there and who he has become because of it, and I really shouldn't talk publicly about the details I have. But suffice it to say that he had put his life on a good trajectory, had been sealed to his wife, had become activated in the church, and was becoming more of what he already was already, a decent guy. On his second tour, he was asked to do and chose to do things that made him a different man with a different trajectory.
As his wife talked about his life right now--driving convoys that don't stop for anyone or anything at anytime--hungry, hot, exhausted, pooping in a box in the back of the truck in front of all present, hot, and taking his showers every six days in contaminated, too-hot water--I felt sick, sad and angry. This is not a man who thought killing children would become part of his day job.
It's because I love and support my cousin and the troops he serves with that I hate this war. I feel "the devil and his angels laugheth"--along with military defense contractors and the ever-expanding Blackwater force, now building yet a new campus in SoCal.
Iraq has become a distraction and an exacerbator of the true threats to our country. Some of the the things we have done in the name of freedom cannot be justified through love of country or love of party (although I only have the former). The leaders changed the story, more and more information comes about how misleading the information and badly handled the tactics have been. Whether one favors the party that put those leaders in office or not, one is not obligated to buy faulty rhetoric from any party, and more and more people are less inclined to do so.
Yes, the media is stupid and doesn't help and it's hype oversimplifies and sensationalizes everything, but it doesn't change the fact that this is a horrific problem that impacts real lives in a horrific way--of soldiers and their families, of Iraqi families, and of those of us at home finding the hastening of our crumbling civilization. There is no good way out, and no real progress coming from staying in. The politicians and candidates have no good answers.
On September 20, 2001, President Hinckley said to President Bush, "President Hinckley stated, “I just want you to know, Mr. President, that we are behind you. We pray for you. We love this ‘nation under God.’ ” We all felt that way, didn't we?
In May, 2003, he gave a very thorough talk on the war, where he said,
One of our Articles of Faith, which represent an expression of our doctrine, states, “We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law” (A of F 1:12).
But modern revelation states that we are to “renounce war and proclaim peace” (D&C 98:16).
In a democracy we can renounce war and proclaim peace. There is opportunity for dissent. Many have been speaking out and doing so emphatically. That is their privilege. That is their right, so long as they do so legally. However, we all must also be mindful of another overriding responsibility, which I may add, governs my personal feelings and dictates my personal loyalties in the present situation.
...
This places us in the position of those who long for peace, who teach peace, who work for peace, but who also are citizens of nations and are subject to the laws of our governments. Furthermore, we are a freedom-loving people, committed to the defense of liberty wherever it is in jeopardy. I believe that God will not hold men and women in uniform responsible as agents of their government in carrying forward that which they are legally obligated to do.
He goes on to explain that we may and should fight for our liberty, and said, " In the course of history tyrants have arisen from time to time who have oppressed their own people and threatened the world. Such is adjudged to be the case presently, and consequently great and terrifying forces with sophisticated and fearsome armaments have been engaged in battle."
Such was adjudged to be the case, and we have had to assume our leaders saw clearly, and some still feel and hope they do. I'm losing that hope.
In 2006, Hinkley said, "When a man grows old he develops a softer touch, a kindlier manner. I have thought of this much of late. I have wondered why there is so much hatred in the world. We are involved in terrible wars with lives lost and many crippling wounds." He seemed pensive and sad as the war drew on when he spoke of it. I doubt he had lost his faith in his leaders and I am starting to, and I'm trying to hold on to the hope he had.
But I just wonder too much now. As oil tycoons and hedge fund managers sit on growing piles of cash and give corporations free reign to fill our food, water and air with their refuse, our economy is in the toilet and we have food shortages, poor health care, job losses and a housing crisis. Meanwhile, cash is ever-flowing into Iraq (yet somehow not into my cousin's food budget). And, although we've had no major attacks on American soil, I feel sick when I think of our heartless claim that it's better we fight them over there, as if the families and children on that soil are more expendable.
With sorrow for Joel in my heart, and anger at the egregious, arrogant smoke blown at us by those who we entrusted to lead us, I received this friendly email from my mom, created on 3trillion.org, which is her shopping spree she did for me using the money we spend on the war. I feel sicker than ever. Take a look at my "presents"---I got all of this for only $3 trillion--she even fit a hybrid car in there!!
End hunger and poverty related diseases
1 purchased for $195,000,000,000.00 each
New Clothing, Shoes, Coats, and School Supplies for Ten Million Children
1 purchased for $10,000,000,000.00 each
Buy a Hybrid
1 purchased for $21,000.00 each
Free, Fair, and Unbiased Media
1 purchased for $2,500,000.00 each
Plant 1,000,000 trees
1 purchased for $10,000,000.00 each
give every teacher a rai$e
1 purchased for $100,000,000.00 each
Increase sustainable Organic Produce in the US
1 purchased for $10,000,000,000.00 each
Sustainable Agriculture Education, Worldwide
1 purchased for $200,000,000.00 each
Healthy Food
1 purchased for $2,000,000,000.00 each
Kyoto Protocol Worldwide Compliance
1 purchased for $400,000,000,000.00 each
World Peace
1 purchased for $70,000,000,000.00 each
New National Power Grid
1 purchased for $100,000,000.00 each
Build 100 New Schools
1 purchased for $2,500,000,000.00 each
Free College for 20 Million Students for 1 year
1 purchased for $400,000,000,000.00 each
Wind Turbines to Power All of the United States
1 purchased for $1,000,000,000,000.00 each
End our Dependence on Foreign Oil
1 purchased for $500,000,000,000.00 each
Achieve Universal Literacy
2 purchased for $5,000,000,000.00 each
Universal Preschool
1 purchased for $35,000,000,000.00 each
Help all orphans
1 purchased for $280,000,000.00 each
Housing for America's homeless
1 purchased for $74,000,000,000.00 each
The house of your dreams
1 purchased for $2,500,000.00 each
Island in Bahamas
1 purchased for $15,000,000.00 each
Non-Violent Leadership Training (1 yr) for 10 Million Leaders
1 purchased for $300,000.00 each
Clean up Pollution
1 purchased for $160,000,000,000.00 each
Conflicted sorrow just doesn't say enough about how I feel today. It's time for some hoeing (and not the Big5 kind, there's too much of that coming from politicians).
Sorry, this is blog my ranting place, and you sure got it today. Hope you love me anyway.
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