Bringing It Home, Again

We head home sometime today.  Here is the final installments of the 2009 Trek memories: 

DAY 5 And End of Trek 

 

Reliving The Spirit

Here are the next Past-Trek memories for you to review:

DAY 3 and DAY 4

Where Has The Time Gone?

Nearly four years ago our stake had a Youth Trek that I was privileged to work with the Trek Committee kids who planned and organized it.  What a treat that was.  This year, I get to go again, but as a Granny in a family.

So, while we are gone, I thought you might like to review the past Trek experience.

See DAY 1 and DAY 2 in these links.

Y.O.T.O. is our theme this time:  You Only TREK Once (well, unless you get to go more than that....)

Family Ties

As we prepare as a family for our weekend Youth Trek experience, we were asked to find a story from our family history to share.  I asked the kids if they remembered one they like and would like to take with them.  (We are all going, but won't be together, as the kids are in different "trek families" and Genius Golfer and I are 'grandparents" in yet another group.)

The Girl quickly responded that she wanted to take the story of her long-ago-grandma who came from Finland as a 'mail order bride".  Great!  That is one of my favorites too.  I have that written down and even on the computer, so I printed it up fro her, adding how many "greats" Grandma Mary was to The Girl.

The Boy said he wasn't sure.  So I asked him if he remembered me telling the story of the Grandpa (a few greats back) that was nearly washed overboard on the ship to America and how he was saved by the woman who eventually wold be his mother in law?  "Sure!" he said, "I don't remember that story."  So I retold him and found it on the computer as well.  I printed it out for him and helped him pronounce the names--they are German--as best as we could.

I have a couple of stories that I love from my family history to share with our Trek-kids.  Of course, my experience with my great-grandparents and their sauna when I was about 8 years old.  That is a family classic! 

And then I started thinking about the LDS pioneer stories.  They weren't always big miracles that build their faith, but regular small patterns repeated to become habits.  So I recalled another story about a great-great-grandmother and her wisdom shared with her grand daughter about keeping her house clean in case anyone comes over so she wouldn't worry about a dirty house, but could just enjoy their company.  Considering me post yesterday, I could use more reflection on that philosophy.


Then I asked GG what story from his family he'd like to share.  He said he didn't have any.  I disagreed, and told him he even has pioneer stories from one branch of his family.  He still didn't think of anything.  In fact, he told me that since I had so many in my family that I should share more and he will listen to them quietly.

I guess that just goes to show that family stories and traditions only last when they are shared.  And writing a book, as GG's Grandpa Woolley did about his family's genealogy, doesn't make your stories any more heart warming or tender.  For family traditions and stories to become beloved, you have to love them yourself first.  Then you share them with children, nieces and nephews and grandchildren because you love THEM.  I never once hear any of Grandpa Woolley's stories from him directly.  But he gave us four copies of his genealogy book.  And they are still sitting in the "safe place" I first put them when they were given to us. 

Thinking of that made me sad for GG, and our kids.  Maybe they won't ever come to know their family history from their Dad's side.  And GG won't know his own history either.  I guess I have more work to do there.

One Of The Four Letter Words

Our FHE lesson last night was on work.  Can you tell it was my turn to give the lesson?  I used the line from the Proclamation on the Family that says "Successful marriages and families are established and maintained on principles of faith, prayer, repentance, forgiveness, respect, love, compassion, work, and wholesome recreational activities."

They hate it when I use that kind of revelation against them.

Together we made a list of work project that our house and the surrounding area need this summer.  I asked the family to commit to me that instead of watching hours upon hours of Netflicks episodes of old sitcoms or Discovery channels shows or whatever else they have been doing for two weeks of summer they would do an hour or two of these projects each day they were home.  Now that I'm working every day it is overwhelming to me to think of this stuff piling up and I dno't have the hours in the day to do it with them.

Here is the list we came up with:

* help Dad fix the sprinkler system
* power wash the exterior of the house
* pull the dandelions in the lawn
* level the dirt by the shed
* keep lawns mowed/trimmed/edged regularly
* paint the laundry room?
* scrub the cabinets in the house
* cleans the blinds in the house
* add end-caps on the pergola?
* build ramp for the shed
* get rid of the pile of recycled bricks (give away or haul away)
* make trip to the dump
* clean windows inside and out
* dust cobwebs off ceilings and corners
* wash & vacuum all the cars

We'll see how it goes.  And I'll be sure to keep you posted.  Wish us luck.

Internet Wisdom

Internet Wisdom today comes from an article from New Zealand's Kasey Edwards.  I loved the message here.   It was good reminder to me, as a mother to a daughter.

When your mother says she's fat

by KASEY EDWARDS

MUMS AND DAUGHTERS: "I don't want Violet to believe that her beauty is her most important asset; that it will define her worth in the world. ... We need to show her with our words and our actions that women are good enough just the way they are."

 

 

Dear Mum,
I was seven when I discovered that you were fat, ugly and horrible. Up until that point I had believed that you were beautiful - in every sense of the word. I remember flicking through old photo albums and staring at pictures of you standing on the deck of a boat. Your white strapless bathing suit looked so glamorous, just like a movie star. Whenever I had the chance I'd pull out that wondrous white bathing suit hidden in your bottom drawer and imagine a time when I'd be big enough to wear it; when I'd be like you.

But all of that changed when, one night, we were dressed up for a party and you said to me, ''Look at you, so thin, beautiful and lovely. And look at me, fat, ugly and horrible.''

At first I didn't understand what you meant.

''You're not fat,'' I said earnestly and innocently, and you replied, ''Yes I am, darling. I've always been fat; even as a child.''

In the days that followed I had some painful revelations that have shaped my whole life. I learned that:
1. You must be fat because mothers don't lie.
2. Fat is ugly and horrible.
3. When I grow up I'll look like you and therefore I will be fat, ugly and horrible too.

Years later, I looked back on this conversation and the hundreds that followed and cursed you for feeling so unattractive, insecure and unworthy. Because, as my first and most influential role model, you taught me to believe the same thing about myself.

With every grimace at your reflection in the mirror, every new wonder diet that was going to change your life, and every guilty spoon of ''Oh-I-really-shouldn't'', I learned that women must be thin to be valid and worthy. Girls must go without because their greatest contribution to the world is their physical beauty.

Just like you, I have spent my whole life feeling fat. When did fat become a feeling anyway? And because I believed I was fat, I knew I was no good.

But now that I am older, and a mother myself, I know that blaming you for my body hatred is unhelpful and unfair. I now understand that you too are a product of a long and rich lineage of women who were taught to loathe themselves.

Look at the example Nanna set for you. Despite being what could only be described as famine-victim chic, she dieted every day of her life until the day she died at 79 years of age. She used to put on make-up to walk to the letterbox for fear that somebody might see her unpainted face.

I remember her ''compassionate'' response when you announced that Dad had left you for another woman. Her first comment was, ''I don't understand why he'd leave you. You look after yourself, you wear lipstick. You're overweight - but not that much.''

Before Dad left, he provided no balm for your body-image torment either.

''Jesus, Jan,'' I overheard him say to you. ''It's not that hard. Energy in versus energy out. If you want to lose weight you just have to eat less.''

That night at dinner I watched you implement Dad's ''Energy In, Energy Out: Jesus, Jan, Just Eat Less'' weight-loss cure. You served up chow mein for dinner. (Remember how in 1980s Australian suburbia, a combination of mince, cabbage, and soy sauce was considered the height of exotic gourmet?) Everyone else's food was on a dinner plate except yours. You served your chow mein on a tiny bread-and-butter plate.

As you sat in front of that pathetic scoop of mince, silent tears streamed down your face. I said nothing. Not even when your shoulders started heaving from your distress. We all ate our dinner in silence. Nobody comforted you. Nobody told you to stop being ridiculous and get a proper plate. Nobody told you that you were already loved and already good enough. Your achievements and your worth - as a teacher of children with special needs and a devoted mother of three of your own - paled into insignificance when compared with the centimetres you couldn't lose from your waist.

It broke my heart to witness your despair and I'm sorry that I didn't rush to your defence. I'd already learned that it was your fault that you were fat. I'd even heard Dad describe losing weight as a ''simple'' process - yet one that you still couldn't come to grips with. The lesson: you didn't deserve any food and you certainly didn't deserve any sympathy.

But I was wrong, Mum. Now I understand what it's like to grow up in a society that tells women that their beauty matters most, and at the same time defines a standard of beauty that is perpetually out of our reach. I also know the pain of internalising these messages. We have become our own jailors and we inflict our own punishments for failing to measure up. No one is crueller to us than we are to ourselves.

But this madness has to stop, Mum. It stops with you, it stops with me and it stops now. We deserve better - better than to have our days brought to ruin by bad body thoughts, wishing we were otherwise.

And it's not just about you and me any more. It's also about Violet. Your granddaughter is only 3 and I do not want body hatred to take root inside her and strangle her happiness, her confidence and her potential. I don't want Violet to believe that her beauty is her most important asset; that it will define her worth in the world. When Violet looks to us to learn how to be a woman, we need to be the best role models we can. We need to show her with our words and our actions that women are good enough just the way they are. And for her to believe us, we need to believe it ourselves.

The older we get, the more loved ones we lose to accidents and illness. Their passing is always tragic and far too soon. I sometimes think about what these friends - and the people who love them - wouldn't give for more time in a body that was healthy. A body that would allow them to live just a little longer. The size of that body's thighs or the lines on its face wouldn't matter. It would be alive and therefore it would be perfect.
Your body is perfect too. It allows you to disarm a room with your smile and infect everyone with your laugh. It gives you arms to wrap around Violet and squeeze her until she giggles. Every moment we spend worrying about our physical ''flaws'' is a moment wasted, a precious slice of life that we will never get back.

Let us honour and respect our bodies for what they do instead of despising them for how they appear. Focus on living healthy and active lives, let our weight fall where it may, and consign our body hatred in the past where it belongs. When I looked at that photo of you in the white bathing suit all those years ago, my innocent young eyes saw the truth. I saw unconditional love, beauty and wisdom. I saw my Mum.
Love, Kasey xx

This is an excerpt from Dear Mum, a collection of letters from Australian sporting stars, musicians, models, cooks and authors revealing what they would like to say to their mothers before it's too late, or would have said if only they'd had the chance.
All royalties go to the National Breast Cancer Foundation. Published by Random House and available now.

Video Sunday

Oh, Provoans.....