On cupcakes, grandmas, and architecture.

Approximately six years ago, I drafted this post. I am publishing it now, on my grandma's 99th(!) birthday. This is still the way I remember her best.

...

Approximately one year ago I wrote about an architectural exhibition I helped with, called TIMEless. It was primarily Spencer's project, though it took a lot of work, and effort, and talent from numerous, numerous people. One of these talented people was Spencer's friend Taylor. She is an extraordinary event planner from Salt Lake City who came to LA for the week to help.

While there, Taylor and I baked 300+ cupcakes for the opening night of the exhibition, at my grandma's house, ten miles south of Los Angeles. (This is the grandma I lived with while attending Claremont, not the granny whose dress I wore.) Every 11 minutes or so, the buzzer would ring, signaling that the latest cupcakes were finished. And every 11 minutes or so, my grandma would jump, being startled: "What was that?!" Taylor would want to answer, but never did, "Just our 23rd batch of cupcakes!" It was pretty funny.

Sometime during the baking process Taylor and I had talked about childhood and how we loved to lick the beater. My grandma wasn't there for this part of the conversation, but brought up the same theme later when Taylor was getting ready, and after all of the cupcakes were finished. She asked if I had licked spoons and beaters when I was a child. "Yes, we had just been talking about that!" In her grandmotherly wisdom, she replied, "And not just for little children!" About this time, I walked out of the kitchen. Thankfully for me, I turned back in time to catch the most beautiful sight I may have ever seen: my 92 year old grandmother, 4'11" in height, picking up the wooden spoon, and then the giant bowl, to lick them both clean. When she finished, she looked up and grinned: "That was a pleasure, takes me back."

When it is her time to depart this life, that will be how I remember her, standing in her kitchen, licking that spoon and bowl, and smiling so big.

That night she was able to attend Spencer's show in Beverly Hills at the Pacific Design Center. Over 500 people came, making it much more successful than even I gave it credit for, though I saw all of the hard work and planning that went into it. Every cupcake got eaten, so I felt proud. I also got to see my grandma revel in Spencer's accomplishment: "He's so successful!"

Cora Baby, Week 1

Likes:
Solly Baby
Bathtime
Eating time
Playtime with daddy

Dislikes:
Sleeping anywhere that isn't mama's chest
Hiccups

Unto us a child was born.

Unto us a daughter was given. And her name shall be called:

Life's a Pizza!

Another National Pizza Month is about to come to a close.

This October did not find me eating pizza every single day (or even every other day) like in October's past. I believe only twice all together, but those two times count for a lot, because each one was shared with good people, and conversations with those good people.

I leave you with this song. (It is quite charming.)



Adieu, and happy pizza!

Spend a lazy Sunday

In my arms.

(I won't take, anything away.)

Also, when you live in Southern California, you can have evening picnics any day in October. And because your husband is with you (when he is spending lots of days and nights and weeks in Utah this autumn), you have them as often as you can. Backyard picnics. Schoolyard picnics. Etc., picnics. They are a delight.

Congraduation!

(Also known as backtracking x 3 weeks.)

The most beautiful part of Spencer's graduation week is that he graduated. The second most beautiful part is that his mom was there, watching him graduate. (It was a true, true miracle.) The third most beautiful part was seeing other lovely lovelies that I don't get to see very often, including my parents, sister, sister-in-law, niece and nephew, and so forth. The last most beautiful part was watching my father open a special book (of which I will write more later).

Pictures pleased:

Southern California Institute of Architecture:
recently named the #1 architecture school in the world.

Dedicated with love.

In the midst of his presentation to a jury of world class
architects. Plus family and friends.

Thesis=finished!

This is how happy we were during S's graduation!

This is S graduating!

Spencer and very supportive sisters. (Plus one more
who is still supportive, but too, too pregnant to attend.) 

Her presence is a treasure. 

The Happiest Place for my mama's birthday bash.

I took the carousel.

All tuckered out.

A time to remember.

This post is the post where I record a handful of things I want to remember about Spencer's mamma, mostly for Spencer, and myself, and any children we might have one day, who I will want to help remember this grandma that they didn't get to know here. She will be part of them, as she is most certainly part of Spencer.

• She was born in Salt Lake City.
• She lived in Missouri when she was a little girl. 
• Her family was part of the first LDS branch in Liberty. They met in the (in)famous jail.
• She also lived in New Zealand when she was a little girl.
• She loved the culture, and the poi ball dancing, which she apparently had great skill at.
• She loved Christ, simply and straightforwardly.
• She had/has a testimony in the atonement, which for her meant that we didn't need to be perfect, we just needed to tap into Christ's grace as perfectly as possible.
• She met her husband in high school. (They went to rival schools.)
• When he got home from his mission she asked him when they would get married. When he said, "Oh, about two years," she answered, "Okay, then I think I will go on my own mission."
• And she did. To Norway.
• She and her husband were sealed in the Salt Lake Temple, by President Thomas S. Monson.
• (Thomas S. Monson was also influential in her not extending her mission, so she could come home. It is a pretty good story.)
• She loved her five children dearly, and rumor is that they were her crowning jewels.
• She also loved her grandchildren dearly. Their laughter and play brought her some of her sweetest moments when she was sick, sick, sick.
• She had great respect and admiration for other cultures, and tried to learn all that she could.
• She also welcomed several individuals from other countries to live with her family. I think in part because she wanted her children to have an international perspective. It has rubbed off on S big time.
• Because of the above at least three women refer to her as their "American mother."
• She was her mother's favorite child. (Or so says all of her surviving siblings.)
• She cared deeply about education. It was probably her lifelong mission.
• She loved her students. And they loved her.
• She was so proud of Spencer for finishing his (very hard) masters. Everyone thinks the hope of attending his graduation kept her alive.
• She was a better cook than everyone says.
• She'd wake people up on their birthdays by singing to them. And she would decorate the table just for them, special. (I think children were allowed to open their gifts in the morning, but I could be mistaken.)
• She loved Christmas, but she (or her husband) made everyone dress formal. Even for opening presents.
• They did the Christmas Eve new pajama tradition.
• Her birthday is my dad's birthday, May 26.
• She spent her second to last birthday with Spencer and I in LA, helping Spencer with his architecture exhibition, TIMEless. (As I recall she even swept and cleaned the huge exhibition space, cheerfully.)
• She had a beautiful smile, even when laying in her last bed.
• When one of her daughters asked her what she wanted to do before she passed, she answered, "Climb a mountain."
• She did that too. A summit to the top, with help and love from others.
• More.

(If you are Spencer, or one of his sisters, or his brother-in-laws, or someone else who knew Janice, please write me stories and memories, so I can keep them safe. Thank you in advance.)

Update (on an update).

Even in the midst of these hard weeks and days there have been sweet moments, too. One was seeing some of my old Provo and Provo family, both of whom I love. I also feel closer to Spencer's family, which I'm sure he loves.

Zeke and Bing, pre-work.

Nana and Eden, post E getting a tad bit hurt.

My horse whisperer.

Myself.

Pretty. Grumpy.

Just pretty.

The one I love.

And again. (On the very day of loss.)

This field love day-of-days, the Autumnal Equinox was brought up, and someone in my family asked me how I used to celebrate it, when I used to celebrate it a lot. I explained our old rituals of jumping over flames, chanting/dancing, the one-at-a-time circle sharing of our favorite thing about the season, and/or a quote, poem, song, or drawing to go along with it. I also explained some of the more specialized rituals involving eating part of a nut and letting the other one go in the water, representing what we want to keep about our lives and what we want to change, or seeds planted with tiny letters written on them, of what we want to grow (which was actually more Spring), or folded paper boats with our secret wishes to be released into the same water (which was actually more Summer). After my telling, my family humored me in sharing their favorite part of fall. I was a tad bit surprised that they would be willing to do that for me, but they were, and it was quite touching--particularly on that holy, sad day. My favorite thing(s): family dinners with baked apple desserts, strolls through fields, feeding horses in those nearby fields, crisp, cool air, dreaming about more apple things (including fresh cider pressed from fresh fruit), and squash--all kinds of squash. (Plus reds and oranges and yellows if I lived somewhere where leaves could be those colors. And a special emphasis on temperatures below 100, wishing I lived somewhere where I could feel those temperatures.)

What are are a few of your favorite fall things?

An update (on a downdate).

I have been back in California for two days, and I am still exhausted, in almost every single way that a person could be exhausted: mentally, spiritually, emotionally, physically, etcetera. I also bore my testimony at church today, which I wasn't expecting. But, that may have been because I wasn't expecting it to be Fast and Testimony Meeting. I forgot that next week is October, and hence General Conference, as well as the fact that that can expedite an opportunity.

There was a baby blessed today, and afterward my heart started doing that pitter patter thing, where you know you are going to get up, even though you don't know what you are going to say. Perhaps unsurprisingly, I shared my sentiments on birth and death, and then even less surprisingly, I started to cry, and then I sat down and cried harder. I couldn't stop, for what felt like a long time. At least until the end of the meeting. A friend of mine, sitting in front of me, turned around to give me a package of kleenex. It was a small gesture in such a time, but it was a gesture, and I was grateful. Strangers were kind to me after, which I guess is one of the reasons we sometimes say something out loud in church. Or maybe it is just why I do, and on a day like today, when I needed kindness.

The services for Spencer's mother happened on Wednesday (which happened to be Yom Kippur, the Day of Holiness or Atonement). They were I think, just what she wanted, that is: simple and based largely on the Savior. One of her brother's spoke, the other sang, and her sister read the eulogy. Each of her children also spoke briefly, as well as her husband. Everyone's remarks were sweet and brave. Her grandchildren are mostly small, but they sang "I am a child of God," and one of my little nephews blew me a kiss during it, after I blew one to him. (Which means that maybe I shouldn't have done that, but it warmed my heart.)

There was a viewing the night before, and that is where I cried the most, aside from the night of the actual passing, or the days preceding it, when we knew it was immanent. What made me cry so hard? A conversation with one of Spencer's closest friends, wherein he asked me how Spencer was really doing, because he wanted to know, and also understood that most people in Spencer's situation just nod and say that they are fine, when they are really not fine. I was grateful that someone was that caring towards my husband in one of his greatest times of need.

The other moment of vast tears was when I noticed a bouquet of flowers that was not like the rest. It was vibrant and beautiful, but made out of some material, rather than living leaves and buds. I soon found out that it was from her students, and that each flower contained a note written in a unique child's hand. I started to read them, and there was no way that I could not cry. One child expressed gratitude to Mrs. Steenblik for teaching her how to read and write, another for teaching him how to speak English, still another for teaching her her multiplication. Each child mentioned Janice's smile and kindness. Many mentioned specific moments when she showed her smile or kindness to them. Many more told her that she was the best teacher that they had ever had, and that they missed her.

Sometime later I noticed a woman in line to pay her respects, that I recognized. She was the teacher who subbed for Janice, when she was on her 6 months of sick leave. I met her because the very first day that Janice had to return to work she was still sick, and exhausted, and nervous, so Spencer and I accompanied her, and helped her teach for part of the day. The teacher was so kind then, so I greeted her now. She was hired full time and teaching the next grade up, meaning the same students Janice had last year. She had them make the flowers, and told me that they needed it for themselves, they were so distraught. One of the students, a girl, was standing in front of her with her dad. At class that day she begged her teacher to bring her, and convinced her father instead. She wanted to be there. I watched as this little girl looked at the body of her former teacher, and could not help but feel for her and with her.

Many others gathered together that day and the next to show love, and also to mourn with many others who were mourning, as well as to rejoice in Janice's life.

In picture form:

Love notes from children.

Love notes to each other.

Post-crying eyes.

Pretty flowers designed by S's oldest sister, Aunika.

In peace.

Friendship.

Maybe this is my child's namesake.

Nephews x 2.

Nice niece.

I'll fly away, oh glory.

Farewell car ride.

Maybe I started crying on the phone today.

I spent the better part of my day on the phone and/or waiting to be connected on the phone to talk to insurance, radiologist, emergency room, and hospital people. All about our accident that happened seven months ago. If only we were living inside of the country to receive all of the follow up things we needed to fill out/send in after we mailed in the initial paper work and claims.

The tears came after successfully getting ahold of someone post two+ hours of trying, just to be told that I needed to call the person I had previously been talking to. The individual was even so nice, it just happened to be the straw that I could not carry. If any of you know how difficult/anxious-making I find even regular phone calls, you may understand.

(I am a not a very good adult. And Spencer better be very proud of me.)

The Napping House.

My 93 year old grandma encourages people to take naps. In fact, one of the first things she says to people when they walk into her home is, "Oh, you must be so tired! Why don't you take a nap?" It doesn't matter what time it is. You got there at 10 am, and only had an hour drive? "Oh, you must be so tired!" You've been there for three days, and are reading a book? "Oh, you must be so tired!" And because I often am tired, I tend to take her up on the offer. 

Thus it is possible for Spencer to ask me after church, "Are you going to take a nap?" And when I answer, "Yes, how did you know? Because it is Sunday?" it is possible for him to say, "You took a nap every day you lived here! You've taken a nap every day since you've been back! The fact that it is Sunday only increases the likelihood!" 

It is also possible for me to remind him that he fell asleep yesterday on the couch, one hour after waking, and that my grandma teetered over to him with her walker, to carefully lay a blanket on his resting form. (It was a sweet sight.)

Yeah Samake: The Mormon presidential candidate I believe in.

Why do I believe in him? Because I heard him speak at my school last night, in an overflowing auditorium. Chairs gathered in from every nearby classroom, and still people standing, eager in the hall, back, and sides. (I have never seen the room like that.) I believe in him because his words were powerful, hopeful, direct, honest, and sincere. He exuded sincerity.

He was introduced by Patrick Mason, the Howard W. Hunter Chair of Mormon Studies, and my Gendering Mormonism professor. They had crossed paths a few weeks back in DC, and now they were here, in California. When it was Yeah's turn to speak, he shared a video. He shared this video:

As I watched it I felt alive. And close to crying. And one million other things that I haven't felt in a long time. It was clear that he is someone who believes in good things, not because he wants to sound like he believes in good things, but because he really does. Among the good things that he (and I) believe in are honesty, education, and equality. (I will come back to the education part in half a moment.) He also believes that given tools to help themselves, people can rise out of poverty. He believes that corruption can be rooted out of even the most corrupt places. He believes these things because he has lived them. 

I so admired his father's commitment to learning, to education. I so admired that same father's sacrifice and insistence that all 18 of his children go to school. People asked him why he did it, and "Wouldn't they be hungry?" His father answered, every time, "My family will go hungry, but they will not know the darkness of illiteracy." (Which answer is without a doubt the most moving part of the video for me.) Then afterwards, Yeah told us that he did know hunger, and about the many nights as a child that he could not sleep, because his stomach was so empty. He would cry in the night, and when his mother woke from those little boy cries, she would simply wrap fabric around him tighter, to hold his stomach in. That was all she could do.

He continued to talk, and I continued to listen, wishing I could write every word down. I tried. And while I am a fast typer, I am not that fast, so my white and black page is full of fragments. Beautiful, hopeful fragments. I give some to you:

It's not like the people are dishonest. It's like they're deprived and will do anything to bring bread to their table. | When you care for people, you are cared for. | I'm here not because I am the best citizen of Mali. | It is not because I want to make money, but because I want to give back. | [Why people in a Muslim region would vote for him for mayor, 86%] It is not about your religion. It is not about where you live. It is about what you can do to help [them] go through life. | I know that I will not misuse a dollar of the tax money. | We cannot rely on the central government. We cannot rely on foreign aid….We must rely on our selves first. | We did not send the army as used to be done. | People believed in the message I shared with them. | No one has ever told them where the money went before. | [He took something from his religion:] The Elders Quorum of the city of Ouelessebougou. | Every city would send a trusted man or trusted woman. | It has to be done by us. | ...the nicest high school. Even better, we got running water,…, solar panel field. We suddenly have a quality of living superior to most of the people in my country. | Once your mind is stretched it never goes back. I have lived in America… I have seen free speech. | Never in the history of my country has a mayor run for president. More importantly, never in the history of my country has a Christian run for president. | Victory is not winning the election. I'm not in this for the power… I'm in it because I know that if we provide opportunities to people, they can rise themselves out of poverty. | Again, I tell you: Mali is not a poor country. Mali is a country with poor leadership. 

I believe in him because he answered difficult questions with grace. One woman feared for his physical safety, acknowledging that people who have power do not easily give it up. Another was not convinced that he would be able to wipe out corruption on a national scale, despite his great success as mayor. She was from Africa, like him, and made her way to America and BYU, like him. Yeah responded that it is easy when you look at it as as cities: "Mali is just 703 cities." My friend Chuck asked him about Mormonism and race issues. Someone else asked him a more general question about the role his religion plays in his campaign, if it is made an issue. He answered that, "it is dangerous in Mali to talk about religion in politics," but added that they "can teach America something." Not the danger part. The focusing on what unites, part: "We should not in any case let our religion divide us. Contrary to what you hear, 1% of Christians live in peace with 95% Muslims... Of course my faith has inspired me, [but] this is not a religious matter. This is not what we are thinking about in Mali. We are thinking, 'Who can bring three meals?' 'Who can bring us access to health care?' 'Who can bring us to education?'" I thought about our own GOP, and how different the debates would be, the conversations. 

I believe in Yeah Samake because of his commitment to education and to miracles: "My life is a miracle. I really believe that many miracles have happened into my life. One of two kids will die [in Mali]  before the age of five. 450 deaths out of 1000 births. It is really a miracle to survive. I was sent to school where the literacy rate was below 11%. My father made a drastic decision to send all [18] of his children..." His father was poor, and his father, making education another miracle. One that opened all of the windows and all of the doors. One that reminded me that the doors and windows are not always open.

I believe in him because I heard his conversion story. Perhaps rather simply, it involved him feeling the spirit for the first time. Not at Mormon church, which he went to, but at a football game. The U vs. BYU. I have to assume that it was at the latter, because it opened with a prayer. He found that fact strange. (It is strange.) Yet, something remarkable happened. As he listened to the prayer, he began to cry. And cry. And cry. It no longer mattered that men from his country do not cry: he was so profoundly stirred, having "felt for the first time the spirit."

This prayer opened a floodgate—not only of tears, but of questions. He asked so many questions. Ultimately he asked to join the church. They had him take 6 discussions. As he was ready, they told him he was not able to join the church. "They didn't tell me why. I was quite hurt. I went to Colorado. I thought if the people in Utah won't do it, the people in Colorado will. I took 6 more discussions. They wouldn't do it. They told me it was because they would kill me," meaning the people back home. The Muslims. He said, "They won't kill me. They are my family. My people. My village. They know me." Still, they would not baptize him. 

Sometime later he was in New York. A bishop there had met his family. Yeah told him he wanted to take the discussions. The man was excited. He took 6 more discussions. And then the same problem, but with one difference: the bishop fought for him and called the Mission President. Yeah was baptized sometime in 2000, exactly one day before he flew home. He thought, "They're all going to join. We're all going to be happy Mormons in Mali. Mali Mormons." Great laughter from the audience, and then a pause, "It didn't quite work out this way."

He continued with his testimony. "It has brought the light out of me.. I did not know Jesus before…It has changed the way I see myself. It has changed the way I look at others. Service has been something I then try to do….Love is service and time. Jesus has served you and myself…That knowledge is phenomenal. It guides my life. I love to serve, because I know when you serve, you will be served."

I also believe in Yeah because he believes in himself, not in a pompous way, but in a positive way, a way recognizing that there is a difference to be made and that he can make it. Near the very end of the evening, he pronounced, "I strongly believe that you are staring at the next president of Mali." His confidence waxes strong because he has "a story to tell the people." A true story. "I have a story of a child growing up in poverty and making something out of his life. I have a story of someone who has turned a city from bottom… I have a story of what education can do… I have a message for the Mali people. I have a message of hope….The media is interested in my message. I don't pay the media. They are interested because it is new…[because] that candidate has a compelling story for Mali." The majority of his "contenders have already served and failed. They have failed Mali."

At the very end of the evening, he said, "Power corrupts. I pray every day that I will be protected, that I will stay away from corruption. That is exactly why I want to serve one term…Really I want to do five years of presidency, stretch the mind of the people because I know they won't go back. They will demand good leadership once they have tasted it. I'm serious that I want to do five years…I'm doing this…for the rest of Africa. Good principled leadership. It works. Not only for the people, but for the leader themselves. People are scared that it may not work for them, because they don't know any other way. Show them that you can let go of power and live a happy life, an even happier life. No one has taken power and just let go of it." His brother-in-law told him that they will make him serve two terms. He still said no. Only one.

It was interesting to hear Yeah speak the very day that my facebook newsfeed was bombarded with pleas to, "Stop Kony," an apparently evil man from, in, or around Uganda. While I think that social justice (and regular justice) is important, I don't know if pouring money into the Invisible Children (or other such organizations) is the best way to stop bad things. My husband lived in Uganda. He saw aid wasted and donated clothes/supplies sold at markets, rather than making their way into the hands of those who needed them most. Because of corruption it became wealthy Ugandans purchasing items bestowed by even wealthier Americans. Many people he met expected him to give them money or fix things for them, simply because he was American. He didn't give money, but he did plant a garden, build several buildings, and install a simple water/pipe system in the small place where he was staying. 

I have not lived in Africa like my husband. I have not even been there. But, I agree with my husband and with Yeah Samake that "if we provide opportunities to people, they can rise themselves out of poverty." I see this as somewhat similar to the old adage: If you teach a man to fish..., while at the same time recognizing that there is occasionally the one time need to actually give fish. (If you look in the Bible, Christ followed both methods, sometimes teaching how and where to fish, other times offering not only fishes, but loaves.) Furthermore, I believe that it is better to invest in or for something rather than against something. How much money has the United States spent in efforts to go after single persons? Sometimes (read: all the time) I think the money could be better spent elsewhere. Thus, if any of you dear readers have heart urges to give to Africa, might I strongly suggest that you donate to Yeah's campaign? It will not be wasted, but will go to an honest man who hates corruption, and has successfully rooted it out of one city in Mali, and wants to root it out of the rest. 

I have been married for 6 months and 1 day today.

(And I meant to do this yesterday. Oops.)

Two thoughts. One: The above are a few things you may or may not know about Spence and I. (Feel free to click on it and make it more legible.) Two: It is fair to say that the last six months have been the most adventurous of my life. It is also fair to say that I am crossing my fingers that the next six months will be the least adventurous. (Though it does not seem likely.)

I have been married for 6 months today.

Car wreck(ed).

This might be a sad post, but it is necessary for me to write. I want to remember what happened, so I can be thankful for the miracle that I am still alive and Spencer is still alive. It happened the day after we were married. The very day. We saw my family that morning. We ate crepes. We opened gifts. We prayed because we were about to drive to our home in Los Angeles, from my parent’s home in Provo, Utah, and while it was a drive we were familiar with, my parents taught me to pray before going on long journeys. We got in our car. We drove past St. George. We were in Nevada, near Mesquite. Spencer was driving. It was my car. Our only car. Things were fine until they weren't: we had good snacks, good tunes, and a good book to read. The unraveling of the fine began with a large semi-truck appearing in the mirror. I saw it first, from the passenger side. It seemed dangerously close, and was dangerously getting closer. In sudden urgency I asked Spencer if he saw it too. He did, but there was little he could do. There was another semi in the right hand lane, so his initial effort to steer that way also had to be accounted for. He turned again toward the left, and that is when we were hit from behind, on the left rear side. The car spun, went off of the freeway, did an aerial in the sky, rolled down a hill, and landed upside down in a deep ravine. We were still intact, but barely.

Spencer was momentarily knocked out, making me momentarily believe that he was dead. One day after I married, I thought my husband was dead. I called Spencer's name. Some seconds passed before he came to. Anyone who has been in a similar situation knows that seconds in such instances feel like eternities, and eternities like seconds. And perhaps to thoroughly demonstrate that he was not dead, but alive, Spencer did what any alive person would do in his situation and climbed out a shattered window, before climbing back in. I think it was also to show me that he could breathe and that we could breathe, because for reasons I cannot explain, I was terrified that we would suffocate (and expressed such fears), despite the fact that every window was broken open, and therefore letting air in. For my part (and though very much alive) I was laying still in a pool of glass and blood. And would continue laying there for a long time, because when the EMT’s came, I told them that my neck hurt, because it did. And then they wouldn’t let me move after that. I regretted not telling them until after I got out of the car. One reason it took so long is that they were having trouble killing the battery, and understood the danger of the car starting on fire, so were themselves afraid to come in. I assure you that them telling me this did not make me any calmer. Eventually they did get me out, and onto a board.

Every act of movement tortured me. I have seen those boards before, but I didn't know how hard they were--I didn't know that they were hard. I thought that they would be soft and comfortable, comforting the injured. Instead, they are almost piercing in their firmness and inability to give. Being lifted up into the ambulance was a new kind of pain, and then having my head and neck secured against the board was another. Whatever they used was digging into the back of my head, and that became the pain I focused on. If I could have lifted my arms up (I couldn't, though they weren't strapped), I would have tried to rip that thing off of me. Spencer was in the ambulance, but not in the back with me. I couldn't see him for their rules. I kept calling his name, and pleading for him to hold my hand, hold anything. Do anything. He would call back to me, every time. He had dug my computer out of the wreckage, and opened it. I had been playing Ashley Mae's homemade video of our wedding, over and over, and now, in the ambulance on the way to the hospital, Spencer started playing it over and over too. Again, because he was apart from me, I couldn't see the screen, but listened to the words, and knew what was playing. That song, that video, was the single thing that could calm me and help me breathe simply again. In real ways it rescued me.

Once we got to the Emergency Room at the Mesa View Regional Hospital they examined me and x-rayed me. Everything felt long and painful. It was difficult for me to sit still for the x-rays, though it was equally difficult for me to move. They gave me medicine for the pain. Two pills of something. They made me throw up twice, when I stood up. (Maybe once for each pill?) And then soon after, they made it so I couldn't remember anything. One of the few things I do remember is a nurse saying that they needed to get me a top to wear, because my shirt was destroyed. I was confused, and didn't know what she was talking about. When I saw my shirt later, it was half covered in blood. There were so many holes where the glass was gouging my skin. That is what my back looked like. During this time Spencer had called his relatives. A cousin of his would be picking us up and taking us to his home in St. George. I don't remember the ride. I don't remember talking to my own parents on that ride, though Spencer assures me that I did. I don't remember the blessing I received. I don't remember the apparently constant question asked me at the hospital, concerning how much pain I was experiencing, on a scale from 1-10. Spencer told me about it sometime later, and that I always said 2. I thought it was strange and mildly funny that I would say that, on the night of the most physical pain I have ever experienced.

The next thing I would remember was not even waking up, but the part right after waking up. I was sitting on a stranger's stool at a counter. He was making me a smoothie. Spencer's dad and grandpa picked us up and drove us to LA. I slept most of the way. They flew back to Salt Lake, and we borrowed the truck for a week so we could do errands and finish moving-to-Europe preparations. It was very nice of them. All of those things, really. I would spend the next week recovering at my grandma's house, and Spencer would spend it driving into the city to try to expedite a new passport, and visa, and etcetera, since those things were lost in the wreckage. Spencer's parents and my parents would come to our much smaller reception in Claremont, to make sure that we were still alive. We were, despite sore necks, backs, and in my case knee. I was limping badly, which limp would remain through Milan and part of our bike trip, and sometimes now, when I walk up or down stairs (I am an old lady). It was so nice to see my parents. And my oldest brother. And my sister-in-law. And their very precious children. And my very precious grandma. And mine and Spencer's very precious friends.

We would make it to Europe a week or so later, despite the wreck, and despite the 6,000 canceled flights due to East Coast earthquakes/hurricanes. All it would take were some pretty terrible circumstances in Baltimore, Maryland (of which city I might be terrified, due to mine and my brother's love of The Wire), and some less terrible circumstances staying with Spencer's sister Kiersten in New Jersey before we could catch a flight to France. I would spend the next several weeks watching bruises appear and slowly disappear. They covered my legs, my hips, my torso. While bicycling Spencer would have to tell me if it was free to cross streets, because I could not turn my neck to check myself. I still have scars on both knees, and one on my right wrist, but am doing okay otherwise.

This is where we fell.

This is my broken car, frontside.

This is my broken car, backside.

This is my shirt.

This is some of my family, whom I love.

Love LA.

(AKA: the first of a flurry of belated blogging.)

Sometime in the summer, my lovely sister, Liahona, and her very precious daughter, Ede, drove S and I to our old home of Los Angeles. (We had driven our friend's car to Utah for her, and were semi-stuck.) Lia rescued us, in more than one way. Not only did she drive us the ten hours, she took our engagement pictures for us. The very day we got in. Pre-shower. Pre-unpacking. Pre-anything. We stopped by Spencer's house first, and walked down the street to the Disney Concert Hall, so he had the full gamut of what he could wear, but not I. How do I compete with a man in a tuxedo? :)

Thankfully for me, we took more photos the next day. Post shower. Post me seeing a pretty place in Beverly Hills, and asking if we could pull over. I am counting my lucky stars the answer was yes.

The last two are my favorite favorites. That Liahona, she is a champion.