If I can grade 18 essays by Saturday at 10:00 a.m.......

 If I can grade 18 essays before Saturday at 10:00 a.m., I can take most of the weekend off to watch General Conference. Eighteen is a lot, though. Even if I could do half by then, I could maybe squeeze in the other nine before, between, and after the sessions, throughout the weekend. I hope that works.

I really love General Conference. It's partly because I appreciate brilliant rhetoric and solid writing, which we get lots of in General Conference talks. Rarely are there wordy or awkward sentence constructions, and almost never a grammatical error. I say "almost" because this one time several years ago, a speaker led his talk with a dangling modifier. I was stunned. The editors for Conference talks are fabulous, but they somehow missed this glaring dangling modifier. 

Memories of past General Conferences are numerous. I think back to the days when we had to go to the church building to watch. There was a guy in our stake in Washington who bought tons of candy, which he set out in a large bowl in the library. Then he watched the sessions on one of the TVs and handed out candy to everyone who passed by. I think his name was Dave. I remember grabbing a handful of candy, then going to the mother's lounge to nurse Seth and promptly falling asleep. I was SO sleep deprived! It was the Sunday afternoon session, and I missed Elder Maxwell's talk. I had waited all weekend for his eloquent discourse. Back then, the talks weren't available on the Internet hours after they were given; we had to wait for them to be published in the following month's Ensign, and read them. I was so bummed.

By the time we moved to Billings in 2004, we could watch General Conference on TV in our own homes. Pajama church for the win! It was a game changer. That said, now I had the task of bribing kids and teens to watch. Home offered many distractions. Bribery included all sorts of unhealthy treats, stuff I'd never bring into my house on any other day. I would hide these snacks in my room and bring them out, one at a time, throughout the two days. As they grew older, the kids began making requests for specific "Conference food." 

You'd think all this might be long over, since Seth moved out two years ago to live in Orem and attend UVU. But no. I'll have you know that I am sharply proficient at living in denial and pretending my kids are all still here. I do it every day. And yes, I absolutely still shop for all the Conference treats. And send everyone pictures of what I buy. And guess what? They still come! Not always for every session, of course, but throughout the weekend, they show up, watch a session with me, and feast on Twinkies, Pringles, Red Vines, and Oreos. If they're lucky, I'll even drive to Sandy early Saturday morning, wait in the long line, (other moms must do this too?) to buy a couple dozen Krispy Kremes. 

(By the end, we all feel nearly dead from the sugar highs and lows, but come on....it's only twice a year.)

Before closing this pre-Conference muse, and lest anyone might wonder, it is not only the solid writing and rhetoric that I love about General Conference (though I do love that!). Like many others, I rejoice to hear the often-inspired words from those in general leadership positions in my church. There are many methods recommended to members as they prepare to hear these messages. I sometimes write down questions about issues I'm pondering or things I don't understand. I study and prep the "Come Follow Me" lesson for the week, even though we don't have church on Conference weekend. Most importantly, I pray that some of the talks will lead me to an increased understanding of Christ's love for every person. 

Especially this time around, when the past two weeks I've been "careful and troubled about many things" (Luke 10:42), I will pour all that out at Jesus' feet, and pray that something in one of the messages will resonate with me and bring comfort and healing. Will I relate to and agree with every word spoken in the 10 hours of talks? Of course not! But if just one idea brings new light, if just one perspective offers a path toward "truthier truth," then I will feel blessed.  

I always do.

This is the most beautiful car I've ever seen!

We have an ironic situation in our family. The people who are under 6'3" (Shulamith, Eli, Amanda, and I) like to drive larger vehicles, such as minivans or SUVs. And the people who are over 6'3" (Isaiah, Seth, Luke, and Gerald) like to stuff themselves into the tiniest, subcompact cars they can find. While we are driving around comfortably with plenty of room, the three of them barely fit in their cars, their heads with but a fraction of an inch to spare. I'm pretty sure Isaiah's lovely curls graze the top of his Kia Rio!

As you may remember, recently, I've developed a problem with cars. They break. They crash. They suck! This was not always the case. My first minivan, a 1990 Dodge Caravan, we purchased when I was pregnant with Isaiah, so we could bring him home from the hospital since our car at the time accommodated only our then small family of four. I drove that van for 15 years, and Isaiah was quick to inform everyone that "learning to drive the same vehicle your parents used to transport you home from the hospital is just wrong!"

Fifteen years driving the same car. No crashes. No transmission failures. No broken emergency brakes (this one I managed to accomplish while driving Shulamith's minivan, but it still counts). 

What happened??? 

I have no idea. Truly, I'm baffled.

But here I am, yet again, in a rental. It took three days to get it. The dealership that will replace my failed transmission told me it was Chrysler Care who needed to provide me a rental. Chrysler Care told me it was the responsibility of the dealership. Back and forth I went. For three days. Finally, this past Monday, a miracle occurred (and it really was!). Chrysler Care assumed responsibility for providing the rental. They told me I could go rent a car as long as it was no more than $65/day, and they would reimburse me. 

Shulamith immediately called Enterprise, and the only car they had to meet that qualification was a tiny Nissan Versa. Don't get me wrong. It's a fine car. Just small. In fact, it would be the perfect car for Isaiah, Seth, Luke, or Gerald. But me? Not so much. I'm a minivan mom through and through, and I absolutely need all that space.

Still, at the end of this very sucky week, where absolutely everything sucks, my job still requires me to drive to three college campuses in three locations nowhere near one another. So for today, though I'd never buy it, at this moment, this is the most beautiful car I've ever seen.

"Point in the direction you're going to go!"

"Get on the train going NORTH. Toward Ogden. NOT Provo," Shulamith directed, as she pointed in the direction of north. "Point in the direction you're going to go," she continued. I pointed the same way she did. North. Once, just once, when we lived up in Sandy, I might have boarded the blue line Trax going north instead of south and wound up all the way downtown before I noticed. It's fine.

Today, she dropped me off at the Draper FrontRunner station, and I headed up to the U. for my afternoon classes. It had already been a sucky day, a sucky week really. I was dealing with some disappointing and emotionally triggering news. My family is totally fine, so don't worry; it is just some personal business that left me feeling hurt and sad. 

And then!

Last night, after driving home from a meeting at SLCC, I stopped at Maverik to grab a Diet Coke. (FYI, soon there will be a brand new 7-Eleven on the corner of Redwood and Porter Rockwell, right near our house! My level of excitement over this is startling, even to me.) When I returned to my car to drive home, I noticed it was behaving strangely. It made a loud noice when I accelerated, then wouldn't accelerate at all until I stopped, turned off the engine, and restarted it. 

"For real?" I thought. My car is a 2019 with just 37,000 miles. This should NOT be happening, When I finally got home, I drove to Shulamith and made her come drive with me around our block, "This is really bad," she said. 

She was right. First thing this morning, I braved the 5-minute drive to our favorite mechanic here in Bluffdale. He didn't even need to look at my car to know what was wrong. Just hearing the noice as I coasted into the shop, he said "That's the transmission." He's been repairing cars since 1969, so his level of ethos is pretty strong. They did the normal tests, and sure enough, my transmission is trash. On my nearly new car. Awesome.

I was already in a "mad at the world" frame of mind, and this didn't help, but my awesome mechanic assured me that power train stuff like this should still be under warranty. Dodge should replace my transmission for free. Really?? Well cool.

I spent the rest of the morning on the phone with Chrysler Customer Care, the Dodge service department, the towing company, and my mechanic. The Dodge dealership ordered a towing company to tow the car from the repair shop to their service department up in Sandy. That's where it is now, and it may be mid-October before they have time to look at it. Meanwhile, Dodge has promised to give me a rental car until this is all resolved. 

Rental cars, though. Like when I get in car crashes. That's how I'm feeling. Like I got in another car crash. Except I didn't. "You just have super bad luck," Shulamith's friend Bridget commented this evening as we sat in a park after I got back from the U. I've never thought of myself as a person who has bad luck, but where cars are concerned, I guess she's right.

Still, some good things happened today, after a crappy week. I made it all the way to the U. and back on all the right trains without getting lost. The weather was cool and breezy. I got to see more of the beautiful U. of U. campus as I walked to and from the Trax station. I received an entire set of writing assignments without one student using that horrific ChatGPT. I felt the Savior's presence right beside me through it all.

So I wish all of you a glorious weekend! Point in the direction you're going to go. You're far more likely to get there if you do.