Hands That Serve

Last month I had the opportunity to speak in church. For me, this is happens, on average, quarterly. Our kind bishopric members know how much I love to speak, so they ask me often, and I couldn't be any more grateful, though often the topics I'm given are incredibly humbling. One Sunday a couple years ago, I came home and excitedly announced to my family that I'd be speaking the following week, but that the topic was something I'm really, really bad at.

My darling family then began to list off possibilities, one after the other. Apparently, I suck at just about every church topic. My topic last month was no different in that regard: Sacrifice. Nope, not that good at it. I mean, come on; sacrifice is hard! Going out of my way to serve others when it isn't convenient?  Let's just say it's not always at the top of my to-do list.

However, I know a few people for whom sacrificial service comes naturally. They do it seemingly without thought, almost like breathing. Shulamith is one of those people.

Two weeks ago was a crazy busy weekend at our house. We took Seth through the temple, sent Eli and Amanda to the final Vans Warped Tour, and celebrated Halfway Christmas, all in three days. Prior to that weekend, I was overwhelmed with papers to grade, and my house reached a point that gave new meaning to the word "tornado." Just thinking about tackling that tornado caused me anxiety. Our house needed to be ready for the weekend, but there was way too much to do in too little time.

Shulamith (whom I've nicknamed Olivia, because she solves everyone's problems just like Olivia Pope on Scandal) came to the rescue as she always does. Her two older kids were scheduled for an afternoon with their grandma on Thursday, so the two of us got down and dirty and spent about three hours deep cleaning the house while her kids were gone. We thought her baby Theodore might nap, but he wasn't in the mood, so he just crawled around after us, intrigued by our dusting, scrubbing, mopping, and vacuuming skills.

At the end, my house sparkled. The glorious smell of "clean" wafted throughout. What lovely sacrificial hands Shulamith has, hands that serve.

The following week, our basement apartment somehow became home to a large number of spiders. We're not certain how that happened, but we suspect a hole in the wall where we removed a covering in order to paint, combined with an attic door upstairs that blew open in a recent windstorm, was to blame. Whatever the cause, we needed to rid ourselves of these pesky arachnids. Eli and Amanda are moving in soon, and they don't care for the things. Eli gets flashbacks from when this happened on his mission.

 

Shulamith to the rescue once again! She read reviews and ordered this heavy duty insecticide spray, and "Operation Kill Spiders" was in effect. She was a wild woman with that thing, spraying everywhere, both downstairs and up, while I was on kid/dog duty, keeping Theodore and Waffles away until everything was dry.

Eli and Amanda are here again this weekend, painting and moving more stuff in, and I'm happy to report that Amanda has not seen a single spider, and she's been looking!

Since I'm way better at preaching the gospel, teaching the gospel, and writing about the gospel than I am actually living the gospel, let me close with the final paragraph from my talk last month:

"Sacrifice makes every "today," however ordinary, a gift. It challenges the natural man, and wins! It shuts down Satan, and offers us a glimpse of Heaven, as inch by inch, we practice loving as our Savior loves."

Grateful for Shulamith and so many others whose hand are so often hands that serve.

Did that really all happen in just one weekend? Including "Halfway Christmas"?

I think it did. Which is why I needed three days to recover before writing about it. I can't remember a weekend so packed full of activity, all good stuff, but so much all at once.

Eli and Amanda drove down from Rexburg Thursday evening. Friday, I got up and went to school for a few hours, then hurried home to get ready to take Seth to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple at 2:30. Several of us were able to attend with him: Shulamith and Mathew, Eli and Amanda, and (of course) Gerald and I. It was a glorious afternoon:

Saturday, Eli and Amanda went to the last ever Vans Warped Tour. I went with them last year; you can read about that here if you like. This year, though, I needed the day to prepare for the second reason (other than taking Seth to the temple) that Eli and Amanda were here: The Erichsen-Webster family's second annual "Halfway Christmas"!

I love traditions.They bind families and, ultimately, generations. As children grow, they feel safe in events that repeat; they feel connected to both the past and the future. Our family has established numerous traditions through the years, many surrounding holidays, others just because we like them. I also love starting new traditions, and last year in June, we did just that. It was our first ever "Halfway Christmas."

You can check out the details in the post linked above, but briefly, Halfway Christmas was such a super success that we definitely decided it would be a yearly event, sometime in June, and this past Sunday was the day.

When we got back from church, we changed into last year's Christmas pajamas, put on Christmas music, and the celebrating began. Some of us are dieting, so we couldn't do our regular egg casserole, chocolate fondue meal. Instead, we had roast chicken, baked potatoes, light Caesar salad, and rolls.

With the frenzy of graduation and mission prep, we hadn't had the opportunity to celebrate Seth's 18th birthday, so Shulamith brought angel food cake with strawberries and whipped cream, and we lit a candle and sang to him. I think he was pleased.

After dinner, it was time to open presents. We had drawn one name each, with a limit of $15. Yep, just $15. And yep, that's not easy. You have to be a little creative. Here are a few pics of people opening gifts:

Did this really all happen in just one weekend? Yes, it did, and one other cool thing thrown in that I almost forgot to mention. Saturday evening, our bishop texted me and asked if I could meet with the bishopric Sunday morning before our block. You might remember back in February when I wrote this, regarding my seemingly lifelong calling to teach Gospel Essentials. I guess I can now testify that patience pays off because, yes, I am finally released!

Even better, just try to guess where my new calling is. Just try.

YOUNG WOMEN!!! Oh yes it is. My absolute favorite place to serve in a ward. I cannot even tell you how excited I am. Thrilled, really. Exactly what I needed.

What perfect icing on the cake of our already wonderful temple/Halfway Christmas weekend.

Feeling snarky. (And then a friend dropped by.)

It's been a meh sort of week. I'm irritated at some people not worth mentioning here, and that, combined with hot weather and not enough sleep, has put me in a bit of a snarky mood. So let me apologize right up front for that.

Sorry.

The result of my bad attitude is finding myself annoyed by some simple, totally inconsequential things, but annoyed all the same.

As many of you know, I loathe imprecise, wordy language. Truth is as I go back and read earlier posts in this blog, I constantly edit to improve conciseness and clarity in my own writing. Let's face it; we're all damn wordy, and we need to fix it! Three linguistic issues are bothering me today. The first is the phrase "reach out." I am so over people reaching out to each other--I kinda want to scream.

No, I don't mean literally. Well, I do mean literally that I want to scream, but I don't mean literally reaching out. It's this new thing to say "reach out" over and over, every time we mean that we want to contact someone:

"I'll reach out to him and blah, blah, blah."
"You reach out to her and blah, blah, blah."
"Maybe we can reach out to these people and blah, blah, blah."

Ugh. I'm pretty sure this phrase became overused within the very hour the first person uttered it. Now it's just dumb.

The second phrase that's killing me is not a phrase, but a word: "leverage." Granted, this problem is not as widespread as the "reach out" epidemic, but I recently sat through a sales presentation, where the representative was trying to sell resume editing software. I actually liked the product well enough, but the sales rep used the word "leverage" 36 times, and that's only after I began to count.

Shoot. Me. Now.

He wanted to "leverage participation" and "leverage positive outcomes" and "leverage support from faculty" and "leverage a productive partnership." Goodness. All I could think of was how much I'd like to leverage his remarks right into the ground.

The final issue troubling me today is not a phrase and not a word, but a punctuation mark. "Which one?" you might ask. The semicolon. The beautiful semicolon. I'm pretty sure it's the least understood mark of punctuation in the English language, and I am not just referring my students' writing; I see misplaced semicolons everywhere. Blah!

So here's a 4-step program to deal with this. No, it's not quite a 12-step program, but it's still good.

Step 1: Acknowledgement.
Acknowledge that you have a problem: I, [insert first name], admit that I do not know how or when to use semicolons.

Step 2: Termination.
Stop using semicolons until you learn how to use them correctly. Semicolons are almost always a choice, not a requirement, so just stop using them!

Step 3: Education
Learn how to use semicolons correctly. You can look online at sites such as "Grammar Girl" or "OWL Purdue," or simply ask someone who knows to explain it to you. It's fairly simple. It won't take long. (P.S. I always wanted to be "Grammar Girl." Clearly missed my true calling.)

Step 3: Freedom
Exercise deliberate, judicious use of this amazing mark of punctuation. Free from the bondage of poor sentence structure, you are now able to make excellent rhetorical choices that include semicolons. Yay!

One last thing. If you don't want to go online, you can always reach out to me for help. Perhaps together we can leverage better understanding of this important issue.

Sorry. I couldn't resist.

Finally, let me just say that God's presence is evident in spite of snarky attitudes. As I finished writing this late last night, my mood was every bit as annoyed and sarcastic as this post reveals. But then today, this friend dropped by, random, unexpected. Without discussing the details, I promise you that she was literally the only person on earth with the understanding to make a positive impact on my mood today. She knew exactly the right thing to say, and she said it over and over. And she told me to say it. And she told me to tell Shulamith to say it to me.

I don't know if she likes to be identified by name in a blog as public as this one, so I won't do that. But you know exactly who you are. Thank you! Really, you made my day.

And the rest of you as well, who read my posts and tell me you like them. It means so much. Here's to a snarky attitude transformed into gratitude.

Itsy Bitsy Grace

Sometimes grace flows is such huge and powerful ways that the whole world stands in awe. Other times, it's itsy bitsy. It comes softly, discreetly. It's easy to miss. But it comes.

Yesterday, Amanda was here because Eli had to go on an overnight camp-out to look at rocks and dinosaur bones with his geology class. I was so excited when Amanda decided to come spend the two days with us. We were headed to Wing Nutz for lunch when Shulamith got a phone call from Matt, who had gone rock climbing on a mountain with their daughter, Kennedy. When he and Kennedy got into the car to drive home, the key refused to turn in the ignition. It wasn't the simple "move the steering wheel" fix that we all know. Something more was wrong.

For the next hour or more, Shulamith and Matt were back and forth on the phone with each other, and with the car dealership to determine if  Matt was within the limits where the free towing policy would apply. He wasn't. It would cost a bundle to tow the car down off the mountain, not to mention what it could cost to fix whatever was wrong. Volkswagens are notoriously difficult to fix, and expensive. Finally, Shulamith decided to drive up there, so she and Matt could figure out what to do.

On her way, she happened to google how to get stuck keys to turn in car ignitions. Most suggestions were expensive, but one said, "Or you could always try squirting in some WD-40 and hope for a miracle." She brushed that off as ridiculous and headed up to Matt. On her way, she happened to drive by a Walgreen's and felt decidedly prompted to go get some WD-40. "No way that's gonna work," she thought, but she texted Matt, and he said why not grab some? "It won't work, but we'll use it for other things."

She stopped quickly, bought the stuff, and texted me, "Pray for a WD-40 miracle." I said I would, though I had little hope. But you see, grace is present even when we aren't as faithful as we might be.

A bit later, while Amanda and I were eating lunch, she texted: "It worked! It's a WD-40 miracle!" And down the mountain they both drove.

Itsy bitsy grace. Sometimes it's so small, we barely notice.

As most of you know, Seth's mission call to Asuncion, Paraguay has left me with a plethora of conflicting emotions. Mostly, I'm thrilled for him. What an incredible opportunity this is, and I couldn't be any prouder of his decision to serve. But, yes, I'm also pretty nervous to send him so far away to a developing country. He seems so young. Wait, he is so young. His 18th birthday was just three days ago.

But grace flows into our lives in the most unexpected ways. The Presidency of the Paraguay Asuncion Mission is changing right now. Mission presidents and their wives serve for three years, and that three years has come to an end for President Wilson and his wife. A newly-called couple, President and Sister Hansen, will be heading to Paraguay to serve for the next three years as mission presidents.

President Hansen was recently released as a stake president, and take a wild guess which stake he was serving in? You won't guess. Not in a million years. President Hansen was recently released from the Rexburg Married Student 2nd Stake. Yep, he was Eli and Amanda's stake president. I haven't met him, but they have. They have heard him speak. They have met with him for recommend interviews. They say he's wonderful. At his farewell last week, he told the congregation that he is going to Paraguay, where he will have 132 new kids to watch over, and his primary goal is to keep them all safe and happy. You really have no idea how that calms my anxious soul.

Itsy bitsy grace. Flowing big!

Social Media Fast: The good, the bad, and the neutral

Over a week ago, at a broadcast directed toward the youth of the LDS Church, President Russell M. Nelson encouraged teenagers to try a week-long social media fast. That would mean no Facebook or Instagram (two platforms teenagers barely use anymore), but most challenging: no snap chat! I didn't think Seth would do it; he'll have a two-year social media fast beginning August 28, when he leaves for his mission.

I was wrong. Last Saturday night he announced the start of his week-long social media fast. What was a mother to do? Join him in support, of course. Gerald and Shulamith did the same. It's now been one week, and my fast is over. Here's what happened:

The good.

1. I didn't miss it nearly as much as I thought I would. I'm pretty addicted to my phone, so I thought this would be super hard. It wasn't.

2. Shulamith said she noticed I was more "present" with her in the car. She always drives when we go places, and I often scroll through Instagram or FB. Then I decide to respond to a post and totally ignore her and whatever she's saying to me.


The bad.

1. It was hardest on Thursday because that was Seth's 18th birthday, and I so wanted to post about how much I love him.

2. The second hardest part was not being able to share my blog posts. I wrote one way back on Monday and published it, but so far it has only 7 views. Pathetic. Apparently a few of you check my blog without being prompted by Facebook, but not many of you. That's totally fine. I just shared it on Facebook for your reading pleasure.

3. One very good thing about social media is you find out right away about events in others' lives. A friend was in a serious car accident, and I had no idea. She isn't a close friend, but she is definitely someone I know. It felt weird finding out way after the fact. She is improving daily, thankfully.

4. In Shulamith's words: "Red lights are really boring."


The neutral.

1. I checked my email a lot throughout the week, probably because I'm in the habit of looking at stuff on my phone, and email was the only thing left. But, of course, hardly anyone sends email anymore.

2. I'd like to be able to tell you I replaced social media with worthier activities, but I don't think I did. It was a busy week, and I was distracted by lots of things.


So what is the takeaway from all this? I don't need social media as much as I thought I did, but I also wouldn't give it up. I'm not from Utah, and my extended family all live in Oregon. My closest friends live in Washington, Idaho, and Montana (and one way down in Southern Utah). Social media provides a much-needed connection with them. A one-week fast was fine; forever would not be.

Four days ago, I had a panic attack. It sucked.

Four days ago I had a panic attack.

I realize this blog often contains sarcasm, hyperbole, metaphors, and irony, the product of my personality, voice, and writing style.

But I'm not being sarcastic, or exaggerating, or using figurative language for dramatic effect today. I had a real, genuine panic attack. A friend of mine and fellow blogger, writes frequently about her struggle with mental illness, particularly anxiety, in order to shed light on a subject so often misunderstood. Recently, she shared a video of herself at the end of an actual panic attack.

I've never recorded myself, and I probably won't, but in light of the two suicides of well-known celebrities this past week (and the countless others, no less important, of people we don't know), I thought I'd share a bit about my own struggle, especially what happened to me four days ago.

I've had anxiety for as long as I can remember. I can't think of a time when I wasn't worried about something. I was an anxious child and young adult, and motherhood only exacerbated my already-present anxiety, as I worry compulsively over the health and well-being of my five children. In the middle of a particularly bad night, I've even been known to say, "People with anxiety this bad should not have children!" Now, I don't really believe that; as I've said many times, motherhood was my divine destiny. Nothing compares with the joy I find in my role as a mom, and I wouldn't trade it for anything. Yet in the depths of despair, I have uttered those words.

Although I experience general anxiety literally every day, my experience with full-on panic attacks is limited. I've only had a few. But let me tell you; that is a few too many! I know such experiences vary among people, but let me try to describe what happens to me, what happened to me four days ago.

I was sitting in my rocking chair. I'd just come home from school, and I was thinking about what I should eat (yes, food is always at the forefront of my mind) and what I should feed Isaiah and Seth. Suddenly, I began to feel pressure in my chest, pressure which worsened and then became painful, like an elephant was standing on top of me.

Thoughts raced through my mind:

I'm having a heart attack! What am I gonna do? I'm all alone. I'm going to die. 

Next, I began to feel numbing down my left arm. I shook my hand, trying to get it to go away. I rubbed my arm, but it was still tingling and numb. I was breathing rapidly and my pulse was racing. I felt sweaty and cold at the same time.

At that point, I tried to control my thoughts through self talk:

Terrianne. You are not having a heart attack. You are having a panic attack. The symptoms are similar, but people with heart disease have heart attacks, while people with anxiety have panic attacks. You have anxiety. Get up and get a drink of water. Breathe. This will be over soon.

I got water and walked around the house a bit. My symptoms began to decrease. The whole thing lasted maybe 10 minutes.


I tried to figure out what triggered it, but I'm still not sure. I had been on a hike earlier that day with Shulamith and her kids. Coming down the mountain, Shulamith was about five minutes ahead of me, and she and her daughter Kennedy encountered a big snake right on the trail in front of them. She and Kennedy prayed that I wouldn't see it on my way down behind them with Swen, and I didn't. She waited to tell me about it until we were already in the car because she knew I'd never come down, and Swen and I would live on that mountain forever.

Was that the trigger? Maybe.

Anxiety is, by definition, irrational, and these panic attacks seem so random. It's all very hard to understand, especially for people who haven't experienced it. I know people who think I'm making it up, that it's all make-believe, some sort of ploy for attention. Believe me; if I wanted attention, I'd find it some other way than feeling like I'm having a heart attack. I promise.

Since then, my anxiety has been high but no more panic attacks. For that I am grateful. I was awake much of last night, worrying about getting cancer and going to jail (not at the same time). I hope tonight is better. Probably will be because I'm so, so tired.

Four days ago I had a panic attack. It sucked.

What can you say about the fifth high school graduation?

Being fifth in a family of five kids has definite advantages. Seth is everyone's favorite. He never has to compete, and they all let him do pretty much whatever he wants. They let him find all the Easter eggs. They let him move the mouse on the Advent calendar. They let him steal their Halloween candy with no repercussions. They always let him go first. Some of them are old enough to have careers and money to buy him stuff. In many ways, it's great to be fifth.

On the other hand, sometimes it's challenging to discover what's special in an event that's happened four times already. That is sort of the case today, as I struggle to blog Seth's high school graduation. Nevertheless, I will give it my best try because his graduation was special and important and noteworthy. Because it was his, and we are so proud. It was held at the Maverick Center in West Valley. It wasn't our first graduation ceremony there, or even our second. Both Shulamith and Isaiah graduated from Westminster College in the Maverick Center.

But Seth is our first Utah high school grad. The very best thing about the ceremony was getting to hear him sing, one last time, with both Vocal Ensemble and Concert Choir. VE sang the National Anthem at the start of the ceremony, and Concert Choir closed out the celebration with "Defying Gravity" from Wicked. Both were beautifully done.

The ceremony, itself, was a bit long, as graduation ceremonies tend to be. I loved the student speakers; the adult speakers were meh. In the middle of the principal's remarks, he burst out into song, singing "Do You Hear the People Sing?" from Les Mis, the fall, 2017 Hillcrest High School musical that won best musical in the state of Utah. His singing was so unexpected right in the middle of his speech that I didn't know how to react. I whispered to Shulamith, "Do you think he thinks he's a good singer?" Anyway, weird.

I gave birth to Seth eighteen years ago this coming week. I had been up all night in pre-labor when the phone rang first thing in the morning:

"Hello. This is the lunchroom at Little Mountain Elementary School. Your son, Eli, has an outstanding balance of $4.82 on his account, and this will need to be paid before the end of the school year next week."

"Okay. Well, I'm actually in labor right now, but I'll get on that just as soon as I can."

"Oh my! Yes, you go have your baby then."

We headed to the hospital, and Seth was born a few hours later. I missed Shulamith's 8th grade graduation that morning, but she came right over afterward to show me how beautiful she looked in her deep blue, sparkly dress we had bought for the occasion. And she held her fourth and final brother in her arms, creating a bond that would last the next 18 years, and I'm guessing, forever.

I thought this new child, this capstone baby, sent to us seven years behind the others would seal the deal for me: I'd be a mommy forever. Surely he would never really grow up.

He totally betrayed me.

Today he is 6'2", a full head taller than me. And so handsome. And kind. And smart. And funny. I love him so. My goal is to enjoy every second of the next 82 days before he leaves on his mission, and not let a single unappreciated moment slip past me.

Happy graduation, Seth! I know you're feeling sad to end this chapter, but they call it "commencement" for a reason. The best is yet to be.