Our Journey Home

Ever heard of the phrase "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder"?  Well, to me this is the perfect saying to explain how our attitude and perspective can make us or break us!  As some of you know I love rain, I love thunder and lightening, I could live in a place where it rained everyday!  Some people hate it and instead love the sunshine!  I love the sunshine too, but for me, the rain is my sunshine much of the time!  I can't really explain it, but that is how I have always been!  Rain reminds me of curling up in a soft blanket with a book, hot cocoa, baking, and pretty much anything comforting!  Yes, that's it there is something comforting about it!  It reminds me of purity and cleanliness.  The rain clears the air and cleanses the earth!  I love the earthy smell of rain, it's one of my favorites.  The thunder and lightening remind me that there is always something bigger than myself out there, that the powers that be are greater than me.  It reminds me that there is a higher power at work in our lives! Then there is the rainbow, the biblical sign of the promise God made to man to never flood the earth again.

A couple of years ago we took a little vacation to California and the month was march.  The central coast is where my husband grew up and we go there once a year usually.  I love it there!  Our main goal was to go to the beach.  The day we were headed to the beach our car decided to make a terrible sound, which of course worried us a little.  So instead of the beach we ended up at the auto shop and had to wait for our car to be fixed for about 2-3 hours.  So we went down the street to the local barber in Atascadero (a little town outside San Luis Obispo, CA).  It is run by a cute older couple who have been close with my husband's family for years.  We caught up with them and it turned out to not be such a bad day.  That was followed by a trip to the grocery store and then back to my brother-in-law's house for dinner with other family and friends.  The next day we journeyed to the beach again and it was raining!  I thought it was the perfect temperature outside, not too hot, not too cold.  When telling family members about our trip to the beach many of them replied with "Ewe, gross"  or "oh sad"! Well, Lucy, my daughter thought it was the greatest thing in the world!  It did not take long for her to sport her birthday suit and run for the waves.  Rain or shine, it did not matter!  She loved the water and the sand!  It was quiet and there were no crowds, it was so peaceful, so BEAUTIFUL!  We still built sand castles, got plenty wet, and picked up shells along the way while observing any plants or creatures that were there!  We then went to this hole-in-the-wall place for fish and chips that were delicious, and I don't even like fish! Haha!  It truly was a perfect day!

Two days later we went to a different beach.  It happened to be windy and colder and crowded.  The landscape was much rougher with many rocks everywhere.  You couldn't really take your shoes off and enjoy the sand between your toes.  Walking down to the beach Lucy took a tumble and scraped up her knees and face, I mean it wasn't real bad, but there was blood and tears.  She was still determined to go and play and have a good time.  She quickly made friends with some other kids and was helping them build a sandcastle!  It was fun watching her, but I hated the wind, it felt like my face was seconds away from just peeling right off of my face!  Two very different experiences, but Lucy was thrilled with both.  She made the best of both regardless of the weather, or her skinned knees!  

On our way home we were met with a few obstacles.  It's about a 13 hour journey by car.  We decided to leave California at 4am in the morning.  Once we were in Arizona we took a wrong turn and it resulted in a little detour of about 2 hours out of the way.  It was a lovely drive, but not where we wanted to go.  Much like life we find ourselves down a lovely path, but ultimately not where we wanted to be.  We ended up at the Colorado river in Arizona which was east of our destination, Las Vegas.  We had to stop and ask for help to get back on the right path to Vegas.  Once we arrived in Vegas we were met with extremely heavy traffic that was moving v_e_r_y__ s_l_o_w_l_y.  That probably tacked on an extra hour.  We were headed to Cedar city after that to my sisters vacation house where we could stop for a rest before continuing on.  I remember thinking that we could have spent the night there, but I wanted to get home so badly so we continued after my husband took a nap.

Before reaching Filmore Utah we hit one of the BIGGEST snow storms I have ever had the horror of traveling in and I have driven in many.  Visibility was not even in our headlight range, it was a total white out!  It was pretty scary, we drove for awhile in it not even knowing where we were, becoming disoriented.  We kept following the road until we saw an exit for Filmore.  We pulled out our phones looking for hotels.  We called all of them, they were all booked!  There was one hotel that never answered the phone.  There were many stranded travelers sitting parked in the hotel lots waiting out the storm.  By this time it was about 9:30pm at night and the kids were asleep.  I was so tired and just wanted to be at home, not to mention I had a ruptured ear drum at the time.  I was starting to have a little bit of a melt down when my husband reminded me that this was not the worst thing and it was going to be okay.  The last thing I wanted to do was spend the night in a cramped car with two little kids and freezing cold temperatures outside.  I don't think of myself as a high maintenance woman, but the right circumstance will bring it out of me, haha!

Well after my little melt down we lost internet service on our phones so we could not find the local LDS Bishop in town to see if he could help us.  We were stuck, we were not going anywhere.  I was hesitant to call on a stranger for help, but that was our only option really, or stay in the car.  My husband called his Dad in Idaho and told him of our predicament, he found the local Bishop and called him.  He told him about us, stranded in our car with two little kids and the Bishop said he would call us.  So we got a call from the local Bishop and he told us he knew the man who owned the Spinning Wheel Motel, after informing him we had called several times with no answer he said he would call the owner's home number and get back to us.  The Bishop found out that the owner was in the process of selling his Motel because he could not handle it on his own anymore and he was closed that night because he could not do all of the cleaning by himself the next day. The Bishop convinced him to open the Motel just for us for the one night.  He promised the Motel owner that he would come by the next day to help him clean the room we stayed in.  When we arrived at the Motel the Bishop was out shoveling the snow in the Motel parking lot.  The Motel was small and very old, run down, but it was clean and I was grateful for a comfortable place to rest for the night, a place of refuge from the storm.  I slept incredibly well, we all did!  The next morning was amazingly beautiful, I mean I was in awe!  Everything covered in white, the sun brightly shone and the skies were as clear as ever! It reminded me that there are always better days after a storm and the storm never lasts forever.  Now we could FINALLY go home!!

We probably would have been okay if we had stayed in our car that night, but I feel incredibly blessed to have witnessed this event and to have been on the receiving end of such a kind act by a Christlike stranger.  After this incredible journey I could not stop thinking about how this was completely synonymous with my life or life in general!  Our attitude and perspective has everything to do with our happiness.  If I was to assign percentages here to illustrate, I think 90% of dealing with life's battles is Attitude and Gratitude!  Just like the beaches, we can always find the good things!  We all have trials, we all go down the wrong path at times and end up where we did not intend, sometimes for better or for worse, just like the Colorado river detour.  Sometimes we get s_t_u_c_k in the ruts of life just like the Vegas traffic.  Sometimes we get so tired that we just need a place to rest like my sister's house provided.  Sometimes we lose our way in the storms of life, and sometimes we can't see very far ahead like the whiteout!  Sometimes we need a Savior or a helper.  One of my favorite people of all time, Fred Rogers said 

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”

I could not help but think that this life is Our Journey Home.  We want to make it back into our Heavenly Father's presence, but life is hard and we need help!  Our churches and church leaders are helpers, our neighbors, family and friends and sometimes complete strangers are helpers. Anyone with a good heart can be a helper! Our homes can be a place of refuge from the turbulent storms in the world and a place to simply rest our heads.  Our church programs are like road signs that keep us on the right path.  The following article perfectly articulates my message.  https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/president-nelson-byu-transcript-september-2019
I have been wanting to tell this story for awhile now and with General Conference coming up I felt that now was the appropriate time because we have a prophet and church leaders that want to help us stay on the right path and help us through the storm, that is life, so we can Go Home!  I've heard some of my non religious friends joke around during a rainy conference weekend saying, "When the saints meet the heavens weep!"  I used to allow myself to be a little offended by that, but now it just makes me laugh because again "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder"!  Everything in life really is just a matter of perspective!  For me, the rain is a physical reminder or manifestation of God's presence.  It's a reminder that a loving Heavenly Father is in charge!  So, a rainy conference weekend is absolutely appropriate in my book!  Now you just have to ask yourself, Do you have the right perspective?

Will you be a Helper? Who will you help on their Journey Home?