Donna's Journey

I woke in the morning and studied III Nephi 4.

I decided today would be a day for me to practice Epiphanal Reading. I could have found my own copy of The Chosen and used my margin notes to lead the discussion. Instead, I decided to take a fresh copy and see what I could do. I had so many more epiphanies than my old copy. I did not read through the old copy first as I wanted fresh Epiphanies. It was an awesome experience. I had time to tidy, make beds, make meals, and finish several chapters of the Courage of Sarah Noble with Mary.

I spent the first hour of class sharing what I had learned about Epiphanal Learning etc. We had discussed earlier this month how do I keep up with my children and pursue my education? Hopefully, this will open new doors for them.

This was the 9th year that we did not engage in Trick or Treating. We have not established an alternative celebration. Sometimes we visit my mother-in-law and do a slide show, sometimes we went shopping. We went to Temple Square one year. But today we just had a quiet evening at home and did pass out candy to munchkins, and later went to a neighbor’s to see a movie, Arsneic and Old Lace. Our school did the play when I was in high school but I had never seen it. Slap stick! We have chosen not to dress up or decorate our home in “Halloween” theme. Yes I know about the Catholic Holy days of All Saints and All Souls Days. They were superimposed over the Celtic celebrations for Samhain (pronounced sow-in) that would then have his counterpart in spring with Beltaine. There were sacrifices of animals and people passed through the fire. I always felt it odd that I would practice a pagan day, that is also associated with darkness and paganism and the festivities that were brought over from it.

You might ask, do I do Christmas?

We do Christmas, I realize that it too was a Catholic Holy Day that was superimposed over a pagan celebration. We focus on the Savior. My children know who the real Saint Nickolas was and that he was a Bishop in Asia Minor. Most foreign countries celebrate St. Nickolas on 6 December. Yes we do a tree , but again the focus is uplifting and not about commercial symbols like santa and reindeer. We have a birthday dinner and party for Jesus and give him gifts. We make much of our gifts, look for ways to give and serve to others. We also have Christmas Evenings throughout the month when we are home, where we remember an episode from the life of Christ, sing religious carols, and read Christmas stories (always the Christmas Carol is part of this).

You might ask, ” and Easter ?”

We do Easter, yes. We have a devotional book for that which goes through the episodes of Christ’s life and we sing songs about him. Easter Bunny is not what we do on Easter Sunday. We have a basket of eggs, each egg has a symbol of Christ’s life and atonement and a scripture. We have a family dinner and we open each egg and think of the gifts of the Savior. My kids have a hide in plain site hunt, where we hide M&M and Jelly beans in our living room, on tops of books, edges of pillows, along the piano keys, in the corners of picture frames, etc. This is done, not on Easter Sunday. The egg represents the rebirth that comes with the resurrection. Yes I know that pagan cultures had spring rebirth rituals or traditions that include eggs. Ah, what came first the chicke or the egg? I say the chicken was created with the ability to reproduce. Likewise, pagan religions were created by those who chose out of true religion and not the other way around. So did some parent teach an object lesson as a family tradition to teach a truth, and then the object lesson became part of paganism? The answer would be speculative at best. Kind of like the interpretations of Indian history and the whys that the Pueblo Indians left the Mesa Verde area. We are great at collecting data, but the interpretation of data is limited by the lens or worldview, we use to interpret it. That goes for anything prehistory.

I see Halloween a little different than either Christmas or Easter. There is a focus on a wrong view of death and the after life on Halloween. Haunted houses, grave yards. Body parts hanging out from under car hoods. Witches on broom sticks flying into buildings, SPLAT. The going from house to house and expecting something for nothing, seeing how much booty one can gather. All that sugar! We even had a man in our neighborhood that had MS and knew he was going to die. So he ordered his casket. That was placed on the enclosed front porch of his trailor home for storage. He climbed in it on Halloween and sat up when people came to his front door and scared the kids out of their wits. I had a son dressed as the angel Moroni. When someone saw him come to the door she said she could not believe that someone would dress their child as a Ku Klux Klan member. My son responded, “I am not that, I am Moroni.” Ah, this comes to the avoiding even the appearance of evil.  All of these things left me at ill ease. SO, we stopped practicing Trick or Treating 9 years ago.

There is plenty to celebrate that is good and uplifting. There is plenty for the imagination. I enjoy Christmas and Easter, the spiritual focus and the spirit that abounds. I just take issue with Halloween.

I rose at 7:00 am only to find that time had changed and it was 6:00 am. We were on the road by 6:30 and drove Julia back to Cedar City, a 434 mile round trip on the same tank of gas. This was a very epiphanal and synergistic trip. We started out talking about the vision and dream quests she had done a week ago. She asked the questions and I had images come to mind. WHen she told me what she had seen, which was different than her classmates, I was astounded that our images had such striking similarities. She had gone home that day and had become quite ill, missing a week of school and spending days in bed. The baptism and going to the temple helped her spirits.

We discussed Epiphanies and the implications it has on reading, note taking, annotating, and learning in general. All of the sudden learning by study and also by faith had deep and powerful meaning. I had always thought, “I have faith,” and I study. I became totally aware that when we study by faith we are literally taking the Spirit as our guide and the result can be transformational. The energy built a crescendo as we discussed for three hours. Many bits of conversations, seminars, my patriarchal blessing, and experiences ran through my mind. Pieces came together. It was so simple. Yet, so very profound. Conference talks flooded my mind as did scriptures.

We got home in time to review my Sunday School lesson and dress for church. When I arrived at Sacrament Meeting, I sat down and pulled out mu scriptures, I looked for some pages that were empty before the topical guide adn wrote scripture references. I went to the scriptures and labeled them.

Epiphanal Speaking– II Nephi 32:2

Epiphanal Learning: LOOK & Glean Understanding– I Nephi 11

Epiphanal Reading: Cast your Nets– Luke 5:4-5

Epiphanal Study: By Study and also, by Faith– Doctrine and Covenants 88:118

Epiphanal Teaching: Don’t Teach Without the Spirit– Doctrine and Covenants 42:14

Epiphanal Colloquia: All have Voice and All Edified– Doctrine and Covenants 88:122

Epiphanal Living: Let the Spirit Guide You Doctrine and Covenants 11:12 , Doctrine and Covenants 45:57
I know there is more but these were the ones that came to mind.

We had elocution class this afternoon. I recited Joel 2:25-26. I also recited Hold Fast to Dreams by Langston Hughes. Martha spoke about Posture, Gesture, and Expression…very helpful.

We hurried home and dressed for the temple, we went to dinner at the Chapel and carpooled to the Mt. Timpanogas Temple. We invited the Brother and Sister Wu to travel with us. Before attending the session we went into the Temple Chapel, the First Counselor in the Temple Presidency addressed us. The main point was that the temple symbolism’s interpretation has not been written down, and that was intentional. Each person is personally mentored by the spirit and has interpretations revealed as the individual seeks and applies what they learn. I understand that truth is independent in its own sphere and that there are many facets to truth and many applications. SO there is no end to learning either depth or breadth.

So while in the session I was searching for understanding and it seemed that it would not come, then all of a sudden I knew that I was to go home and search the scriptures to get my mind around a specific word and that would be a gateway to my understanding. One word. I had to be willing to seek and look. I learn something knew each time. I pondered what I knew about that one word and what implications it might have. What a process!!!!

My youngest was baptized tonight!

This is Mary in here confirmation dress.

We drove by the Vermillion Cliffs and through Zion’s National Park today. We arrived in Cedar City around 1 and stopped at GWC and then went to lunch. Then to see Julia. I have made a serious dent in reading that book by Campbell. I stopped at Class Books and bought a book.
We arrived home at 7 to find that I needed to be at a RS board meeting and out the door I went. I arrived just in time to catch the lesson and hear a lovely violin/viola duet “Be Still My Soul.”

Needless to say, we had a late supper. Then Roger and I took a walk. I can now retire to my own pillow and bed. Tomorrow I must prepare for a baptism, Mary’s is Friday!

We woke and spent the morning in chatting and packing. We waited for Marji to get home before we hit the road.

We made the Grand Canyan just at sunset. When sunset came, I put down my book and drove for about an hour.
We drove on to Page, Arizona and spent the night.

We attended church in the Mesa 60th Ward.

After church we went to our old friends Glen and Marji’s home.

After dinner we went to the Mesa Temple and walked the grounds.

We came back to their home and spent the evening in delightful discussion. We spent the night at their home.

We slept in and then, without breakfast drove to Morenci and took a tour of a huge Copper Mining operation. This took all afternoon and we missed breakfast and lunch.

We returned to the Safford-Thatcher area. We went back to the West’s. He lives in the same home he grew up in. He toured us of his mini farm, goats, pecan trees and more. We all went out to a Chinese dinner and shared some more. As we came out of the Chinese Diner, I looked to the western sky and saw the largest and most colorful shooting star, a meteorite trailing across the sky.
It was hard to go, but we had to drive to Mesa and got in at midnight.

My mother was born in 1929, she was the artist generation and she really was an artist, she painted in oils, she created ambiance in the home, and she was a creative sewer. She graduated from Pepperdine University with her BA and MA in Organizational Behaviors, at the same time, the same year I graduated from BYU with my BA in Art. I honor this woman. She taught me that no one ever promised me that life would be fair. She also taught me to value books, great music, theater, and art. She taught me by example to value education. I know of no one in her ancestry that graduated from college though they were very successful farmers and businessmen in their communities. Her invitation to me,when I was a child, was, “Going crazy, wanna come along?” Though she suffered from loneliness, she was always a warm and generous hostess and people knew they could trust her. She amazed me as a single mother. With no college degree, she learned computer programing and worked her way up to a GS 23 and served in Hawaii for the Commander In Cheif of the Pacific, The Joint Cheifs of Staff in Germany, and finally for NATO, in Belgium, as a specialist in Computer Languages and a high level supervisor. The NATO job came after she graduated from Pepperdine.

I remember the hikes we took, the singing Moon River, Somewhere Over the Rainbow, folk songs and Christmas Carols. I remember her reading to my sister and I from Hans Christian Andersen, even when we were in high School. She took me to get my first Library card the week the new library was opened in Aiea when I was 9. We used the library and it was part of our life. Funny, I think of it, we had precious few books in my home growing up. They fit neatly in part of a partition shelf between our kitchen and living room. Yet, with such few books, the value of education was still conveyed, and I was one of 20% that could read at the college level when I graduated from high school. How did mom do it.? She was not a Sargent mom when it came to home work. She never lorded over our piano practice, if we wanted to quit, it was OK with her. Piano was our idea, not hers. She was even lax when it came to school attendance. If a friend was visiting from the mainland, she would let us cut school and take them on tour. She would take us out of class to go to the Honolulu symphony. Yet, all in all, we all went to college, in spite of zero pressure growing up. Maybe she prepared me for TJEd, after all. She led by precept and example.

Mom got to hold and love most of her grandchildren, but died before the last three were born. She had red hair and the only two grandchildren with red hair, were born after she died. She has been gone now for over a decade, leaving mortality in 1994, at a young age for her stock. She has left her legacy. Yes, I miss her.