"Forgetting those things which are behind"

"One of my favorite books of the New Testament is Paul's too-seldom read letter to the Philippians. After reviewing the very privileged and rewarding life of his early years -- his birthright, his education, his standing in the Jewish community -- Paul says all of that was nothing -- 'dung' he calls it -- compared to his conversion to Christianity. He says -- and I paraphrase -- 'I have stopped rhapsodizing about "the good old days" and now eagerly look toward the future "that I may apprehend that for which Christ apprehended me." ' Then this verse: 'This one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus"' (Philippians 3:13-14). No Lot's wife here. No looking back at Sodom and Gomorrah here. Paul knows it is out there in the future, up ahead wherever heaven is taking us that we will win 'the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.'


"At this point let me pause to add a lesson that applies both in your own life and also in the lives of others. There is something in us, at least in too many of us, that particularly fails to forgive and forget earlier mistakes in life -- either mistakes we ourselves have made or the mistakes of others. That is not good. It is not Christian. It stands in terrible opposition to the grandeur and majesty of the Atonement of Christ. To be tied to earlier mistakes -- our own or other people's -- is the worst kind of wallowing in the past from which we are called to cease and desist.


"When something is over and done with, when it has been repented of as fully as it can be repented of, when life has moved on as it should and a lot of other wonderfully good things have happened since then, it is not right to go back and open up some ancient wound which the Son of God Himself died trying to heal. Let people repent. Let people grow. Believe that people can change, and improve. Is that faith? Yes! Is it hope? Yes! Is it charity? Yes! Above all it is charity, the pure love of Christ."


—Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, "Remember Lot's Wife," BYU Devotional, January 2009

Knowledge Is Power: Get the Facts on Pornography

For, oh I'd say, the last 6 months I've found myself in many-a conversation about the dangers of pornography. I've appreciated it because how do you know what you don't know unless you discuss? There is so much scientific information about addiction—the brain changes that take place, reasons for porn addiction, ways of coping with it, etc.—that we're shooting ourselves in the foot by not increasing our knowledge in something that is so rampant today. There's no hiding from it, ignoring it, hoping it will go away. It won't, so we have to arm ourselves to deal with it in our lives. If you're a friend, sister, wife, mother, or whatever to anyone who has an addiction or might have an addiction to pornography, by increasing your knowledge you can help the people you love be more in control of their lives and know how to avoid any future porn addictions. Not everyone who looks at pornography is addicted, but if they are, it's best if you know how you can help.

So I'm gushing on and on about this because my friend Emilia del Mar posted on her blog a link to more facts about pornography. Click here to read her words and more. Let me know if you have any other questions. I'm still learning, but what I have learned has definitely made me feel more aware and hopeful about the power everyone has to overcome, especially when you let Christ into that equation.

Here are a few examples of how porn can reek havoc (also found in the link above):

-Provide an escape and consume your life so that nothing else matters, even your job or other responsibilities.

-Lead to divorce. Fifty percent of divorces involve one spouse involved in porn.

-Decrease respect for women.

-Decrease desire to marry and have children.

-Increase risk of becoming sexually abusive to others.

-Increase risk of becoming sexually dissatisfied and cheating.

-Encourage unhealthy views about sexuality, such as the belief that sex is nothing more than a recreational activity and that reserving sex for marriage is unrealistic.

-Increase risk of experiencing difficulties in serious, intimate relationships.

(http://www.loveandfidelity.org/blog/?p=334—this is the same article the link about eventually takes you to.)

Clouds of Marbles and Tidal Waves

Monday evening the sky was a swirl of midnight blue, cerulean, and indigo. How do clouds color themselves like that? And the sun was peaking through, not wanting to go to bed just yet. The clouds were playing marbles, just like summertime at Great-Grandma Newbold's in the upstairs loft with the steep stairs and the fuzzy wallpaper. For me playing marbles meant admiring each glass ball one by one and spinning it close to my eye. Looking out the window of my moving car, I was staring at those same marbles. Thank you sky.

Then Tuesday on my way to class the sky was a wall of ocean! A massive, white-water wave frozen mid-air. It was glorious. I was on the  warm sand watching time stand still, but still feeling the mist of the water spraying me. On my way home from class a different tidal wave of cloud loomed straight ahead. It was pounding down onto the oceans surface from nearly 100-ft in the air. I swear. Foamy, white, majestic, and powerful. I was actually a little afraid it'd come to life and sweep me away. But I got home okay.

the month that never was

JUNE never ended. July never existed. Last night I counted that in the last 10 days, 8 of my journal entries were dated June instead of July. What does that mean? I feel robbed. Here's to living it up the last two days of June . . . I mean JULY.

Boy meets girl.

Boy meets girl. Girl meets boy. Boy and girl watch fireworks and then carry on interesting conversation, interesting enough that girl wouldn’t mind if boy wants her phone number. He does. Girl awaits his call with actual anticipation.

Boy calls girl. Girl answers. Boy and girl talk for an hour and a half, and girl believes they were meant to talk to each other forever. Boy calls again. And again. Girl answers every time. Girl even calls boy and he answers. Boy asks girl out. Girl accepts. Boy even is going to look up all the vegetarian, vegan, and veggie-friendly restaurants in the area to take girl somewhere where she can comfortably eat the food.

Boy picks girl up. Girl . . . lets him pick her up? Can't think of anything better. Anyways, boy is thirty minutes late, but girl looks mighty fine in her new Plato’s Closet short-sleeve sweater dress and doesn't mind at all. Boy sees her and says, “Oh, you’re wearing sandals . . .” Girl says, “Uh-huh. What do you mean? What are we doing?” Boy says, “We’re going up in the canyon.” Girl says, “I don’t have a jacket.” Boy says, “Oh. Yeah. And we’re doing a BBQ and bonfire up there, so do you have any food at your place you can eat?” Girl says, “No, you idiot, but if you’d told me even half an hour ago I could’ve though.” Okay, girl really didn’t say that, but she did communicate that with her body language, tone, attitude, and eye contact. Just not her words. Instead she said, “Well, why don't you take me back home, and I’ll change my clothes. I don’t have anything at my house to grill because I’m vegan and you know that and we’ve talked hours about how hard it is to find food I can eat when it’s a date or social event, but I guess we can see what I can find at the grocery store.” Okay, she didn’t say all that either, but basically. Then boy proceeded to tell girl about his choice of media and the movies he'd brought for them to watch in the canyon. Boy's choice of viewing wasn’t so choice. Perfect beginning to a first (and last) date.

Boy grills steak. Girl grills salmon. The food is delicious enough to at least cloud girl’s memory of how the first hour of the date went down. Then girl's chair topples down the hill with her still in it, and she remembers.

Boy hasn’t called girl since. Girl hasn’t called boy since, although she needs to because he still has her camping chair and salt shaker. And they lived happily ever after. The End.

Fake it till you make it.

Just now on my way home from visiting my cousin Laney (who, by the way, grows the sweetest strawberries I've ever tasted), I decided to remove my hanging handicap pass from my rearview mirror. If I'm to get better, I need to act like I'm healthy and think like I'm healthy. So now I'll most likely be setting up a silent auction for my two handicap passes. They've still got two good months before they expire and they look quite attractive when the sunlight hits them through your windshield. They slide easily into a purse or briefcase, and they get you rock star parking no matter where you go.

Not for Long

In two weeks my Salt Lake self is being put to rest in the city cemetery next to that hauntingly creepy ghost story woman. Long past dusk we crept over the chain link in search of her. Never found her (even though friendly Mr. Officer found us), but I've still got time. Two weeks. Two weeks to eat my oat groats with the morning cool and the box elder bug babies and my little parsley plant on the balcony. Two weeks to smile at the sycamore trees on Michigan Avenue and dream of the day I'll have my own mini window in my front door and listen to Josh Ritter tell me how hard I am to love.

Fourteen days to hike up Emigration Canyon and be able to call it my own and visit my neighbors the three rowdy tiger cubs and run across the street to catch the shuttle to campus. I've got fourteen whole days to visit my little ducky friends at Garden Park and listen to the trees in the gully and talk to the rushing water. Sometimes it's all I need. Fourteen days to not feel so far away. I still need to partake of the Patagonia Outlet, pay Park City a visit, eat at Omar's, tour the Masonic temple, meander through my favorite corners of the Avenues, discover more secret gardens, reek of camp fire, and just be one hundred percent in the moment. Walks and talks and friends I love. I'm pretty sure this is exactly what it feels like to know you're dying.

But the downtown farmers markets will bring me back at least once a week and so will the refugees and so will you. Please promise to put flowers on my grave, and I just may come back for a day. Or three. Layton feels too far away.

June

Is the smell of vine-ripened tomatoes that triggers memory after memory of watering my dad's garden to the setting California sun. And picking zucchini the size of baseball bats. It's morning sunlight and carefree wildflowers and fuzzy baby quail waddling along the back fence. It's cut grass and baseball and endless weekends. Summer storms and evening hikes and a renewed hope for romance, of course. And farmers markets and new yummy recipes and late nights with the windows open and the fire pit ablaze. And lots and lots of  beautiful words on paper that come together only at dusk. (Maybe I should've waited till dusk to write this post.)

Beauty in Life

A friend shared this video with me this morning. I needed it. Maybe you do 
too. There's hope all around us. Love you all, my friends!!

Miracle Waiting in the Wings

Barbara didn't exactly tell me what I wanted to hear, prayed to hear. As of late my prayers have definitely been taken up five notches and are more like pleadings now. It's humbling. I can almost touch God.

I've been praying that the joint pain in my right pointer finger, which has all the RA symptoms, would really just be the infection and parasites and Strep G that are in all my other joints. But when I asked Barbara to look at that finger specifically, the computer clearly said RA. My faith is often like our eyes when we're starving and pile our plates high with more food than we could ever swallow. My faith likes to accept every challenge fearlessly, but it doesn't know what patience means. So when Barbara told me it was RA, it was almost like a slap in the face. I've been so, so healthy the past couple months. Shouldn't I be better by now?

But now that I've had time to reflect, I feel like Heavenly Father is telling me, "I know you think you know what you're capable of, but Katie, I'm about to show you that you are capable of so much more." And even more powerfully He's saying, "Watch what I can do. If you'll let me, I'll work an even mightier miracle for you. You haven't seen nothin' yet." I trust Him, I do. He's healed me so many times before that I can never doubt His power, but this is to a new height. I'm wondering if He wants me to prove Him to the point that he lets me see the physical affects of RA so that He can heal me, change me visibly. It makes me heart ache because of the love He has for me and ache because I feel like a little child afraid to jump off the diving board. I guess we'll just have to see what He has in store.

PS: The most beautiful sun is making my backyard radiate and shimmer. It wants me to come out and swing for a minute and pick the pretty purple wildflowers growing through the grass. It doesn't even care that I'm still in my pajamas.