Category: LDS

  • flashback

    The other day my Mom handed some xeroxed pages to me, saying she’d been going through the boxes in the garage.

    I looked down and saw two articles about cancer of the pancreas. Articles I’d found in my research in the Science Library at UCI. I was 8 months pregnant with C when Dad was diagnosed, and just 3 months away from graduating with a biology degree. Dad has asked me to do some research for him. To find the best treatment because his doctor hadn’t given him much hope.

    I’d spent the day poring over medical books. I found one surgeon’s name that kept appearing over and over again. I told Dad I thought his best hope was with this “A.R. Moossa” that was doing a cutting-edge surgery with some promising survival rates. The articles I held in my hands were written by Dr. Moossa. It was a few days later that we learned that Dr. Moossa had recently taken a position in San Diego. And within a few days of that Dad was on his way down for a consultation.

    I like the notes I wrote in the margins of the articles. My printing is strong and clear, nothing like the lopsided and illegible chickenscratching that I now produce.

    I wrote–
    Dad:
    I feel very encouraged that your hopes are high. I think that this surgery will be hard–it’s very involved, but it seems to me that it will give you a fighting chance.
    I would really like to talk to you after you read these articles to see how you feel about the surgery. Also, I’ll be happy to answer any questions (if I can!). I am praying very hard that you can find the best surgeon or treatment.
    No matter what the future holds, I will always be thankful to you for being such a great Dad & I feel peace in knowing that we have a forever family.
    I love you Dad.
    Jana

    I never met Dr. Moossa. Because of my high-risk pregnancy, I didn’t dare travel far from Irvine. But Dad and Mom stopped by my place as they were driving down I-405 to SD. Dad had the surgery. He was still receovering on the night that I gave birth. I called him and he talked me through the contractions, sangs songs with me, and gave me a father’s blessing over the phone.

    Two of my strongest memories: Dad holding C–his first grandchild–for the first time. A few weeks later, me holding C cradled in the crook of one arm, and grasping Dad’s hand with the other. Watching both of them breathing. C’s barely audible breath sweet against my cheek. Dad choking, gasping for air. During a long lonely night.

  • FYI…

    Some of you might be interested in my latest exponentblog post about menstruation. I’d appreciate if you would take a minute to read it and share your thoughts.

    Also, John’s latest entry about his experience watching the Vagina Monologues is a nice companion piece to mine, IMO.

  • toes & tofu

    Ok, this article about DNA and The Book of Mormon was front page LATimes today. A part of me is tempted to address this article and its relevance to the Mo church & culture.

    But the other part of me is strongly resisting that urge. Instead I will tell you that I have a really bad cut on my middle toe that’s infected and oozy. I’ll spare you the picture and just let you imagine it. Not a pretty sight. When you’ve got so few toes to start with, even the tiniest cut on one of them hurts really bad.

    And I’ll also tell you that I just ate a block of marinated tofu. Plain, cold, tofu. Yum. Yay for companies that make protein so palatable and digestible.

    So by juxtaposing my comments about toesores and tofu I am in no way saying that the Lamanite DNA problem is anything like my sore toe–that will fester for awhile and eventually heal after I pour lots of apologetics (I mean hydrogen peroxide) on it. Nor am I saying that reading the Book of Mormon is much more palatable when it is processed into bite-size flavored curds.
    :)

  • toes & tofu

    Ok, this article about DNA and The Book of Mormon was front page LATimes today. A part of me is tempted to address this article and its relevance to the Mo church & culture.

    But the other part of me is strongly resisting that urge. Instead I will tell you that I have a really bad cut on my middle toe that’s infected and oozy. I’ll spare you the picture and just let you imagine it. Not a pretty sight. When you’ve got so few toes to start with, even the tiniest cut on one of them hurts really bad.

    And I’ll also tell you that I just ate a block of marinated tofu. Plain, cold, tofu. Yum. Yay for companies that make protein so palatable and digestible.

    So by juxtaposing my comments about toesores and tofu I am in no way saying that the Lamanite DNA problem is anything like my sore toe–that will fester for awhile and eventually heal after I pour lots of apologetics (I mean hydrogen peroxide) on it. Nor am I saying that reading the Book of Mormon is much more palatable when it is processed into bite-size flavored curds.
    :)

  • minerva

    Thinking about Minerva Teichert today. She’s got to be one of my all-time favorite artists (LDS or otherwise). She’s also an inspiration in many other ways.

    But the best part about Minerva is that this woman knew how to use RED!

  • grace

    Reading this post by Brookewill gave me the kernel of an idea that I needed to complete a short piece that I’ve been trying to write about grace.

    Grace is an almost foreign concept in the Mo world. Though we espouse a belief in both grace and works, the balance of doctrine and ritual weigh in on the side of works. So when a friend suggested that I write about a moment grace I was hard-pressed to do so. Though my favorite hymn is “Amazing Grace” (not in the Mormon hymnal, btw), I have rarely thought through the concept or tried to apply it to my own religious practice or belief.

    So here’s my moment of “grace”:

    When I was 12 I was boy-crazy.Sometimes I even kissed boys in the halls at school.Enjoying the power the promise of such kisses held.Imagining myself a winsome beauty.Relishing the whispers of girls who gossiped about such things.Knowing that I was the center of scandal.

    When I was 13 and I was diagnosed with bone cancer, I started to feel guilty about my boy-craziness.When someone suggested that my cancer was God’s way of punishing me for kissing boys during my lunch hour, I believed them.I knew I was supposed to wait for such things until I was 16, or I was engaged to a good Mormon boy.Maybe God knew that only way to for me to ever end up worthy for the temple was to make me so sick that I no longer thought about boys.

    Now, with the temple marriage behind me and more than twenty years since my diagnosis, I still wonder why I got cancer. But I recently gave up the belief that my cancer was God’s doing.He and I have talked about that.And I now know that it was as hard on him as it was on me.

  • exponent

    For those of you interested in the Mo world, check out my inagural post on exponentblog.

    I’ve been asked to be a bi-weekly columnist. I’m humbled by the request because I’m following in the footsteps of women who I’ve long admired for their tenacity, humor, and honesty.

  • trailer

    For fans of God’s Army…Dutcher’s done it again.

  • boathouse


    boathouse
    Originally uploaded by pilgrimgirl.

    On Saturday Caroline and I got up at 6:30 to go canoeing. That was 6:30 a.m. CT time, which meant 3:30 CA time (yawn!). When we got down to the lake we realized that the canoes were not conveniently located by our cabins, but were across the lake from us.

    After a few hesitant moments, we headed off at a trot around the lake. What made it all more interesting was that I had forgotten my coat (left it on the floor of my bedroom back home) and it was COLD! I also hadn’t worn my leg (didn’t want to get the computerized knee wet), so I was on crutches. To my surprise the 1/2 mi hike around the lake goes pretty fast when you are freezing and it is 3 a.m. and you haven’t eaten and you are wearing a coat that you kifed from your still-sleeping bunkmate.

    The paddling turned out to be delightful. All the more so because we were accompanied by one of the well-known founding mothers of ExII. What fun to get to know her better!

    By the time I had crutched to the boathouse and back and paddled for half an hour, my arms were about ready to fall off. After a hasty breakfast I headed back to bed for an hour…

  • worship

    One of the most beautiful sights I’ve seen:
    Last night E spread her homework around on the living room floor. She sprawled her own body out in the middle of textbooks, papers, pencils/pens, erasers, etc. As she tapped her toes together while doing math problems, well, it rivaled the most beautiful painting on the Louvre. To see her wholly absorbed in the moment as her pencil moved across the paper, to have her look up at me every once in awhile and confirm a math question. To see the small ringlet curls that had escaped her ponytail, and the way they framed her face.

    John, C and E can always capture my complete attention. To me they are the most disarmingly beautiful creatures. Perhaps it is sacrilege to say that I worship them. But I do. I devote most of my life in serving and loving these three people. They are my trinity.

    It brings to mind a quotation from Jeffrey Holland that I heard a lot this summer. He said “Heaven just wouldn’t be heaven without my wife and children there.” I agree with him wholeheartedly. But I can also say that, for me, every day _is_ heaven. Because every day I mingle with deity.

  • from the mouths of babes…

    Last night E told me that I’m building a house. I looked at her, puzzled. She replied:

    “Well you have AROOM and you have an Outhouse, so I guess you should just go ahead and get the whole house.”

    I giggled at her insight. AROOM is my reading/writing group (it stands for A Room Of Our Own Making–an allusion to Virginia Woolf that’s highly appropriate for our all-female group). Outhouse is what we call the group of liberal Mormons that we meet with every Wednesday night [The name came from a funny discussion about a year ago that we had about “in-house” versus “out-house” intellectuals. The name seems to fit our ragtag group of Mo’s pretty well and has stuck ever since].

    I’d never thought about the group names in relation to an actual architectural structure. But, in a way, it’s apt. For, as a result of these groups I’ve found a community of friends to call “home.”

  • name

    Guess I’ll feel really comfortable in my Mormon community now that I have an “official” Mo name. Here it is:
    My Mormon name is An’Janae.
    John’s is even cooler than mine:
    His Mormon name is Jadon.
    What’s yours?