The Shadow Proves the Sunshine

                I have been told that there is a syndrome frequently experienced by brides. I don’t know what it is called, but in its most basic explanation: “you just cry all the time.” I found that to be interesting, because a girl is supposed to be super duper happy when you’re about to marry the man of your dreams. Right? But when it comes down to it, you’re still a girl. And most girls just bubble and ooze with a minimum of 16 emotions in a moment, and taking that brimful teacup and adding a steady stream of life change and excitement and goodbyes, you’re bound to slosh over onto the saucer every once in a while. Or twice a week. Or hourly. I shouldn’t over generalize, so I won’t say this is the same experience for every woman, and I quickly recognize I am probably more emotional than most. But this is definitely a good summation of the past few weeks.

                My sister once told me that she never used to cry in sad movies, even when the most devastating, unthinkable thing happened. Until she met Dusty and fell in love with the man she was to marry. Now, she cries. I think a lot of it has to do with vulnerability. It takes shedding a layer or two (or several for many) of our hard skin to be in a relationship with someone, especially commit your eternity to one person. Allowing yourself to be completely open and bare to another, imperfect human being leaves you a lot softer than before. I think part of it is also just the encounter with something so good and wonderful, someone you didn’t think could exist, and realizing it could be yours. There have been so many times when I am sent reeling at the blessings I’ve been given, including my fiancé and my job and my family. So many moments where I look at Vaughn and think “I don’t deserve that.” The grace of God that allows you to have that happiness anyway, never questioning what you’ve done to get it, sends you to your knees in thanksgiving and humility. And makes you cry all the time, because what else do you do with all that emotion? It just bubbles up and leaks out your eye balls.

                As I prepare to make this tremendous life change, I realize marriage is the complete melding of two lives. That includes every single part of my life, and his life, including the hard stuff. And somehow, a lot of memories and pain and joy resurface out of nowhere. In preparing to knit the strands of my life with another, I am unraveling the whole roll to see what’s there that I’m actually giving. I’ve analyzed how I grew up and how I turned out how I did, why I do certain things. It’s not something anyone could have warned me about, and it leaves me welling up at the slightest provocation. A child running to his mother, Christmas music, getting a card from your former piano teacher. Through these tears, some happy, some sad, I’ve learned that some of my most valuable lessons were learned from some pretty terrible circumstances. Your heart has to break before God can put it together again. Silver isn’t worth anything until it has been refined in a crazy hot furnace. It was knowing heartbreak and experiencing life without Vaughn that made our life together so certain when he came back. It was life without the Gospel that makes it so important now. It’s the storms that brought me to where I am today—that is, being unbelievably, ridiculously happy. No one could have told me that I could be this happy. An explanation never would have been sufficient. I’ve realized I’m happy because of the trials, otherwise I would not have recognized the blessings. God knows us well, and he knows what lessons we need to learn most. And those are the curveballs he throws. The ones we need. He’s not being cruel, he’s making us strong. And he's making us happy.

                This Thanksgiving, I’m making my usual list of things I’m grateful for, but I’m starting with my trials. They say gratitude is the root of all other virtues, and I think it’s because it transforms all the negative into wonderful things. Being grateful is very much a tapping into the Atonement. It builds bridges to others and mends broken hearts. It helps us see God’s artful hand at work in the details of our lives. It’s basically a kidney punch to the Adversary and messes up his plan, and replaces it with the light and joy of a Heavenly Father. 

For the sake of brevity, I won’t elaborate on these, but here’s the Annual Thanksgiving List. This year, I am thankful for:

• My current 12-hour-graveyard-shift-blue-collar job. 
• Whitworth and picking a major I was not good at. 
• Whitworth’s price (and consequential debt)
• Circumstances of my childhood
• Never being rich.
• Having a six month engagement. 
• Knowing loneliness and heartbreak
• Not having the talents I wish I did
• Not getting everything I want
• Having to work for things
• Not being good at the things I enjoy
• Not growing up Mormon
• Being Mormon now
• Those who helped me become Mormon
• Those who helped me stay Mormon
• My mom, the epitome of sacrifice and charity
• Vaughn, my puzzle piece, the other half to my whole of eternity
• Elyssa, the no-nonsense, hilarious best friend
• My dad, the hardworking, practical business man
• My sister, a slightly different version of myself with a lot more strength and talent
• My brother, the hilarious, hardworking, persistent now-husband
• My grandma, the one who always pushed me and provided me the opportunity to do so
• My friends I still talk to from childhood
• My closest friends that aren’t really geographically close 
• The Durfee family that has adopted me in from the start
• Having a prophet on the earth to guide us
• Having a temple to connect to heaven with
• Living so close to so many temples
• Having a temple in Spokane
• My endowment
• Random acts of kindness
• My new normal-scheduled-schnazzy-lab job
• Selling my housing contract
• Vaughn selling his
• Finding an apartment in the right time
• Working for some of the best people in the world
• That little old woman in the temple who, upon realizing I was engaged, leaned over, squeezed my hand, and whispered to me “I’m a widow, and was married sixty years. Marriage is wonderful.” 
• Inspired local church leaders who took me under their wing
• The various role models for the kind of wife, mother, and woman I’m striving to become
• Being raised with music
• Having people that love me
• Sunshine
• Rainy days
• Sn—actually that’s false. I don’t think I can quite say I’m thankful for snow. I don’t get snow days anymore, so there’s not much use anymore
• Books, movies, articles, people, and experiences that force me to rethink my opinions and perspective
• Slam poetry (specifically the rarities without cussing)
• Post it notes to remind
• Working as an RA
• Vaughn’s safe return home from his mission
• Knowing that people love me
• Being well taken care of
• Not having all the answers, but knowing God can handle them
• Heating and cooling systems
• Sleep to renew us
• Chocolate for those hard days
• Those who saw potential in me
• Those who see in me what I cannot see myself
• Optimistic, happy people
• Genuinely good people who do genuinely good things
• People who use their talents to bless others
• Naps to cope
• Technology progressing to allow me to have access to people, places, and scriptures from my pocket.
• Water to cleanse us inside and out
• Second chances
• Grace
• Moments of inadequacy and resignations to do better
• Bridges being built
• Strong women who embody what it means to be a woman of God, both LDS and of other faiths
• Having a degree
• Unanswered questions
• The invention of treadmills
• The restored Gospel
• The amazing access to information we have
• My savior
• The adventure of living life eternal with your best friend beginning in 34 days

I am thankful that the shadow proves the sunshine. And this Thanksgiving I am thankful for hard things too.

“And if thou shouldst be cast into the pit, or into the hands of murderers, and the sentence of death passed upon thee; if thou be cast into the deep; if the billowing surge conspire against thee; if fierce winds become thine enemy; if the heavens gather blackness, and all the elements combine to hedge up the way; and above all, if the very jaws of hell shall gape open the mouth wide after thee, know thou, my son, that all these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good.”
                                                               Doctrine & Covenants 122:7