My Village Green

One of the highlights of my collegiate career was the day Adrian Pulfer changed the design curriculum from  "Debating the Virtues of Serifs" to watching The Man Who Planted Trees, the 30-minute animated short that won an Academy Award in 1988. I had already pledged allegiance to the mighty acorn thanks to the deciduous play days of my Missouri childhood but this cranked it up a notch. Years later, after Amazon but before Youtube, I bought the DVD for somewhere in the $70 region. I loved it that much. This is the blurb on the back of the case:

The Man Who Planted Trees (based on the story by Jean Giono) tells the story of a solitary shepherd who patiently plants and nurtures a forest of thousands of trees, single-handedly transforming his arid surroundings into a thriving oasis. Undeterred by two World Wars, and without any thought of personal reward, the shepherd tirelessly sows his seeds and acorns with the greatest care. As if by magic, a barren landscape grows green again. A film of great beauty and hope, this story is a remarkable parable for all ages and an inspiring testament to the power of one person.

Parables are magic because their meanings can vary depending on the vantage point they are viewed from. The 20-something artist and believer in me couldn't help but gawk at the mesmerizing illustrations and add my witness to the moral of the tale. The 40-something veteran who recently put the crib in storage loves it for reasons much deeper.

The defining experience in my life thus far has been waiting for and receiving my boys.* I think I typically remember it like this: years of desert, babies arrived, BAM! instant oasis. The babies fixed all. But rewatching this movie corrected my synthesis; I saw my personal landscape morph through a time-lapse capture and was shocked I had missed the obvious.

I had missed the acorns.

Year in and year out Heavenly Father planted many presoaked and hand-selected acorns in my life knowing their slow, consistent presence would change my wasteland to a government-protected, sprawling French forest. Friends with roots, who weren't going anywhere, began to stake claims in my happiness. Their growth slowed the howling winds; they buffered the reality of my elements. Their goodness attracted more life; where there was once only windswept rock a bunny now nibbled on yellow flowers near a brook.

Elder Jeffrey R. Holland said, "We may not be able to alter the journey, but we can make sure no one walks it alone." Acorns didn't change my path—I still had to walk the long road to Labor & Delivery that was meant for me—but they did change my life. Scenery shifting for another man's travels is no small feat. For years I begged Don't leave me here alone and He remained my companion; I came to know God from glimpsing his reflection in every polished acorn around me.

The thing with my acorns is that individually they were each exactly what I needed when they sprouted in my life. Are there made-to-order acorns? Of course there are! Heavenly Father is the paternal pinpoint planter! Sometimes I needed a crying shoulder, sometimes I just needed a laugh. Sometimes I needed wisdom, other times I needed a girls' night out. Once I got hard news on the phone when I was driving and needed someone close; I flipped a U-turn and was at an acorn's house in less than a minute. I needed prayers and hope. I needed phone calls, porch chats, and walks around the block. I needed empathetic surprise visits. I needed arts and crafts. I needed someone else to magnify what was beautiful in the world. And, when it was finally time, I needed a big ol' baby shower!

My babies were miracles, no doubt, but they might not have seemed as such if they had been born on a dry, thirsty day over a lonely parcel of dirt. My babies' birth certificates declare the extraordinary environment they took their first breaths in. Place of birth: Tight and Happy Village, Bustling Town Square, Beside a Deep Well Filled Years Before by Chosen Acorns

Ah, the power of acorns. You have to be patient if you plant an acorn but my destiny was to witness the production of a forest from the potential of ground zero. I was a spectator to creation, thinning, mingling, towering, and the subsequent chirps, buzzes, and bouquets they offered.

I wanted a big change, one that came wrapped in a swaddle blanket cocoon, so much that I nearly missed the big picture, the one of a wooded village green caused by small and simple acorns. They were underfoot every step of my way, doing their best to create itty-bitty-turned-oaky miracles.

*The second was moving. I needed a love parade on my way out of town and a scrapbook full of Polaroids to prove the forest was real. I also needed a little sack of acorns to stick around and punctuate the fragile overlap of my old and new life. The Lord provided in that regard, too.

Quote by Elder Holland taken from "Bearing One Another's Burdens", Ensign, June 2018

Link to the film

Panorama

A few thoughts on Patriot Day:

----------

The 10 Most Spectacular Panoramic Views in the United States

(According to the Society of American Travel Writers)

1. New York City, as seen from the top of the Empire State Building, Staten Island ferry, across the Hudson River, or when flying into the city at night
2. The Grand Canyon, from either the South or North rim
3. Helicopter views of the Na Pali Cliffs and coastline of Kauai
4. Monument Valley
5. San Francisco, from the Golden Gate Bridge
6. Yosemite Valley
7. The Chicago skyline, from a boat on Lake Michigan
8. Big Sur, California
9. Diamond Head, Honolulu
10. The National Mall, Washington, D.C.

Honorable Mentions: View from the Space Needle, Niagara Falls from Freedom Bridge, Bryce Canyon, the summit of Pikes Peak, and the Blue Ridge Parkway through Virginia and North Carolina

I've been lucky enough to see several of these panoramas (just not the two in Utah, go figure) but I never saw the Twin Towers. My first trip to Manhattan wasn't until 2005.

----------

Andrew "Little Tiger" Enke posted a picture of this quote from the 9/11 Museum a year ago:

"Hey Jules, this is Brian. Ah, listen...I'm on an airplane that has been hijacked...if things don't go well, and they're not looking good, I want you to know that I absolutely love you. I want you to do good, have good times, same with my parents. I'll see you when you get here. I want you to know that I totally love you. Bye, babe, hope I will call you." Brian Sweeney, passenger, United Airlines Flight 175

His caption read, "As I read the last line, I cannot imagine what his wife felt as she waited for his phone call which would never come. As we often use the phrase never forget I would invite all of you who see this post to never forget but also to always remember to let your family know how much you love them. Life is too short to hold onto grudges. If you haven't already, call your mother, father, son, daughter, brother, sister, spouse, or friend and let them know how important they are to you."

I really love Andrew. He was my college roommate's little brother and the same age as my little brother. When I'd sleep at Meagan's house on special weekends Andrew would be practicing drums in his room or eating a sixth bowl of cereal in his flannel pants. Now he's all grown up, Seattle's Husband and Dad of the Year, and the only person that teases me about boiling turkey carcasses every Thanksgiving.

----------

My new neighbor was vacationing in Hawaii on January 13 of this year. He was awakened by the odd phone alarm and incoming message

BALLISTIC MISSILE THREAT

INBOUND TO HAWAII. SEEK

IMMEDIATE SHELTER. THIS IS NOT

A DRILL. JAN 13, 8:07 AM

He said that facing imminent death brought this train of thoughts:

1. My wife is with me. (relief)

2. My temple recommend is current. (relief)

3. I have no enemies at this moment. I am in good standing with my fellow man. (relief)

He spent the next few minutes trying to call or text his children to tell them he loved them. He didn't reach all of them but left messages. It was 38 minutes until the false alarm was announced.

----------

I watched Boatlift on Youtube today. What a good eleven minutes. I cried when all the boats surged to the seawall and when the man at the end said he never wants to say "I should have...". 

----------

If you line up enough lives and truly look at them you'll see a panorama of the most beautiful shapes in the world: love, sacrifice, forgiveness, connection, remembrance, and rescue.

Paper Mate

BACK TO SCHOOL = flashbacks of Dad giving me a father's blessing and a new Pink Pet eraser in the wood-heavy kitchen at 405. I commemorated each scholastic new year by rubbing my thumb over the eraser like a worry rock the length of my bus ride. Ramona Quimby's dad gave her a pink eraser, too, if I remember the books correctly. I also have Ramona's hair. Unfair but true.

I will forever associate a smooth, unused, pink rectangle with new beginnings, equal amounts nervousness and anticipation, and feeling loved by my dad. I am passing the tradition on, although Pink Pearls caused the extinction of Pink Pets and therefore Pearls are all I can offer my swine, I mean kids.

Did you know pink is a noun meaning the best condition or degree? So a pink eraser is technically the best, finest, most perfect eraser.

The Atonement of Jesus Christ is a cosmic pink eraser so big and perfecting it has infinite faces and vertices. My most heavily used face is INFIRMITIES; the open umbrella houses every ache and sorrow I've physically or emotionally felt. It quells pains even I can't speak about. Where the river is deepest it makes the least noise.

I apply the angle of TEMPTATIONS for strength and AFFLICTIONS for endurance. SUCCOR races to revive when I'm fading. SICKNESSES cures better than bone broth. MERCY cools when I'm in personal Hell. An unusual surface is FORGET, where I beg the Savior to fuzz out old memories of being wronged so I can stop refueling the flame of offense. I have rubbed SINS raw; I'm forever blowing pink sawdust off life's loose leaf paper.

I love office supplies but school can be hard. 

I recently found a new side of the eraser for a dark but necessary experience in my editing: HONEST MISTAKES. Have you ever gone about your merry way, trying your very best, and somehow left a wake of destruction behind you? It's the worst. This kind of unsuspecting screw-up feels like acid eating your insides while your bright eyes and bushy tail drain out of the holes it made. But the pink eraser is perfect. The Atonement of Jesus Christ isn't just for BIG MISTAKES, INTENTIONAL MISTAKES, or STUPID MISTAKES. It can handle HONEST MISTAKES, HOT FLASHES OF ACID, and LOST FAITH IN ONESELF. In fact, I even found the GET BACK UP AND TRY AGAIN and I LOVE YOU FOR WHO YOU ARE AND WE CAN WORK WITH THIS facets.

BACK TO SCHOOL = blessings and erasers and the blessing of erasers. I show my work to get partial credit for wrong answers, my chicken scratches reveal the need for a tutor and paper mate. The teacher, the Perfector, stays late just for me again and again.

I continue to learn how much my Heavenly Father loves me and how relentless my grasp of Christ's Atonement needs to be.

Photo quote from "Abide With Me" written by Henry F. Lyte.

UPDATE: This arrived in my mailbox today after a two-day blizzard (maybe it arrived yesterday, actually, but my mailbox was frozen shut and I couldn't open it until today) and its contents made my heart swell all the way to the shores of Baltic Sea, where I hope a swan will deliver a look of serene gratitude to my soul sister and kindred spirit, Siostra Dixon, for her Priority kindness and exotic postage stamps:

Intaglio

Well, son, I'll tell you:
Life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
It's had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor—
Bare.
But all the time 
I'se been a-climbin' on,
And reachin' landin's,
And turnin' corners,
And sometimes goin' in the dark
Where there ain't been no light.
So, boy, don't you turn back.
Don't you set down on the steps.
'Cause you finds it's kinder hard.
Don't you fall now—
For I'se still goin', honey,
I'se still climbin',
And life for me ain't been no crystal stair. 

"Mother To Son" by Langston Hughes

This etching was made by a process called intaglio, which means "to engrave a design into a material". Little lines are etched in a surface (I used metal plates when I took the class at BYU but this one was carved in wood), ink is rubbed into the scratches, the negative area is buffed as inkless as wanted with a cloth, and the plate is run through a press to create a print. I found intaglio extremely difficult.

This particular intaglio depicts a scene from Gethsemane: the beginning of Christ engraving the ultimate love for mankind upon himself. So many lines for each of us. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands. 

Because this sacrifice was real I should be focusing on my own engraving, on mimicking perfection with my holy designs. I say unto you, can ye look up to God at that day with a pure heart and clean hands? I say unto you, can you look up, having the image of God engraven upon your countenances? 

Intaglio can be really messy if you're Melissa Lawson. (Even messier than Melissa eating lettuce wraps at PF Chang's. Am I the only one with soy sauce running off my elbow when I eat those?) Holding a wad of cloth and buffing sticky, inked metal till the end of time seems doable until my fingertips, palm, and the beveled edge of the plate I'm holding are all soiled. Once I even dipped my hands in kerosene to strip the ink off. Not smart. I shudder to think what I did to my cells via osmosis. Let's just say it's a crazy song and dance to properly apply and remove ink without tainting one's flesh.

Life can also be really messy if you're Melissa Lawson. I thought I had talent and even called myself an artist but the truth is I ain't no pro. I'm a pure heart who often comes up short in the clean hands department. I'm scratched and scored, carved to my core. My crosshatches wildly detail the botching of one test and the failing of another. However, I'm full of both painful embarrassment and true devotion, so I just keep buffing over my disgrace in hopes of creating an acceptable print. Please, Lord, give me credit for trying. I am a mess but I'm trying.

The beautiful truth is that I do get credit for trying. So I'm staying in the studio—shadows, smears, and all. What really matters is that His hands are clean, His work is perfect, and that He vowed in the garden to help me with my mess.

Detail from Jesus Praying in the Garden by Gustave Doré. Scriptures cited: Isaiah 49:16, Alma 5:19.

For Carrie, who climbed the non-crystal stairs to Bhutan's Tiger's Nest, made me a stupa, and recited this poem in a way I'll never forget.

West

 [FOR ARCHER'S BOOK]

It was by faith that a small band of early converts in the eastern United States moved from New York to Ohio and from Ohio to Missouri and from Missouri to Illinois in their search for peace and freedom to worship God according to the dictates of conscience.

It was through the eyes of faith that they saw a city beautiful, Nauvoo, when first they walked across the swamps of Commerce, Illinois. With the conviction that faith without works is dead, they drained that swampland, they platted a city, they built substantial homes and houses for worship and education and, crowning all, a magnificent temple, then the finest building in all of Illinois.

Persecution soon followed, with profane and murderous mobs. Their prophet was killed. Their dreams were shattered. Again it was by faith that they pulled themselves together under the pattern he had previously drawn and organized themselves for another exodus.

With tears and aching hearts they left their comfortable homes and their workshops. They looked back on their sacred temple, and then with faith turned their eyes to the West, to the unknown and to the uncharted, and while the snows of winter fell upon them, they crossed the Mississippi that February of 1846 and plowed their muddy way over the Iowa prairie.

With faith they established Winter Quarters on the Missouri River. Hundreds died as plague and dysentery and black canker cut them down. But faith sustained those who survived. They buried their loved ones there on a bluff above the river, and in the spring of 1847 they started toward the mountains of the West.

It was by faith that Brigham Young looked over the Salt Lake valley, then hot and barren, and declared, “This is the place.” Again by faith, four days later, he touched his cane to the ground and said, “Here will be the temple of our God.” The magnificent and sacred Salt Lake Temple is a testimony of faith, not only of the faith of those who built it but of the faith of those who now use it in a great selfless labor of love.

Theirs was a vision, transcendent and overriding all other considerations. When they came west they were a thousand miles, a thousand tedious miles, from the nearest settlements to the east and eight hundred miles from those to the west. A personal and individual recognition of God their Eternal Father to whom they could look in faith was of the very essence of their strength. They believed in that great scriptural mandate: “Look to God and live.” (Alma 37:47.) With faith they sought to do his will. With faith they read and accepted divine teaching. With faith they labored until they dropped, always with a conviction that there would be an accounting to him who was their Father and their God.

The power that moved our gospel forebears was the power of faith in God. It was the same power which made possible the exodus from Egypt, the passage through the Red Sea, the long journey through the wilderness, and the establishment of Israel in the Promised Land.

We need so very, very much a strong burning of that faith in the living God and in his living, resurrected Son, for this was the great, moving faith of our gospel forebears.

Behind us is a glorious history. It is bespangled with heroism, tenacity to principle, and unflagging fidelity. It is the product of faith.

Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Gordon B. Hinckley, pp. 83-84, artwork is The End of Parley’s Street, by Glen S. Hopkinson

It's Pioneer Day, a holiday here in Utah. We celebrate the perennially strong men and women who triumphed over their trek and plotted, dug, and prospered our desert. We celebrate the miracle of the cricket-gobbling, crop-saving seagulls. I personally celebrate the organized grid system and clean angles of our cities. I make butter by shaking whipping cream, a pinch of salt, and a single marble in a cold jar and spread it on homemade biscuits to teach my kids how it used to be done. I also eat jerky on Pioneer Day, not because of any specific story but because jerky is old school and I love it. You can tie it up in your knapsack and gnaw on it for hours. Greg and I both ate some of Costco's Korean BBQ jerky before breakfast. That stuff is addictive! We sing "Come, Come, Ye Saints" more times than normal and every time we hit Archer's 3rd verse his eyes squint and he beams. I will never stop reminding that kid he's my West, that we all have a trek to endure, and that God's promises are sure.

I miss President Hinckley and the beautiful way he spoke. (Who else ever used bespangled in a sentence?) I love the succinct way he described the Mormons finally reaching Zion. Because I'm always on high-alert for snippets to do with my kids' names, I marked some special sentences in bold. I felt a little surge of pride (the good kind) when I read those lines. I know something of turning my eyes to the uncharted (but prophesied!) vision of the West. I have locked up a cozy workshop and gone for it only to meet a blizzard. I know what it feels like to be completely isolated, thousands of miles from my dream, having to trump science, time, the odds, and fear with faith. I looked above the cloudy unknown for years and focused on the one true source of my faith until I saw Him in high-definition. I feel qualified to call myself a pioneer. I hope I never forget or make light of the hardships and the miracles that preceded Archer.

Zion is real. He's wearing a dinosaur shirt and basketball shorts in the next room.