Pillars of Strength

Today is Mother’s Day, and while it is almost the end of Mother’s Day, I wanted to write down the feelings that are currently whizzing around in my head. I thought a lot about my Mom today. This is the second Mother’s Day that I haven’t seen her in a row now. I’m excited for her to come home soon! She taught me a lot over the years. She taught me how to walk and talk (even though I still managed to screw that up for a number of years until a professional was brought in to fix it!). She taught me how to make Sunday rolls (drool worthy!). She taught me how to juggle a million different things while making my friends and family know that they are things that really mattered. She taught me how to love and how to respect people. She taught me how to drive (okay, with a little help from Dad!). She taught me how to love the Savior and how to serve him. She taught me to relax every now and then (diet coke with my feet up—I prefer Mountain Dew, but again, Dad had to be sprinkled in there somewhere!). My Mother is a pillar of strength in my life. My Mother is an amazing Woman, but I have been blessed to have many other examples of amazing Women in my life.

This weekend I ran in the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure in Salt Lake City. Three years ago it was my first 5k, now I’m training for a ½ marathon! However, this is still one of my favorite races. You don’t run this race competitively, you run it united. The Susan G. Komen Foundation is a foundation for the research of Breast Cancer. This year there were 18,000 participants at the event, many of them were survivors of Breast Cancer. My family has a strong history of Cancer, lots of variety even, but this year while I was running this race I was thinking about my Aunt Wendy. She’s another amazing woman in my life. She recently fought breast cancer and every time that we talked about it she came across as “no big deal, I can handle it”. I’m sure that behind closed doors she had her moments of doubt and worry, but when it came to the people that she loved she didn’t want us worrying and stressing about her. Aunt Wendy has always been someone that I looked up to. She was always on the move. She has become a very successful Real Estate agent in the Seattle area and loves to Travel! While battling her cancer she went on a cruise! (My kind of woman right there!) She’s my Dad’s baby sister, but I know that he respects her. I remember her coming over for dinner on Christmas and just taking a genuine interest in us. She always impressed me as being strong and determined, but knowing who she was and also showing those around her respect. She is a pillar of strength in my life.

I got to spend some time with my sister Shannon last weekend. She married her adorable husband Erik almost two years ago and they frequently invite me up for dinner. They are always willing to share their dating/marriage wisdom with me, but it isn’t what they say that really impresses me. It’s how they treat each other and how they both lived their lives before meeting each other. Shannon was 36 when she married Erik and had lived most of her adult life in Utah, part of the time with roommates and part in her own place in Bountiful. I was still very young when she went away to college, but I knew that she loved me and I missed her. It wasn’t until I was in college in Idaho that I really started building a friendship with her. I would occasionally get to come to Utah for a weekend here and there and I’d spend most of those times with Shannon. If it wasn’t for those weekends when I could run away from college life I probably would have gone nuts! We didn’t even do things that were that spectacular, but I always had a good time with Shannon. She showed me how to be happy even when life wasn’t what you had expected. She showed me the importance of having and exercising faith. She’s still teaching me about forgiveness and unconditional love. I know that she is going to make a wonderful mother and that her kids will never have to wonder if they are loved or who to turn to when they need help. She is a pillar of strength in my life.

When I was in college my sister Dani was diagnosed with Leukemia. I remember feeling so helpless and honestly, angry with the Lord. I didn’t understand why he would let something like that happen to someone so good and who still had so much to do in this life. At the time her youngest was only 6 months old. Looking back at the situation now I know that she is the only one that could have endured that with the kind of faith that she did. It was through this traumatic situation that our family became closer. We finally realized that we can’t take each other for granted and that we would be willing to do anything for each other. I’m more like her than I think that she knows. We share some of the same passions. I actually was studying from the same teachers that she had studied from at college when she was diagnosed. She used to be very firery (if that’s a word, but anyone who knows Dani, especially when she was younger, knows what I’m talking about) and full of…well…fight. Growing up with Dani around I always knew that she would fight for what she knew to be right, and she wouldn’t give up on it either. While marriage and family and health have quieted her some, I still know that if given a reason to fight she will, and she’ll win! That’s how she beat the Leukemia and that’s why she’s a pillar of strength in my life.

My sister Nicole is one of my best friends (I think that all of her sisters would say this!). She was always there for me when I was in high school and college. I can’t tell you how often we’d talk. She definitely got Mom’s nurturing side. She’s still the one that I talk to constantly and that I miss all the time. I was lucky enough to be there to help her when she had her first baby, Tyler, almost 10 year ago! Then I was there when she had Nick, almost 6 years ago, but then when she had Zoe she had to do it on her own. We had just moved to Utah a year before and she is still in Washington. Zoe was born premature and I remember hearing my Mom talk to her on the phone. I could tell that she was scared, but I knew that Nicole would figure it all out, and she did. I think that going through that alone was something that she had to do. I believe that it showed Nicole that she can do anything, it made her stronger. Yes, Mom was just a phone call away, but through that experience Nicole became Mom to her sweet little family and an example of strength and faith to me. Her love of life and practicality of each situation is refreshing and encouraging. She is so much like our Mom sometimes it’s scary! (I’m sure that she’d say the same of me!) Nicole’s faith in the Lord and her ability to overcome any situation is why she’s a pillar of strength in my life.

I have not always gotten along with my sister Suzanne. When she was in high school we fought all the time! What are sisters supposed to do that are that age right?! When she went away to college is when I finally started to recognize all of her amazing gifts and talents. I regret not getting to know her better when we were younger, but yeah, I already covered that. She recently referred to herself as a jack of all trades, master of none, but she’s isn’t totally correct in that. While yes she is extremely musically talented and very creative, she is a master mother! Her little boy adores her (so does her Husband!) and he is so intelligent and insightful. Sometimes I just have to stand back in awe of some of things that he does and says. Suzanne has an uncanny memory and her little boy has inherited that. You can tell him something and he will remember if forever! On her birthday she wrote that she didn’t picture her life as a mother with a full family. She pictured it singing Opera and travelling. While she would have been an amazing Opera singer and could still be, I know that she is right where the Lord wants her to be. She is an example to me of having the courage to try new things and to reach outside of the box while continuing the work set out for you. She doesn’t really let anything stop her from exploring new territory! She’s done music; including the French horn, tuba, drum major, opera singing, broadwayish musicals, choirs and instructing voice lessons, become a digital scrapbook designer, makes and sells children’s clothing and is a budding photographer, to list a few. I do believe that she inherited our Father’s need to learn new things and put them to use and to just figure out how things work. Suzanne’s drive to expand her horizon while being a fantastic Mother and wife is one reason why she is a pillar of strength in my life.

There have been many more women in my life that are examples of faith, courage, strength, honesty, love and respect to name a few. To all of those women, and to these women in particular, thank you for making me who I am today and the kind of wife and mother that I hope to be in the future. I love you all!