A Lovely Leeeeeeap

On my computer I keep a folder called "Stuff I like." This is one of the pictures in it. Isn't it neato? Jummmping. Flyyyyying. Soarrring.

Things and People I love today:

Thelma, the lady I work at the temple with, who is a HOOT, let me just tell you
The song "Samson" by Regina Spektor...also "Free Fallin'" by John Mayor (wowie, it is awesome)
Perusing the aisles of Target at night
The fact that my brother is in town, and we are having a breakfast party tomorrow!
Crazy wacko tights
Friends who are wise and insightful and share their nuggets of knowledge with me (even when I don't deserve them)
Curry...mmmmmm
My jeep, Harvey, who is a studmuffin
Long phone calls with my Mom
Happy memories and exciting hopes
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (which I love every day...if you didn't know already, it is my FAVORITE book - if you've not read it, today is your day.)
The book I'm currently listening to on my iPod: When We Were Orphans by Kazou Ishiguro

Thursday night...and a stuffy nose

Today is Thursday.

But it is almost Friday.

It is that in-between time of the night when I am too tired to brush my teeth and I just wish I was already in my bed. But instead, here I am, still in my MTC skirt, on my little chair. Typing to you.

Today was a good one. Tonight my elders were a little...riled up, shall we say. It was their first P-Day Eve, so they were giddy.

Tonight we focused all on the Book of Mormon. We made a massive explosive brainstorm on our classroom whiteboard of all the things we love about that book, and by the end I was writing so fast and furiously all the ideas they were shouting that my handwriting about couldn't be read. We put up names...words...stories...inspirational moments.

Have you read it?

If not, ...do.

If you have, ...read it again.

I will do it too.

Because it moves me everytime in new ways. And not just the book as a whole...
...but eensy verses...phrases...clauses, if you will...

I will never forget one time that I was reading the Book of Mormon on my mission. I was in Hialeah, Florida, newly arrived to the Ft. Lauderdale mission. That was a very delicate and strange and wonderful and horrific time of my life. One day in the little Gleneagles apartment where I lived for six months I found myself with time to read the Book of Mormon. My companion was taking a nap for some reason that I've forgotten, but it was me, there in that strange little space, reading that day. I read 1 Nephi 8, Lehi's account of the Vision of the Tree of Life and it was like, even though I'd read it many times before, that

I was reading it for the first time

That's what it felt like. It filled me joy and an unbelievable realization that God knows exactly. Who. I. Am. And what I'm going through. That sometimes life feels like walking through a mist of darkness...but if we call His name He'll lead us to the tree.

I sat there, me at my desk in that little apartment with my companion slumbering...and I cried. I held the book to my chest and I cried and cried because through it I knew God saw me.

It's time for me to go to bed now. I just wanted you to know that God knows who you are too.

Psstt... read the Book of Mormon.