Being a Victim

I have been a victim in my life.  It is not something I like to talk about or even remember.  I actually prefer to not think about those times.  So much so, that I really don't remember a lot of things about my childhood and even parts of my adulthood.  Occasionally I worry that I have a true memory problem because so much is a blank. 

But, because of it, I know what it is like to be angry.  I know what it is like to want others to suffer like they have made me and mine suffer.  I know what it is like to want life to be fair and just.  I know what it means to desire justice for someone who has wronged me.  Because of all I have been through, I also know what it is like to truly forgive.  I know how it feels when the burden is lifted off of my own shoulders.  I know what a miracle forgiveness can be, not only for the person who has wronged me, but for myself. 

It is amazing how much relief I can feel when I turn it over to the Lord.  If I can't trust Him, who can I trust?  I know that only He can know when someone has really repented.  If they do not, than it is up to Him to judge.  He will do it fairly and lovingly.  And isn't that all any of us can ask for? 

I know in my own life that I have also sinned.  I am sure that I have hurt someone else's feelings or caused pain.  I know that I want to be forgiven of my own sins.  I know that the atonement was for each and every one of us so that we can be forgiven.  I really believe that if I want the atonement to work for me, I have to also allow it to be utilized for those who have hurt me. 

Now, don't get me wrong, I don't think that Heavenly Father expects us to pretend that some things never happened.  Even though there is forgiveness, there are still consequences.  The Lord does not take those away.  We still need to keep ourselves and our loved ones safe and secure. 

So, I use my own attitude to help me determine if I have forgiven or if I still need to pray and work harder on it.  If I can think about the person and the act without getting angry and hurt all over again, than I have finally let it go.  If I can love the person in spite of their shortcomings, than I have forgiven.  Then I can move on with grace and gratitude for His love and forgiveness in my own life.  If I still get angry and hurt, then I have found it helps to pray for the person, sometimes several times a day, until those feelings pass.

The one thing I have discovered is that usually the person who hurt me, doesn't care how I feel about them.  I don't hurt them to stay angry, I only hurt myself.  I tear myself up inside wanting revenge instead of turning it over to the Lord and feeling His peace. 

I don't know about you, but peace seems to be a much more welcome answer for me.  I am reminded of the words to one of my favorite hymns,

 

Be still, my soul: the Lord is on thy side.
With patience bear thy cross of grief or pain.
Leave to thy God to order and provide;
In every change, He faithful will remain.
Be still, my soul: thy best, thy heavenly Friend
Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.

Be still, my soul: thy God doth undertake
To guide the future, as He has the past.
Thy hope, thy confidence let nothing shake;
All now mysterious shall be bright at last.
Be still, my soul: the waves and winds still know
His voice Who ruled them while He dwelt below.

Be still, my soul: the hour is hastening on
When we shall be forever with the Lord.
When disappointment, grief and fear are gone,
Sorrow forgot, love's purest joys restored.
Be still, my soul: when change and tears are past
All safe and blessed we shall meet at last.

Memoir Monday - Childhood Fear

What is something you were afraid of as a child?

For me, it was always the dark.  I was terrified of the night.  That blanket of darkness that would swoop down and take away my sight.  My heart would thump in my chest and I just knew that something awful was going to happen to me. 

The darkness was something that hid my deepest fears.  The monsters that went bump in the night came from there.  I had a very vivid imagination.  I still do actually, and to this day, I won’t watch scary movies. 

During that time of my life, my brother and I shared a room, and I would lay awake, long after he was sleeping, watching in the darkness.  One night, I saw eyes in my window.  They were shiny in the night.  I was terrified, too scared to even scream.  I could see the face trying to look in the window.   It became my first real experience with prayer.  I had just learned about using prayer to calm a troubled heart.  I know that I clasped my hands together tightly and prayed with all my might.  I was too afraid to close my eyes, but in spite of that, eventually the eyes went away and I was able to go to sleep.  I have never forgotten the comforting feeling that washed through me when I prayed.  I knew that all would be well.  I felt safe for the first time in the darkness.

I was fine in the dark when someone was with me, even if it were my younger brother or sister.  I could handle being in the night as long as I wasn’t alone.  As I grew into a teenager, we would spend evenings walking in the quiet desert.  We could see the brilliance of the stars overhead and the welcome light from the full moon.  Sometimes we would light a fire in one of the sandy washes and roast marshmallows while talking and laughing.  The desert is a wonderful place with friends. 

You could smell the mesquite trees in the spring and especially after a rain.  There is nothing quite like the smell of the rain in the washes of the desert.  The first few sprinkles will bring out the smell of mesquite and of earth.  If I close my eyes, the memory still comes back to me;  the thunder in the distance, crashing in large, jagged lightening streaks in the sky, the smells of rain all around me and the sounds of a summer thunderstorm.

It was the aloneness that got to me.  We lived in the city, but back then, it was quiet at night.  There were big river toads that came out in the monsoon season in the desert.  There were owls and hawks.  There were crickets that made a loud symphony of sound in the evening twilight. 

I remember walking outside my door one night and finding a frog on the doorstep that was bigger than one of my shoes.  It scared me sitting there all silent and creepy, then it’s throat bubbled out and it made a very loud sound.  I was not expecting that! 

I have never quite gotten over my fear of darkness.  It feels like anything can happen once the lights are gone and then I become afraid.  I am good when my husband is home, but I don’t like being the only adult in the house at night.  Usually, I need to leave the television on so that I am comforted by the sound of other voices. 

It is funny how that one childhood fear has stayed with me all my life.  Even now, when I am old enough to know better, the fear is still there. 

Today, we live in a small town.  There are no lights after dark and it is a deep dark that surrounds us.  I still find myself afraid when I am alone.  I still have a need to others to be with me.  I still want to feel protection.  I don’t like the dark, but without it, I would never see the stars that twinkle brightly overhead.  I would not see the face of the man in the moon looking down at me and my silly fear.  I would miss the sound of the night whispering in my ears. 

I have learned that with others, I can face my fear of the night. 

Wordless Wednesday - Hey Mom!

A single photo 

– no words –

capturing a moment from our lives.

A simple, special, extraordinary moment.

A moment

I want to pause, savor and remember.

A moment

that brings a smile to my lips, 

and joy to my heart.

Monday Memoirs- Reminiscences

So, I am trying to start something new on Mondays.  I am learning to research my own ancestors, and am using words and sentences to help me remember parts of my own life as well.  I want to leave a Legacy for my own family to find.  So, the challenge is to write about the prompt and come back here and link up to share what you have written.   There is no time limit, so write however you would like too.  Write a sentence, paragraph or page but write something today!  Don't forget to come back with your link!

REMINISCENCES

Where did you attend first grade?

Memory Triggers- Favorite teacher, classroom walls, best 1st grade friend, favorite activity.

I went to first grade at Laird Elementary School in Tempe AZ.  I don't even remember the name of my first grade teacher, although I do know that I loved her.  She was kind to me.  School was about 1/2 mile from my house, and I walked with the other neighborhood kids every day.  This would have been around 1965 and we were not allowed to wear pants or shorts to school.   I had "dirty blond" hair (that is a color by the way and it was not actually dirty!) and also white glasses that were very visible on my face.  

My mother said that I broke everything, so she bought me glasses for kids that were plastic.  They were very old fashioned and I cringe even today when I see things like them come back in style.  Amazing how the things that go around come back around again, even when they really should stay gone.  

The girls all had to wear dresses to school.  It wasn't until I got into the older grades that I learned how to sneak shorts under my dresses.  In first grade, I did not know those things.  I was a tom boy and loved to swing and slide and run and was forever ruining my dresses.  I remember wishing that I could be a boy so that I could wear pants.  

We had to be polite in first grade.  We did workbooks and writing and learned our letters too.  We also learned classical music and listened to it often in class.  I loved school when I was young.  I wanted to do well, but really struggled sometimes.  I think I was a bit of a daydreamer and that was frowned upon by the school.  We were supposed to draw what we were told and write what we were told and really not think for ourselves.  

I learned to read in first grade.  It was very boring stuff called "Fun with Jack and Jill".  I remember because I didn't like those books, but they opened up a different world for me later on.  Our slide was very high and silver metal.  You couldn't slide down it when the sun was too hot.  We had swings and a merry-go-round also.  I loved to grab the bars and "fly" as it twirled.  We also had monkey bars that I loved, but was forever in trouble for getting on because it wasn't "ladylike".  In my life, I came to hate that word!

I was the smallest girl in first grade.  I tended to be picked on by the bigger kids, and my mom was divorced, so that alone made me different.  In those days, parents were supposed to stay together and when they did not, the children were the ones who struggled.  Of course, women made less than men then, so I think it was rough on my mom too.  I remember that she worked every night.  I went to a babysitter's house in the afternoons until my mother got home.  

School was always something that I looked forward too, at least in those early years.  I had friends, and I wanted to do well.  It is so different today than the lessons that I had then.  I think that I was learning in first grade, what my grandchildren are learning in Kindergarten.  It is amazing when I think of how much knowledge these children today are learning.  

Ok, now it is your turn to write about first grade.  What are your memories about that time?  Don't forget to come back here and link up so that I can read what you write too.  

Memoir Monday- Discipline

Prompt: Describe a disciplinary method your parents used on you as a child that you use(d) on your own children?

My parents used a lot of ways to discipline, that i never have used in my life.  The one way that has stayed the same is grounding.  When I was a teen, I was often grounded to my room.  I wasn't an ordinary teen.  I did not rebel with drugs or bad friends, or running off.  My form of rebellion was to go to church.  Of  course, it probably helped that the church I went to was not the same as the one my parents wanted me to go to.  

When things were at their worst, I would sneak out my bedroom window and go to church, knowing that when I got home, there would be a beating and a grounding to go with it.  I was grounded from church for every seeming infraction.  I have stayed up to three months in my bedroom when my parents were home.  They "did not want to see my face".  

My parents couldn't ground me often from friends, I didn't really have any.  They couldn't ground me from babysitting, because I bought everything I needed with my own money and they did not want to buy anything that I might need.  I never thought I would ground my own children, but after all the other things I learned, this one, somehow has still stayed with me.

Of course, when my children are grounded, they still have to go the church and school.  They spend extra time on chores and homework, and they hate it as much as I used to!  Especially because I only use grounding when there is something that they really want to do instead of stay home with me!  

I have learned that grounding has to be fair.  They need to know it is a consequence based on their own actions.  They need to know that it is coming and that I expect the problem not to happen again.  I do think that grounding can be effective, although I don't believe in grounding for everything and I never ground them to their room.  I want them to be part of the family and part of what we do.  I want them to realize that although I am disappointed in their behavior, I will always love them and want to be with them.  

My family means the world to me.  They are the best blessing that I could ever have.