Closing the Door

Men stumble over the truth from time to time, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing happened.

                                                         -- Winston Churchill

Every now and then I see something on Face Book that says something cheesy about just being who you are and not to worry about what other people say.  I hate those kinds of meaningless quotes.  I mean, really. Who forgets what people say or think about them?

If there is one thing I admire about politicians,  (yes…I actually thought of one thing!)  …it is the fact that they persevere through the election process when there is always a large group of people who hate them…. whoever they are.  I just finished reading “Killing Lincoln” and I was surprised to read about how hated he was.  I shouldn’t have been surprised because, after all, he presided over the country during the Civil War.  But now, years later, he is our most beloved president.   It’s just hard to think of anyone really hating him.

A modern day artist and author, Sabrina Ward Harrison (Spilling Open; The Art of Becoming Yourself) wrote this:

I am afraid to show you who I really am, because if I show you who I really am, you might not like it –

                                                            And that’s all I got.

Now that’s an honest thing to say. 

The last few nights I gave some serious thought to not writing anymore. I received a hurtful email from someone I admired, and even though I was pretty sure there was an underlying reason that she wrote what she did that had nothing at all to do with me… something that she said has undermined my confidence. 

At first I let it go on by.  But then, I started thinking that maybe others felt like her. What I say when I write might be getting under someone else’s skin too…even when I am trying hard to be respectful, which is something that I feel is not often practiced these days.

So, I have this dilemma.  I started writing to purge.  I could tell that my family was getting tired of listening to me hold court on some political subject or religious view when we got together…and frankly, I don’t express myself very well verbally.   I can write things down and get rid of it. 

Sometimes I have to do a little research to get it right and that always helps me sort things out.  But whatever I write, I almost always feel better.  Even this little confession is giving me a forum to make a decision.

Barbara Kingsolver (The Poisonwood Bible) said:

"Close the door. Write with no one looking over your shoulder. Don't try to figure out what other people want to hear from you; figure out what you have to say. It's the one and only thing you have to offer."


But does anyone really care? 

Today, my 88-year-old father came over for Sunday dinner.  He tried to talk to us about the only things left that he could have an opinion about; only to have us all tell him that he was wrong to feel as he did.  He felt ‘light headed,’ he said.  “You don’t drink enough water,” we told him.  He said, “The meals at the assisted living are tasteless.” “You eat too much junk food. You ruin your appetite.”  Soon he sat quietly eating his meal, offering nothing else up for discussion.  

Dad doesn’t make much of an effort to connect with anyone anymore.   Maybe that is one of the signs of old age…deciding that your thoughts and ideas have no merit. 

So, here I am.  I can write about events like air shows, great restaurants that you might like to try, or even how to make goat cheese.  And you might read.  At least I won’t offend you. 

Or I can just be myself, a person who loves to write about meaning in something as mundane as exercise or babysitting or running out of gas on the freeway.

And I really hope that it’s OK with you.  If it isn’t, I hope I can take the cheesy advice I hate to see on Face Book. 

Flawless Diamonds

-By Bill Nelson 

One day, a man purchased a pair of diamond earrings as a gift for his wife. The wife was sincerely touched that he had remembered their anniversary and the husband beamed to see his wife so pleased.  She had once mentioned that someday she would like such a pair of earrings to match her wedding band.  He had saved a little each month for several years in order to buy them.  The only problem was that his wife, thinking that there was no way in the world the husband could have afforded real diamonds, thought they were cubic zirconium. 

In the month that followed, she wore the earrings casually.  She was careless when she put them on and took them off, and finally she misplaced one.  When she told her husband, he became very concerned.  Only then did she realize that the diamonds were real.  The worth of the stones had never changed.  What had changed was how she valued the stones. 

What is the difference between a person we value as a beautiful diamond and one who is merely an artificial substitute? 

The answer is that in God’s eyes, we are all diamonds.  It is the image we have of ourselves that will make us into what others see.

My wife and I recently watched a movie that was staged during the big band era.  Benny Goodman was a rather ordinary looking man in rimless glasses and a conservative business suit; but he was also a man who could play the clarinet like no other before or since.  This made Benny Goodman a unique individual.

Many people in history stand out from the crowd like Benny Goodman. Albert Einstein, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Teresa and Robert E. Lee are only a few. They were recognized by the world and honored for no other reason than because they sought for excellence.  They DID something that made others take notice.

When people wear garish clothes, dye their hair strange colors and decorate their skin, they are only drawing attention to what they are on the outside. But an ordinary guy who has dyed his hair purple or orange, is nothing more than an ordinary guy with funny looking hair. 

But almost everyone can appreciate the worth of an individual when we see someone who strives for excellence.  Those people who invent, who improvise, who know more about a subject than other people do and who take something that doesn’t work and make it work – these are the people who gain more than a glance as we pass them in the parking lot.   Those who love and serve without expecting recognition, perform tedious jobs without complaint …live Christlike lives…are the people that set a standard for the rest of us.

An old priest told a wealthy Persian named Ali Hafed that if he had a diamond the size of his thumb, he could purchase a dozen farms.

“Find a river that runs through white sand, between high mountains  In those white sands you will find diamonds.”

Ali Hafed made up his mind to find diamonds. He sold his farm, but after many years of searching, he had spent all of his money.  He passed away in rags.

Meanwhile, the man who purchased Ali Hafed’s farm one day led his camel out into the garden to drink.  As the animal put his nose into the shallow waters, the farmer noticed a curious flash of light in the white sands of the stream. Reaching in, he pulled out a black stone containing a strange eye of light. In the black stone was a diamond. According to the story, this marked the discovery of the most valuable diamond mines in the history of the ancient world.

Had Ali Hafed remained at home and dug in his own cellar or anywhere in his own fields, rather than traveling in strange lands where he eventually faced starvation and ruin, he would have had “acres of diamonds.” 1

How many times do we look for our happiness at a distance in space or time rather than right now, in our own homes, with our own families and friends?

When we look for opportunities to serve others, or when we invite purity into our own lives and into the world that surrounds us, we find beautiful diamonds in our own backyards.

As a young man, the son of King Louis XVI of France was kidnapped by evil men who had dethroned his father. These men tried to destroy him morally, knowing that he would then be unworthy to inherit the  throne. For six months they subjected him to every vile thing life had to offer, and yet he never yielded under pressure. This puzzled his captors, and after doing everything they could think of, they asked him why he had such great moral strength. His reply, “I cannot do what you ask, for I was born to be a king.”

Like the king’s son, each of us have inherited a royal birthright; a divine heritage. Virtue, kindness, goodness, and charity, or sharing our talents for the happiness of others...these things develop the inner beauty of a person.  This is the beauty that really matters, the beautiful lasting diamonds in our lives.

Benny Goodman performed his music with excellance for his appreciative audiences in a plain business suit and dress shoes.  He was one of those ordinary people who wanted to be the best that they could be…

Diamonds  shining in white sand.  

“Wrestling Pigs in a Clean White Shirt” released!

We wish to say thank you to our friends who have been so supportive and encouraging during the months it’s taken to get our book published. 

Being new to the process, we thought that the paperbacks would not be available until June 26th, but we are excited to announce that it can now be purchased online from Tate Publishing in paperback or e-book.    ( We have included the link)

We hope you will order a copy. It might make a good read for a book club as well.  

Bill and Diane Nelson 

http://www.tatepublishing.com/bookstore/book.php?w=9781618626516

S O S

People who say they sleep like a baby usually don't have one.

                                                                                                     ~Leo J. Burke


…Or a flat screen TV in their bedroom that turns itself on several times every night.

I started writing this blog at a little after 3 AM.  Most nights, when I am not worrying about my children or about how I am going to squeeze 37 activities into the four good hours of energy I might have tomorrow, I sleep well. 

That is,  until the TV comes on. 

                                                                                                                                                     

Any sane person would just move the darn thing into   another room.  But it would take major wall surgery to move the umbilical cord, called a cable, which connects us to our ‘No Spin’ addiction.     Besides, how would we get to sleep at night if we move it into the other room?  (I’m only mildly joking about this.)   

While I totally agree that we watch entirely too much TV (I actually used an episode of NCIS to teach my grandson an important life lesson the other day…Right! I know…sick!)  But that is a subject for another day’s blog, one that you won’t see very soon. 

The problem right now is the television that turns itself on.  My husband can fix pretty much anything, but this even has him stumped.  It might be that we don’t think about it too much during the day, and then when it snaps on with an infomercial featuring noisy blender recipes, it becomes a major priority on the list of tomorrow’s ‘to do’s.’ 

And that might not be so bad if it only happened once a night.  Sometimes we get awakened 2 or 3 times; leading me to believe it has something to do with the DVR programming. 

Anyway, once I am awake, my brain jumps into high gear.  The first thing I think of is that, tomorrow, I am going to find a pad of paper and a pencil and put it by my bed so that I can write down all the genius thoughts that come to me in the middle of the night, because the main thing that keeps me from being able to drop back off is the thought that “I can’t forget this!”   (Most of these ideas, for some reason, involve Bill fixing something or building something…don’t ask me why.)   

Other nights, I think about things I want to write about.  I’ll work on it all night like a bad song stuck in my head, until the next time I sit down to write and I can’t think of anything interesting…like now.  I guess I should have lain in bed awhile before getting up to write this…

I sew things, move furniture and decorate rooms (with lots of built-ins via Bill’s help), pack for trips and make long lists of things I shouldn’t forget to take, plan new exercise routines (which never get implemented), and plan birthday and holiday celebrations right down to the napkin rings.   

I wake exhausted. 

We have got to figure out how to fix that TV. 

Insomnia is a gross feeder.  It will nourish itself on any kind of thinking, including thinking about not thinking. 

                                                                              ~Clifton Fadiman


Attitude vs. Altitude

Mom used to say, “You won’t get far with that attitude.”  And she was right.

Sometimes, when I pray, I think it’s hard to come up with something to say that doesn’t sound like last night’s prayer.  The strange thing is that when I call my daughter, it seems like we never run out of thing to talk about. And it seems like twenty dollars is a lot of money when I am about to pay tithing, but such a small amount when I want to shop.  Two hours seems like such a long time when I am trying to sit still and focus on conference, but it seems to go by pretty quick when I am at a good movie. 

However, I have learned something from these kinds of seeming contradictions.  I’ve discovered that it is my attitude at the beginning of anything I am about to do that decides what kind of an experience I am going to have.

Much about having and maintaining a good attitude comes from lessons I learned from missionaries and the people they taught.  My sister and I shared a bedroom when we were children because the missionaries lived in our home.  It was a happy time and I remember many instances in daily living when those young men set wonderful examples for us.  The faithful missionaries, (those who came for the right reason) taught me that when I truly give …of my own free will… that kind of giving is really the only personal thing we have to place on God’s altar.

“The many other things we ‘give’ are actually the things He has already given or loaned to us.  However, when you and I finally submit ourselves, by letting our individual will be swallowed up in God’s will then we are really giving something to Him!  It is the only possession which is truly ours to give!”       

                                                                                                   -Neal A. Maxwell

One missionary who made a big impression on my young mind was Elder Barber.   He was not one of the missionaries who lived in our home, although he came often for dinner. One afternoon, my mother said, “Elder, I see that you have torn your pants.  Bring those over tomorrow and let me mend them for you.” 

Elder Barber tried to decline, but my mother pressed him until he finally said, “Sister Nelson, these are the only pants I have.  I can’t leave them with you.”  My mother did not make a big deal out of it…she had him go wait in the bedroom while she fixed the pants.  But over the next little while we learned that as a boy, his father had left him and his large family.  His mother had raised them all alone.  When it came time for his mission, they could only afford to purchase one suit.  He had nothing else.  Still, he did not let this ‘wardrobe malfunction’ stop him.  He went on his mission.

A missionary we know who just returned home not long ago from a mission to Mexico wrote this in a letter to his father. 

“… Hurricane Alex hit Wednesday and it stayed until yesterday. My companion and I survived crossing rivers of death.  …streets that aren’t paved…when it rains they become rivers.  Our leaders said that since we couldn’t do anything about the water, we could stay in the house if we felt like we couldn’t work.  But we felt pretty bad about staying in the house so we went out.

“First we crossed a huge river of water just to go to eat.  We were able to help a woman and man get to their house with the food they had purchased.  The water was up to our waist.  Luckily it didn’t have a lot of strength.  We walked all day Thursday just looking for people to help because no one would open the door.  When we got home, we were soaked.  We put our clothes next to the fan and went to sleep.  When we woke, the clothes …and our shoes… were still wet.  We figured they would be wet by the end of the day anyway, so we put them on and went to work.  The hurricane hit even harder on Friday.  We could only see about 5 feet in front of us.  The wind and the rain were horrible.  We looked for people to help again.  We offered a lot of service.  We cleaned two flooded houses and broke a sidewalk and gutter with a pickaxe so that another house wouldn’t flood. 

“Friday night we had family home evening with a recent convert and by then the rain had slowed down a little and we thought it would pass.  By the time we started to leave, it started up again and it rained for an hour.  We were walking the whole time and when we got about 2 miles from our house we came across a river that we couldn’t cross for the strength of it.  About three times we almost got sucked under in the current.  Of course, everything we had was wet…books, book bags, coats, everything.  We felt so weighted down, so we said a little prayer that we could have some help crossing and the rain slowed down and the river lowered just enough that we could cross.  We found out right before we crossed that a dad and 2 kids were separated, so we hauled the 2 kids across giving them piggybacks. 

“It was all pretty intense, but I learned that our Father in Heaven is always there to hear and answer our prayers.”

This man taught two important things in his letter:

1) It is our attitude toward life that will determines life’s attitude toward us.  He might have chosen an easy day at his apartment reading his scriptures and resting up.  Instead, he decided to look for ways to put those scripture teachings to work.  He looked for ways to give service. 

2) Part of a good attitude is to look for the best in every new situation.  Your mind can only hold one thought at a time.  So instead of holding on to negative thoughts, we should learn to cultivate positive thoughts.  To be successful, a person must behave in a manner that will allow those results to truly come to pass.  He might have wished and prayed every night for opportunities to teach.  He might have prayed every night to make a difference in someone’s life.  But he knew that he had to go outside of his comfort zone to find the people who needed him.  They were not going to come into his apartment.

Sometimes we have to really go out of our way to maintain a good attitude.  I can usually justify why I haven’t done my visiting teaching or anything else that is a little inconvenient. 

Stephen L. Richards, who was a counselor to David O. McKay told about something that might have changed his attitude if he had let it.  He said that on his wedding day, he reserved a horse drawn carriage to take him and his bride from the temple to their new home. 

“It was the first hack I had ever hired.” He said.  “I was quite proud to think I could get it to take my wife home after the marriage.”

When Brother Richards greeted his bride at the temple gate, he found she was accompanied by an elderly woman she’d met in the temple.  His new wife said,” This sister lives two or three miles out on our way and I thought we could take her home.” 

Fifty years later, President Richards said, “I don’t remember whether she sat between us or not.” His disappointment in what he had planned turned into a humorous memory. 

In 1996, there were a group of Cambodian immigrants who lived near Buenos Aires, Argentina.  One of these families was being taught the law of fasting.  The missionary explained it to the family like this:  “Fasting is a 24 hour period in which we do not eat or drink anything, putting our bodies in submission to our spirits.  We use the time to read the scriptures, pray and engage in other uplifting activities, culminating in attending fast and testimony meeting, where we then give to the bishop of our ward the monetary equivalent of the food from which we had abstained in order that he may distribute it among the poor and needy.

After this explanation, the missionaries suggested that because the following Sunday was Fast Sunday, the family might like to try fasting.  The father agreed and the missionaries left the home. The following Monday evening, the elders returned to give another discussion.  They asked for a report on the family’s experience with fasting.  The father rather apologetically explained that they had tried and would surely try again. 

He said, “We began our fast in the afternoon with a prayer; followed by scripture reading and a discussion.  We continued in this way until early the following morning.  I regret to say that some of the younger children fell asleep during the night.  We were very tired but showered in the morning and prepared to go to church where our spirits were revived and filled with the beautiful testimonies that were given.  Perhaps next time we’ll do better, and the children will be able to stay awake with us all night."

The missionaries were astonished!  You mean you didn’t go to sleep during the whole 24-hour period? “No," replied the father.  “You didn’t mention sleeping.”

Such a beautiful lesson about enthusiasm for hearing and trying out new ideas for finding truth.  This positive, enthusiastic attitude is contagious.   The word enthusiasm comes from the Greek words en Theos.

The translation?     

“God within.”