Christmas Time in Sunny Mexico

This photo has nothing to do with this post, just wanted you all to see how darling my child is.

So I have been really in a funk since my mom left. For three days I have done almost nothing. I did start laundry, but still have two loads on the line, for three days now, and one load that never even made it out of the washer. My mom came, and left, and that made me sad. Basically I have been totally out of gas, and sick of living here, and ready to be done with Mexico. Hopeless that we will ever get to go home, and really struggling that God is fine to let me struggle and suffer. That is so not the God I have believed in. Yes, we have trials to make us grow, yes he sees a bigger picture, but somehow this time, this trial seems different. Like way beyond growth and my better good, more like sadistic cruel punishment. How can it be ok that I am in a country that all my god given talents are stifled and I am losing my self one piece at a time, with every taco I eat. The interesting, fun loving, intelligent musical Brook Ann the Great, is becoming this shallow, non human entity that barely exists form one day to the next, doing nothing stimulating or progressive, just trying to keep Eva alive, and protected from Rabid dogs, and bug bites.

So we go to the church because Justino has a bunch of President stuff to do, and the ward is having a Christmas “charla” basically a message about the Savior and then refreshments. Justino comes out in the hall and tells me that the person who is supposed to give the message didn’t come, and I have to do it. Great timing since I am feeling abandoned by God, and completely indifferent to the Savior, who is supposed to lighten my load, but did I mention I am still sick and dying pregnant because I followed his plan for my life. He could at least help Eva nap like normal children her age instead of sending me a daughter who is a sleep handicap, and still doesn’t sleep through the night or sleep more than an hour a day. He couldn’t let her be a docile low key child either, she has to be a monkey that gets into everything and throws tantrums when I stop her. Not to mention that he knows about every job in the world, and yet we still don’t have one, despite the fact that we are nearly out of money and the only thing we have been doing down here is serving in HIS church, FOR FREE! Yeah I was thrilled to think that I had to give some uplifting spiritual message about the Savior when want I feel like saying is “Look do your own thing because His way is about the most excruciating way you can think of, and by the way while you are dying of the pain filled life that he has “blessed” you with Buck up and give thanks because it is for your own good, and if you don’t whine about it, you get to live with him who has punished you for eighty years forever. Whoopee! “

So we sing the opening song and I am wracking my brain about what to say, and then someone says the opening prayer and the time is mine, and I open my mouth and start to BS, about I don’t know what, and then something happened and the spirit filled my mouth with what He wanted me to say, and I hear myself saying that he was born in a humble stable to teach us to be humble, and then he died for us, to fulfill the Fathers will, and again we have to learn to submit to the Father will as he did. And what a glorious time of year this is to remember Him, and progress. And I read in Mosiah 3:3-5 how King Benjamin sees an angel and the angel tells him of the “tidings of great joy” that is that the Savior is going to come into the world, and that King Benjamin has to tell his people that they might “rejoice and have joy” And I ask the ward members why they think that the Saviors life and birth are tiding of great joy, and why we can rejoice because of his birth and life. And then humility of their answers humbled me. They expressed gratitude for life, one day at a time, and repentance, for His gospel. Mexicans have a way of being so grateful for each day. As a people they have a reverence for each new day. They said it with such sincerity that I was truly touched because I had been plagued with a bad attitude. I haven’t been thankful for one more day of life, repentance or the gospel because I wanted to be grateful for my really nice house, for fine restaurants that I eat at with my family, ( that don’t serve beans or tortillas) I want to be grateful for books and things and all the trinkets that come at Christmas. None of which I have.

But what do I have. The best husband in the world, the most beautiful daughter in the world, ( monkey as she may be) Another monkey on the way, who might not be a sleep handicap. Parents who love me. The best friends a girl could ask or, who love me from far away. A safe place to live, the opportunity to go to the Christmas charla and get my attitude adjusted.

I finished and as we sang the final song I remember the experience that I had when I went on trek the summer of 2005. ( Trek is a week long excursion that our Church puts on for the youth where we divide up into to families leaders are called to be “parents” to ten teenagers, and then we dress up like our pioneer ancestors and walk 30 miles the first day, pulling handcarts, through difficult terrain, eating very little and then camp and live as much like they did as we can. It always turns out to be really awesome, and super spiritual week) I did it three times as a youth, but the last time I went I was not thrilled to be there. I was tired, and out of shape, and the whole time thinking, “why am I doing this AGAIN?” One night we had a message from a young man who told the stories of his pioneer ancestors, who first came to the states form England, and then who made the journey with the early members of the Church to the Salt Lake Valley. Along the way all of their children died, then this brother lost his wife. Parts of his journal were read,, and then the young man posed the question, “Why would they choose to go through such hardship?” He answered reading the testimony of his ancestor who said, “I continued through my deep grief because I know that Jesus is the Chirst” He said much more, but those word struck me that day. That is the reason that I went on trek in 2005, because I have a testimony of Jesus Christ, and I was asked to do so by his servants. Tonight in a small chapel in Martinez de la Torre, I thought again of that summer night in the mountains of Utah, when I felt renewed to do a hard thing because of my Savior. A surge of hope ran through me as I felt a renewal again as I thought of my Savior. As I thought of how he has never let me down in the past, and how even though I have felt forsaken and abandoned, I know I am not, because he has never let me before and I believe he won’t this time. Again the wonderful people of this horrible ugly small town have taught me such a powerful lesson about what to be grateful for and where to keep my focus. I forget so easy. Merry Christmas.