A Little Star Shining Brightly

The stars are all my friends
Till the nighttime ends
So I know I'm not alone
When I'm here on my own
Isn't that a wonder: when you're alone
You're not alone, not really alone.

Leslie Bricusse (with John Williams), "When You're Alone"

When I'm out walking at night, usually to or from my car, I find myself almost instinctively turning my face up to look at the stars. I look for my favorite constellations of the season—the Big Dipper in summer, Orion in winter. Somehow seeing these brings me comfort, like I have a friend in the night sky, and I feel at home under it.

The Big Dipper, I think, was the first constellation I recognized. It took me years—until I had to teach stargazing to a bunch of thirteen-year-old girls at Girls Camp one summer—to find it. Before that I would pretend I saw it, nodding my head like I was sure which stars everyone was pointing at. A few times I thought maybe those stars were it, but I was afraid that I'd chosen the wrong stars; I wanted to be certain I was seeing the same dipper everyone else saw. It was frustrating after awhile, and I told myself it was stupid to look for one particular dipper when I bet you could find a million of them all over the sky. How rare could that arrangement of stars actually be? Maybe people just picked out their own version of the Big Dipper and pretended like it was the same one for everyone.

Like I said, it wasn't until I had to help a group of younger girls find the Big Dipper that I found it myself. I went out into the middle of the cul-de-sac of my home a few times that summer before camp, trying to find it so I'd be prepared for the stargazing class. I had to learn more about it, which part of the sky it would be in at which time of night, and I enlisted the aid of my dad and my brother, who was interested in astronomy at the time, to patiently point it out by its brightness, orientation, and the stars around it. One night I finally found it on my own. It was wonderful! I finally saw with certainty what all those other people were talking about. The more I looked for it and picked it out, the easier it became to find, until it was so clear, it couldn't have been more obvious if there actually were lines between the stars like in the star charts.

Isn't it interesting how even though the same constellations have existed in the sky for who knows how long and observed by humanity for centuries upon centuries, each person still has to find them on their own? No one can see them for you.

There are a lot of similarities between this and something else that also brings joy and comfort to my life, and that is my faith in God. It's easy to scoff and claim that like stars, people are just picking out proof of God to make sense of a vast nothingness, or that people just see what they want to see. But I've found that the more I've looked for God in my life and the more I learn about His ways, the clearer I see Him. I feel certain that I'm looking to the same beacon that many of my ancestors and other faithful Christians in the world's history have followed, and yet it was not something anyone else could find for me. Like my dad and brother helped me find the Big Dipper, I've had a lot of guidance in my faith from my parents and Church leaders, but in the end none of them could see the evidence of God for me; I found it for myself.

When I tilt my head to look at the night sky, I see the stars I know and feel at home. Maybe this is partly because I also know their Maker, who is grander than the sky and every twinkling galaxy but still just as present and as comforting. He is my Maker too, after all, and the Father of my spirit. Seeking Him has brought more clarity and direction in my life than following any star ever would.

Passive-Aggressive Roommate Poetry

I've been a little lacking in the verse department on this blog lately, and it's time to remedy that. I discovered during my roommate years that although some people object to the passive-aggression of leaving notes around the apartment about roommate issues, nobody minds a note in snappy, rhyming verse. So I have a few poems to offer about some common roommate situations I experienced.

I wrote this one years ago and put it in the bathroom by a quickly disappearing commodity:

Afraid I will offend you (slightly):
Alarmed to change the paper nightly.
Can't you just use three or four?
Do soggy bottoms need much more?

Another bathroom one, just for the ladies:

The garbage can is often full
of evidence of monthly needs.
I ask that it, if possible,
be taken out by she who bleeds.

Put on top of a layer of plastic wrap over the sink:

The disposal isn't working
and the kitchen sink won't drain.
Please don't pile your dirty dishes
in our clogged-up sink again.

Never posted, but thought about over and over and over one specific term at school:

Please don't touch the thermostat
because it is apparent that
your parents raised a spoiled brat
who burns up electricity.
It's cold in here. You think I jest?
See me in my winter's best?
It's summertime, and I suggest
you leave the thermostat to me.

This is applicable to my current little, furry roommate:

I was happy to adopt you
and I couldn't love you more,
but I wish you wouldn't opt to
kick your litter 'cross the floor.

Fun, huh? I've got a few more poems left in me to add to these. What would you put down in verse in a note to a roommate?

How long has this been going on?

I was reading over my last posts and thinking about all the things that have transpired since my last article.

I lost my little summer kitten to FIP (feline infectious peritonitis). Actually, that happened near the end of October, so technically before I posted my last article, but I was too sad to write a post about it.

In November I went on a cross-country trip with a couple of close friends, ending up in Seattle for a couple days.

A friend I met there in Seattle come down here in December. It was the first time a guy has traveled a long distance just to see me, and although nothing really came of it, it was definitely flattering.

My favorite holiday last year was Second Thanksgiving. We went out of town unexpectedly for the first one, and although it was fun to do something different and see extended family, it was more fun to have a second feast at home, with just us and some close friends. We had it a week before Christmas, but it felt like Thanksgiving all day.

Got my heart broken just after New Year's. Whoopee. Scraped myself back together for the rest of the month with the help of a new friend—and a new kitten!—then managed to have a pretty decent February.

March, birthday-studded, always goes by quickly. With it, though, came some tough lessons about dealing with family and friends, living my religion, and generally battling my own demons.

. . . And suddenly here we are in April. I'm watching life unfurl in the trees and dirt of my little world, and I think I feel much the same as these new leaves: I'm ready to stretch out and welcome in the sunlight. And maybe write a few more articles on my blog. :)

On Service

I'll walk with you. I'll talk with you.
That's how I'll show my love for you.

Carol Lynn Pearson, "I'll Walk With You"

I.
If there's one thing that's stuck out to me as I've read the scriptures, listened at church, said my prayers, and watched General Conference, it's that I need to be more service-minded. I have felt the need to focus on that. So I've been praying to know who I should serve, and how, and I've been trying to keep my eyes open for opportunities.

To try and prompt inspiration, I've been doing things like reaching out to people in the ward I don't know as well and going through the ward directory and thinking of each sister, one at a time, and her needs. These are the kinds of things I need to be doing for my calling anyway, and I usually have general ideas and impressions about how these girls are doing. But in spite of how strongly I've felt lately that I should be serving, I didn't feel strongly that any of the people I was looking at needed that service from me. So I decided I needed to pray with more faith and spend more time thinking about it. Meanwhile, I felt guilty about spending more time than usual with my family and a few of my close friends. How could I justify doing things that were so selfishly enjoyable when I was supposed to be out serving others?

And then I had an epiphany.

What if Heavenly Father has already put people in my path that I could specifically help? Maybe I was given these friends and family members partly so that, when they needed help, I would already be there, perfectly positioned to serve them. When I thought about it, I realized that I don't really have to look far afield to find opportunities to serve; there are plenty around me. All I have to do is lift where I stand.

II.
I was on a date in the semi-recent past with a guy who expressed similar feelings about needing to serve people. Our conversation was good, if a little overly cerebral; we spent most of the time on philosophical/religious/political topics. As the date progressed, I started wondering what exactly this guy was looking for in a woman, because although I matched him wit for wit, I didn't sense that it moved him at all. I even wondered whether he really saw me, or whether I was just a sounding board for thoughts he'd held inside all day and wanted to get out.

To be honest, it was precisely his comments on service that started me wondering. He told me he felt an urgency in these promptings to serve people and was trying to figure out how to balance that with his very busy work schedule. He spoke as if he could see people off in the distance, hovering morosely around the edges of his social influence, in need of his help, and he was so passionate in this vision that I felt . . . well, next to invisible. He could see right through me—the not bad-looking and very available girl across the table listening to him, sipping soda, making encouraging comments—to these people with needs. I started wondering what I'd have to do to get him to see me. Swoon dramatically? Have some tragedy befall me so I could cry on his shoulder? Change my speech so I appeared younger and more naive and desperately in need of his advice?

As someone without any obvious needs, I felt like not much of a person, and least of all like an attractive woman. This guy isn't a jerk and certainly didn't intend any unkindness, so I wasn't angry at him at the end of the date when we parted ways; just a little discouraged. How ironic was it that the desire to serve could become a barrier, a blindness to less immediate but deeper needs for love and companionship? I didn't need him to date me to rescue me; I just needed him to be there at the table with me, seeing me. But I guess the bottom line is how can you see something you're not looking for?