Humbling experiences

Last week, I had an epiphany when I realized that I'd actually understood Sacrament meeting. Like, well enough that I could have interpreted what was going on without stress. I was like, "Woah, dude!" about the whole thing. It felt like a real break-through, or level-up, or something like that. But the euphoria was short-lived, alas.

On Wednesday, we had a Primary presidency meeting, and were discussing who could interpret for an activity we have this week. Suddenly, the conversation took a plot twist when someone said, "Maybe it's time for you to try interpreting."

I had a lot of reasons why that was a bad idea (namely, I'm not good enough yet) but my sisters pointed out that it was a perfect first time to try. My audience is 2 sisters who know me well, and are used to my gimpy signing. They are both very smart and good at English, and good at figuring out what's going on. And the activity is listening to an elderly gentleman tell stories from the past - he won't talk too fast, he won't say anything critically important, and it won't really matter if I mess something up.

I just want to say that having someone trust you as their means of communication is really pretty amazing. The sweet encouragement they gave me to give it a try was so touching. They made me feel like I was doing THEM a service, instead of them doing ME a service by being guinea pigs for the sake of my personal growth. Because we have actual interpreters that we could ask to come. But they wanted to encourage me, and help me grow. I feel just like a little boy who grows an inch when given a responsible task from his dad, because he knows he has tall shoes to fill, but his dad believes in him.

Lillian had a less-pleasant learning experience in Primary this week. We are working on a song to sing in Sacrament meeting. I was playing the piano (along with Andre) and Sister S. was helping the kids who were signing the song. At one point, she corrected something they were signing. Lillian, realizing that the signs we were using had come from a good source, objected to the modification. Sister S. reminded her of the rule in Deaf culture: when discussing matters of language, a hearing person should always defer to and learn from a Deaf person. Lillian turned to me to back her up. She was surprised when I didn't!

We got the translation of the song from a Deaf person, so why didn't I say we should stick with what we'd already practiced? Because Marriner and I realized early on (and from unfortunate mistakes) that we have to be perfectly humble to learn. We can't think that because we've studied a lot, we have become an authority on ASL. If someone Deaf tells us we should fix something, we fix it. If 10 minutes later, a different Deaf person corrects us back to the way we were doing it before, we correct back. No arguing, no explaining, just deference to the people who own the language. I hope Lillian caught that valuable lesson. It's been a great benefit to us.

In Sacrament meeting, I had the also-humbling experience of realizing that just because I understood a few people in Sacrament meeting the week before does not mean I'm fluent now. This week had some much faster signers, and different topics...and a not-to-be-named kid had consumed all my energy before church, such that I just wanted to curl up in the corner and close my eyes. In fact, I did close my eyes sometimes...maybe that's why I didn't understand so much :) Or maybe I gave in and closed my eyes because it was all going over my head...anyway, it was brutal. The last speaker was a fabulous signer (as defined by "way over my head!") and he was helping his daughter with a talk in Primary just after Sacrament meeting. He told the parable of the sower, and it was just fabulous. I completely understood him that time. So now I know - if the signing is going over my head, just tell them to talk to me like a little kid, and I'll be fine. Phew.

VP

So I come out of the bathroom and see Marriner in a white shirt, tie and blue jeans.

"Ah, makin' some phone calls tonight?"

"Nope, sendin' some emails...I just thought I'd get in the mood."

And, we both bust up.

#weresofunny #trialsofvideochat #makingphonecallsandsendingemailsiswhatmyhusbanddoesbest

This story will give you the feel-goods

You ought to understand that I worry about all my kids during Kindergarten. By the time I'm on my 4th kid, I've learned that about myself. There's something magical about being 6 years old that makes this mom worry about all my kids' abilities to make it in this tough world. So in my head, I know that my worries about Sam are just as irrational as my worries about Lige, Ellis and Lillian were. They all turned out just fine. Nevertheless, my brain keeps pushing things to worry about into my head, and I wonder if Sam's going to succeed in life.

But today, I give myself permission to stop worrying about him! Here's why:

A few weeks ago, we were studying scriptures as a family. I honestly don't remember what exactly we were studying, something about following the example of Jesus Christ. I do remember we talked about ways we could be like Jesus, for example befriending those that weren't easy to be friends with. I remember Sam saying that he thought he should be friends with Joshua (name changed) in his class, because he always caused trouble, so nobody wanted to be friends with him.

Today I was volunteering at the school and noticed a new person working with Joshua. During a chance moment when we were alone, I decided to ask her: "My son wants to befriend Joshua. Do you have any suggestions?" She looked at me a second and said, "Is your son Samuel?" (This was a funny question - I've been asked that a lot this week. There are two white kids in his class, they look really similar, and those two kids' moms are volunteering at the book fair this week. The whole school is confused. But in this case, she wasn't asking because she was confused.) Then she told me that today, Joshua had been struggling with something, and when he came back, Sam waved at him and shouted, "Joshua, come sit with me!"

I just thought, this kid can't sit straight for Primary, he doesn't pay attention to what we read in the Book of Mormon every night, and he loses his temper all the time. But he's 6 years old, and he's following Jesus. And not just in the easy, comfortable ways. I think he's going to turn out just fine. And I hope I can be more like him.

Fat-lip week

This week was a little unusual. On Monday, I had the great honor of doing something all by myself, without the kids!

Ok, actually, it wasn't the Mom Getaway we all dream of. I had to go get a spot of skin cancer cut out. The procedure was the stuff needle-phobes like me dread - and I'll just leave it at that.

I came home with a bandage the size of a twinkie on my upper lip. For a super-small job, it was a super-sized bandage! I could hardly breathe, it covered most of my nose. So I spent the day holding my nostrils up, so I could breathe. My lip felt fat and sore, and talking wasn't really desirable. This was the first time I've just been Oh. So. Grateful we can all sign. I mean, I could talk. But it was miserable. And it was comfort to my beat-up soul to just pull out my hands and let my poor lip relax.

But actually, the sign language was impacted by the lip job, too. Yeah, it turns out a lot of sign language is in the facial expressions. It's tough to tell when someone's asking a question or giving a command or making a joke when their face is monotone. So my poor kids.

My lip was so swollen that even after I took the bandage off, I couldn't smile. Literally couldn't move my lips that way. So for 3 days, everyone I met thought I was grumpy or depressed. And truthfully, scaring people in the grocery store is sorta depressing, so everyone was glad when the lip started to return to its normal size!

On Wednesday, I scared the Activity Day kids with my weird face (though, to their credit, they were all polite enough not to bring it up) and we had a Jam Session for our activity. Marriner laughed that the ASL branch was having a Jam Session, but it wasn't my idea - one of the Deaf moms suggested it. Her kids are playing the violin at school, and she wants them to improve and enjoy it. And I think that this was a great activity for enjoying music! First we did some jamming - someone started a groovy beat on the drums, then everyone joined in, one by one, in the key chosen. (D major. Always. Because it's good for beginning violinists.) We made some pretty awesome music. Then we pulled out an easy trio version of "I hope they call me on a mission" that I'd found years ago. The parts were "hard, medium and easy" so everyone picked the one they could play, and we practiced until we could play the whole thing. President Merrill rocked the "hard" part on his trombone. Finally, we practiced the song we are learning for Sacrament meeting next month. Fun night!

On Sunday, Jane was feeling the music. She stood on the pew and waved her hands in grand operatic fashion - clearly imitating the signing, but adding in her own flourishes, too. It was so adorable!

Our last piece of ASL news is that we finished our Winter ASL Challenge. This challenge was to watch 5 min of ASL every day for 2 months. The person who got the most days won either a cool flashlight

or a USB clock fan.


Ellis and Lillian tied for first place. Ellis wanted the light, Lillian wanted the fan. But they both wanted the glory of first place. So we had to figure out how to break the tie. We ended up doing an ASL Bee (spelling bee style) - I pulled up a vocab list and started asking them words. They went for a long time, but finally Ellis won when Lillian missed the word "pet" (as in a pet dog). Ellis got it right, and took home the trophy! Way to go, Ellis!!

Now I'm looking for some fun prizes for our next ASL challenge. They have to be things that anyone in the family would think is SO COOL that they will actually try to win them. So, if you have any prize recommendations, put them in the comments below! Anything to keep us studying!!