Today is Michelle's 37
th birthday. I am thrilled for her, I really am. But I am also feeling the distance, for sure. I would say that moving from Utah this year was most difficult for just a couple of reasons, but paramount was leaving my sister and her family. Shell and I are 10 years apart. We didn't share much of the same years growing-up, and we both have separate childhoods. When she was in high school, I was a pesky underfoot child. I have seen pictures and heard stories recalled that she loved me as a baby, and tended to me often. Not surprisingly, as we both grew older, our relationship was driven with a greater and greater wedge. I do not recall any specific abuse or damages caused me, but I do remember several irritating behaviors that I instigated. I remember Ryan and I (our brother- square in the middle-) dialing our own home number and hanging up while she was babysitting us, annoying her to great lengths as I recall. (That trick actually worked more than 20 years ago.) I remember the great difficulty of trying to wake her teenage self from a nap, and that she still sucked her thumb. I remember hiding behind a car and trying to spy on her and her boyfriend, Mark
Felburg. I remember she dated a
blonde guy named Rick, and I did not approve. I remember that she turned the kitchen sink hose on the neighbor kids in a fit of babysitting-induced frustration. I remember she loved Billy Joel. I remember when she left for
BYU, and I inherited her old room and promptly went through her remaining things. (I was only 8, by the way-) I remember reading her diary from 6
th grade and her writings of her boyfriend named Bo.
I have at least one letter to prove that she wrote me when she went away to
BYU. Coincidentally, by the time I also went to
BYU, we were in the same dorms, the same hall, and the same floor.
We started to become actual friends sometime in my adolescence. I wasn't always happy at home, being the virulent teenager that I was. She would talk to me as an adult,
commiserate, and share insights on a future that would include marriage and family,
disappointments and depression. She seemed not too distantly older than to me to remember the difficulties of growing up and figuring things out. It was during this time that I felt like she took a genuine interest in me and I began to get to know her, from different coasts.
Not too many years later I was moving to Provo to go to school, and looking forward to having my sister nearby and the further friendship that would ensue.
BYU was much different for me than I expected, and it was a difficult transition in many regards. During my years at
BYU, many momentous changes occurred, many, if not most of them hazardous. I ended up living in Utah for about 8 years, and some of these experiences included:
* moving into the dorms
* surprising home-
sickness* navigating the social maze of
BYU and Utah cultures
* moving into my first apartment with 5 other girls, all of us strangers
* the terrible, sudden, and violent onset of my battle with depression
* Consequent church disciplinary action and the request to leave
BYU* Dating and breaking up with
Timm* Marrying
Timm!
* Quickly conceiving our first child
* The death and burial of Lola Jane, our little girl
* The emotional psychotic pregnancy with Bella, 3 months after Lola died
* Going to the temple with
Timm* Bella's successful birth via planned C-section
* Learning to mother my daughter, in practice as well as principle
* Finally moving to North Carolina
The amazing part of this to me is that she was actually
present for all of these events! (With the exception of Lola's conception...) And not just in a 'she was there for me' sort of way, although she was. She was the ONLY person physically present for all of these
occurrences. These have definitely been the most life-altering and definitive markers in my life, and she was physically, as well as emotionally present. Besides all of these events, she has continued to help usher me through the torments of depression, lend a sympathizing ear to my woes of weight fluctuation (both of these being very closely related), and provide ultimate examples of motherhood, sisterhood, virtue, patience, steadiness, compassion, and friendship.
Despite 10 years between us and very different personalities, we share much in common. Even though our personalities are so different, we still have many of the same qualities, leanings, and affections.
In short, during the course of the 8 years I lived in Utah, Michelle became my best friend. As I grew up and became more of a peer and less of a child, we began to share common experiences and a closer relationship. I have loved the result of these sometimes tumultuous years, which have left me nearly 5 years married, pregnant with my 3rd child, still battling many of the same struggles, but always with my sister of nearly 27 years, and best friend of recent years.
Because of all of these experiences Shell knows me in a way that no one else does, and miraculously still loves me! It is truly a miracle and she has shown me the meaning of unconditional love, support, friendship, and the example of a better woman.
I love you my sister, my friend, and these 2,074 miles are punctuated today by your absence. You have forever earned yourself an integral place in my history, and my hopes of the continuation into our futures. I love you like no one else, and today I miss you in italic, highlighted, and capital letters.
Happy Birthday!!!
I will have to take some close-ups of those chairs because the light does not do it justice-especially the brightness of the green one! My favorite color. Next on the list of household to-dos is to paint the coffee table cream. (Possibly on Timm's spring break? We do have beautiful weather here now.)
Another ingenious idea from my mother- an egg tree fashioned from an enormous backyard branch, strung with over-sized polka-dot and striped eggs on string. So cute- again, the lighting doesn't really show the true beauty of this sight. (Note: the pillars in the background have finally been completed, immensely improving the impact of the kitchen.)
Just a happy little corner.
So here is the before of the kitchen. Pretty dismal. It's small, has mismatched dated appliances, a hideous metal paper towel holder affixed to the wall, and what stand out most, is the ultra dated cheap 'dirty disgusting oak'. ( The latter being Timm's assessment.)
Besides the hard wood floor which isn't my favorite color, there's not much to praise in this kitchen. Until...
Boo-Yah!!
Now what- now what?! That's right- completely made-over. That is, within the reach of new paint and accessories only. My next reasonable improvement is to paint a checkerboard floor on the diagonal. I haven't decided what color to do yet, as I want one of the colors to be the wood as it is. If we had infinite funds, matching stainless appliances would be next on task. In regards to home-improvement, as with most things I am finding that with money you can do anything. Too bad. Someday, someday. Soon I will have exterior updates as well as the cutest Easter pictures, with the cutest Easter dress-courtesy of, my mom.
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