Granny Leavitt (Dora Darthella Downs)

Granny Leavitt died today. We got the warning that she was deteriorating quickly two days ago. Tragically, I was thinking last week that it had been a while since we had heard anything from Grandma and that I should get everybody to call her. I did not. So, as always, the greatest lesson in death is to use the moments we have for the things that matter most.

When I was 6, my Grandma Lay died, my Great Grandpa Downs died, and my cat Boregard died. Before I had the capacity to grieve I was taught that there was no reason to. I would be able to see them all again in heaven, and they were happier now than they had been. The sad part was how much we would miss them. I have no specific memory of my great grandfather so I do not know how often I saw him, but I saw my Grandma Lay once a year when we visited her and one or two times when she came to visit us. They often came on Halloween (Nevada Day parade) or Christmas. So, though I would miss those events, they were not a part of my daily life so there was not that much to miss. Since then I have viewed death in terms of the loss associated with missing someone. I have never felt much loss because no one who has been a daily part of my life has died. Sharon Palmer and Charlotte Soukoup are the closest people to me that I have lost, but by the time they passed, I had not seen them for a long time so there was no future to miss.

This is the distinction. As a child--and up until now I have seen the grief or the sadness of it as a lost future. But I now see that the real tragedy is in all the moments I could have better spent with them. All the opportunities to show my love and appreciation that I excused. All the relationship that was never built. The part of me I lost by not sharing it with those I love. So I am left with the memories I did build and the love I did share, made all the more precious by their rarity.

So here is what I remember of my grandmother. More than anything, I remember Hannah, Wyoming where the seven of us Lay children stayed for six weeks. I turned 12 that summer. I helped grandma make Tang for Grandpa and helped her pack his lunches for the night shift with Carbon County Coal Company. Many of our dinners included home-frozen corn from plastic bags that I heated in the microwave. She found clothes for Devanie and the twins at a garage sale. Many nights I would stay up late with her and watch (I'm pretty sure it was) Johnny Carson while Grandpa was at work. My mom was mad that she had let me do that because I had dark circles under my eyes when she picked us up.

I was the first granddaughter, after Grandma had had my mom and then her six boys she anxious for a darling little girl and I finally came. I held a special place in her heart. But I did not understand her love and concern for me when I overheard her telling my mom how she needed to teach me to control myself. As an insecure newly teen it was a devastating disillusion to find that I was not adored by my dear grandmother from every angle. I allowed that to create a rift in our relationship. Even years later when I had the opportunity to heal the rift, I concealed the pain and kept it for my own.

When Grandpa died Grandma Leavitt carried herself with strength and dignity through the funeral flurry. That night when everyone had gone to their rooms and the lights were out we finally heard her pain. Her voice sounded like my mother's. I ran out to comfort her, but when I saw that my mom was already there to comfort her own mother, I let them be. I have heard that same sob choked out of my own throat. The same voice of the generations that has graced our chapels with beloved hymns has cried to God in our secret places and our darkest moments.

Grandma had lost the precious love of her life. She had little desire to live without him. Still, strength and dignity won. She found and acted upon her own personal purpose as she chose to serve the mission they had planned on serving together--even before the General Authorities so actively promoted senior missions. She forged herself into another binding link in generations of faithful women of God.

Because of the limited amount of time I spent with her, the thing I know best about her is the absolutely incredible woman she produced in my mother, Randa. I do not mean to minimize Darthella's sons. They are men of strength and distinction who bring honor to the name of their parents. But it is the daily observation of my own mother that teaches me who her mother was, and who I can become.

Despite the love I missed from Grandma Leavitt of my own neglect, and despite the loss of future opportunities for her and I to strengthen each other, I know that death is the reminder of the value of life. By the time I leave this life, will I have lived as faithfully and loved as fully as time and the very best that is in me has allowed? There is time to be better. I am needed. And I need my family to know that I need them today and into eternity. My heart would be so empty without them and without knowing that they are forever mine.

I am so very happy for Grandma to be reunited with her precious Jack. The joy they share as he acknowledges his pride in her for enduring without him. The sweet fulfillment of knowing there is nothing more for either of them to endure--except to see their children endure. But in their love and anxiety for us they now work again, side by side. How blessed we are. And how great is their joy.

Identical but Distinct

My babies are three and a half. I miss the days of infancy, but I adore the little people they are becoming. While their personalities are not "totally different" each is a very distinct person.

Amelia gets a little more excited about the rock songs that come on the radio--she gets more excited about recognizing a song period. But when I look in the rear-view mirror, it is precious to see them turn to each other and smile in recognition of a song and then start feeding each others excitement about it.

Anastasia is a storyteller. She has a fantastic memory. She will talk to people for--as long as they will listen--and tell them about characters from a movie she recently watched--and she has an exceptional grasp of character motivation and the meaning of actions. She will tell memories of time she spent with her cousins or anything you want to know about her dog, brothers, sisters, how she dunked her head under water when she went swimming last summer, about her best friends (who are actually Claire's best friends) and she will even make stuff up about them.

She talks so much because she is a super attentive listener. Words and sounds are her world. She will name things according to the sound they make. Sunday shoes have harder soles and make more noise. The rest of us have learned to call that sound clicking or clunking. She calls her Sunday shoes her kirk shoes. I can't think of any other sound words she has made up, but she regularly does that if she has not learned the right word for what she is trying to describe.

Amelia loves movement. While it has taken a long time to get Anastasia to stop freaking out on the swings, Amelia has loved it and always wants to go higher. She loves to do puzzles and is good at seeing the little picture parts in the pieces to know where they go. She has also decided lately that she does not want to wear dresses all the time like Anastasia does. I think Amelia is a little more averse to change. We put the castle bed up a couple of months ago and she says she wants to unscrew it and have her little bed back.

So, I can't help but wonder how those differences come about. One hypothesis I have is that in the womb, Anastasia was smashed against my pelvis and had limited movement, where Amelia hogged up the space and kicked all the time. With more limited movement, but more access to sound (her head being closest to the surface) Anastasia became auditory while Amelia became more kinetic.

I also wonder if the primary distinguishing trait of identical twins is that the younger ones have a more rounded face. I adore them. They have been absolute pills lately because I have not taken daily focused time to be with them. I say that because it is my opinion that behavior problems are parental attentiveness problems. That is not about guilt and blame. That is about the power of a few minutes of focused love and attention, followed by independent play. We can do so much more if we do the right things.

Skembox

I knew I had not blogged in a while, but I just realized it has been three full months. Mike is still working out of town and coming home on the weekends. He should be done with it by the end of June.

I wen to Utah in March the twins and I visited Devanie during spring break. I took our new puppy, Tinkerbell. She was very good through the very long ride. She also had a lot of fun with Devanie's little puppy, Jazzy.

The main reason I went was to get the prototype for my toy invention built by the folks at Tanglewood Design. They also made the castle bed that I just installed for the babies. I picked up some of those pieces and had the ones that did not fit in the van shipped to me. About a month later I had everything painted and set up.

The name of the toy is the SkemboX. It is the non-digital toy with as many apps as a smart phone. Of course, me and my development team are still working on the apps, but the existing hardware (really, screws, bolts, MDF, etc.) offers a lot of options to begin with. It is a 2ft. by 4 ft. box with different cutouts on every side to spark a child's imagination. It can even be used as a desk or bookshelf.

I have some business details to take care of before the major launch, but it should be coming soon. I will be sending an email to all of my friends for them to opt in to the Skembox list so I can keep people up to date on product information and give them ideas for using it and playtime ideas that don't even require owning the SkemboX.

Apart from that, I am getting really close to finishing up my bachelors degree. I only have five more classes to take. I really hate my school, but it is too late to leave. I do not think it is the school specifically, but the online atmosphere. It is convenient, but I would really like more human interaction--especially for the price I am paying. But I am going to leave that there. I need to do another assignment before the babies wake up.