Shining

I gave a presentation to a women's group about writing personal history. I used Dad's blog posts (memoir chapters) as an example. He has written some really honest, tender things and I'm so glad he's doing it. One of my favorite lines in his entries is the one where they were at church with the queen and Mom made Dad sit on the back row. It shows Mom and Dad's personality so much.

One thing that the women commented on was Jack Nicholson's face on the side of the blog and it says: Mom's favorite movie. They were dying. Your mom's favorite movie is The Shining?
I said, uh yeah. That and Silence of the Lambs.
They were laughing so hard. And I told them about the time Mom recommended I go to The Ring. She and Dad were on their mission in DC and they had just gone to see it so then I went to see it and I was not surprised at how freaky it was.
But then I told them that she worked in the temple, double shifts. And how she slaved away at work, and read book after book after book (and recommended some to me that were good, yes, but had some graphic material in it and when I was like, Mom? she was like, oh come on, I don't even think about that stuff). I told them about the time I had the worst first day my freshman year at BYU so she picked me up and took me to GI Jane at Wynsong.

Today Cam made waffles and they said, Daddy usually does waffles and you make other breakfasts. I said, yep and they said, is that how it was in your house?

So I told them how Mom used to make breakfast but then she had to go back to work so Dad took over. We talked about all the breakfasts Dad would make (and how Sam really really didn't like one of them) and how I used to beg him to get us doughnuts and chocolate milk practically every morning. And when he did relent, how I let EVERYONE KNOW that we had them because of me. Dad made us a lot of cracked wheat, oatmeal, eggs, pancakes, german pancakes, etc.

Mom never made breakfast really for us because we were in the younger family but I know she made it for the older kids, right? I remember some of you talking about biscuits and other things she'd make. She did always make dinner. Always. And she made us eat it, even the fish casserole on Dad's birthday.

She also bought healthy-ish cookies, like those oatmeal ones with the raspberry jam in the middle that were only like nine to a package which we would eat fast even though they weren't oreos. Oreos we ate in about two minutes (I usually scraped the cream out of a bunch of them and made a frosting ball wrapped in saran wrap to keep in my pocket for secret eating. I did get in trouble when she found tons of the chocolate parts in the garbage).

I also told my boys about the dinners she would make. How every Sunday we had a roast, potatoes and gravy, rolls, two vegetables, a salad and a fruit. And then dessert. Like the chocolate cake with walnuts and chocolate chips on top and then pears and raspberries to go on the side. Van suggested we could have put the pears on top, which is true.

I loved talking about Mom at that group of women and with the kids recently. They didn't know Mom loved frosties. Van said, I DO TOO! We're the same!

I love Mom and I love Dad and I love our family.
Maybe we should all watch The Shining for Mom's birthday---or better yet, an entire film festival! Ha ha ha.