No, I don't drink...

Or anything like that. I just spent the last ten minutes defending how random my last blog post was. Like I might have been "on" something.

I HAD A HEADACHE!!!

Really, church was awful.

Well, I like church, but it was a really rough day emotionally. We had a testimony meeting, which is when instead of 3 speakers who have been asked to prepare a talk on an assigned subject, the floor is open to anyone who wants to share what they know about a gospel topic. ANY gospel topic. Usually, someone feels that there is an experience they recently had that helped to teach them, or reaffirm to them, a gospel principal.

One friend of mine shared how her home teacher came and rescued her when her SUV, pulling a trailer full of camping gear for a youth camp out, was deemed unsafe to drive with a bad tie rod end on her way to the camp. He was there, ready to drive a couple of hours, in less than 30 minutes, with no advance notice.

Talk about charity. And service.

"When ye are in the service of your fellow men, ye are only in the service of your God."

Someone else bore testimony of watching her toddler walk away from her a bit in the woods, it was a safe area for that to happen, and how he repeatedly looked to her to insure he was safe. It reminded her of how we need to regularly look up and make sure we are not too far from our Savior, and consequently our Heavenly Father.

That sort of thing makes up a testimony meeting.

Was I wrong to be sad that no one mentioned Savannah? Melissa and Brian weren't there, so obviously they didn't share anything regarding their grieving process. I didn't get up. I couldn't put my finger on anything particular to say, so I said nothing at all.

Then we sang the last song of that meeting, "I am a Child of God". It's one of very few that are in both the Children's Songbook, and the grown-ups hymnbook. Most every one in our faith can sing it without the book, and it happened to be one of Savannah's favorites, so we sung it often at the hospital.

I cried. I held Michael close to me and cried. Hard. Then Zachary came up and wanted a hug during the ending prayer, and I took the opportunity to leave the room with him, and I went and cried in a smaller room.

Eventually I pulled it together. LDS services consist of sacrament meeting, which was now over, then Sunday school, then Relief Society for women.

Our lesson on the first Sunday of the month is up to the Relief Society presidency to decide. Their topic? How to be a good friend.

Both of my best friends weren't there. But to my wonderful joy, another good friend, one who was there at the hospital with us those last days, was. She got me through it.

For your information, I also found the testimony I needed to share.

A good friend, a true friend, knows who you are, even when you forget. They remind you (when you are desperately looking to get your family out of survival mode) that you stopped telling your boys to LOVE each other. They remind you that your boys need to be reminded that love is a verb, a way to act, and they need to LOVE each other. Because that is what you have taught them all their lives.

An amazing thought that was in our lesson is to substitute in the scriptures the word friendship for charity.

1 Corinthians 13:4-8: Friendship suffereth long, and is kind; friendship envieth not; friendship vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,
Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;
Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;
Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.
Friendship never faileth

I am so grateful to my Heavenly Father for the friends that He has placed in my life, and for all that they have taught me, and the service they have rendered me. They are a treasured gift.


ps If you have any questions about the faith that I share with members of my church, feel free to check out www.mormon.org for more information. Or ask. That's ok too.