Something to ponder.

I forgot to mention this a few days ago, so here it is. Last week on the return trip of my walk I saw something that made me go, hum? So I figured I would share it. As you all know, I live in Huntington. A town that people come to to go hunting. Thus, Huntington, use to be known as Hunting Town. Someone dropped the the space and the "W". Not sure why. I have always liked the letter "W" and my space but I digress. I was passed by a truck full of hunters on their way back from, you guess it, hunting. From the view I got of the back of the truck not a successful trip for there was nothing in it. But I am told that not all trips hunting are for killing something but for "tracking" something. Which leads to my pondering thought. As they passed me and began their return trip into town, Rufus made notice of some deer CLEAR up on the mountain top. Watching the truck leave the mountains. As it did, the deer started to turn and go back into the mountains. But of course one of them noticed me waving at them like a crazy woman and turned just enough to give a look that said, "Lady so help me if those hunters notice you waving at us and turn around! We will no longer leave your precious flowers that you baby so much alone any more and they will be recycled in your yard by morning. Are we understanding each other?" At least that is what I got from the look, you may have gotten something different but you were not there and so you have to just take my word for it don't you? Jeez! So I started to wonder if with all the technology we have for hunting, I know, I have been inside a Cabela's before. Do we really think we are out smarting an animal that lives in the mountains all year long. Getting advice from the ones that have survived hunting season after hunting season as to how to hide. We may be able to make ourselves look like the surroundings and smell like something they like and even sound like them. But who is tracking who?

WHISTLE! WHISTLE! Did you see that?!

As a young girl, I have always wanted to be one of those girls who turned heads. It never happened for me. In fact, boys and men would drop their eyes to the floor. So my dreams of being a head turner, I thought were gone. Being married for almost 16 years now, gone. The man I married wouldn't even look at me when we were dating! He says it is because girls scared him. First of all, I was not a girl and second, Liar! Any who! Today on my walk, it happened! I made the FedEx guy look twice!!!! I know it wasn't because of my size because even at my biggest, (240- 245, I stopped weighing myself at 240) I was not getting those kinds of looks. It MUST be because of my hotness. I posted pics so all of you could see it. It was my hotness right? It had to be! It could not be because I have a nice looking...... dog! Or that he liked my hat! For he could not see it from behind me. You can only see the BSU thingy from the front and he was coming up from behind me and looked at me as he passed and I know I saw him look at me in his side mirror AND THEN AGAIN as he twisted himself in his seat to get another look! Poor man must not get out much. (Get it? FedEx guy that doesn't get out much? Come on! Work with me here! Jeez!) I must admit that my outfit on a normal walk does not particularly match. I must stop myself for one minute because after I just used that word, most of you must be wondering how I spelled it correctly. Knowing me as you all do as a HORRIBLE speller. OK! I admit that I open another tab as I post and it is google.com and I type in the words I want to use and it gives me a list of words that it thinks I want and I chose the word and make sure it is spelled right by checking the definition. See! I just did it again on that word. I know, I'm cheating. But it works and NONE of you would have known any better if I had not just told you. Admit it! Anyway! Today's outfit matched right down to my new shoes that I bought. I looked all over the Internet looking for shoes that would help me in my new walking atmosphere (did it again) of mountains and walking up hills both ways. My old walking Ryka's just were not cutting it and I was getting blisters from the movement of my feet in the shoes that I have had for almost a year. Not good. So I took Eric's advice and I started looking for trail running shoes. Not cheap! Trail shoes for the rocks and such and the running for the snug fit for going up hills and down the other side. Not for the running part. Angie does not run! That is part of the reason I take Rufus with me. He is too nosey to run from something and while he is snooping around it, I have a chance to get away from it. That and if I was to run people would think weird things like: "The world must be ending for that lady to be running!" or, "That right there is just sad and maybe quite painful." Things like that, so I just don't run. And I also have a bad knee, right? But the shoes I found are pretty amazing. They hug my feet so there is no moving of my feet. Even thou I had to take my toe rings off that I have worn for six years. The things we give up for fashion huh? And no one looks at my feet anymore anyway, so why not? But back to the reason for this post. The poor FedEx guy and his sprained neck. Maybe the real reason he looked twice was to see if I was having a conniption fit because as we all know, I am not into really caring what people think of me any more and besides, up here there are not too many people anyway. So I was enjoying myself and celebrating the fact that I made it up the natural elliptical machine again by dancing and wiggling my fanny to the music that was playing in my ears. Not hearing the FedEx guy in his truck coming up behind me. I was not in his lane so he did not have to honk or anything. He just drove past me, looking to see if he needed to call 911. And probably laughing to himself and will later go home and either tell his wife or write it in his dairy. So here's to you FedEx guy, I beat you to it!!

FRUSTRATION, CONFUSION, REGRET, ANGUISH, VENTING

Have you ever had one of those days that seem to repeat it's self no matter where you have moved or no matter how you have changed your reaction to it? While we lived in Gooding, (four years) church was never a place that I enjoyed. It always seemed to drain me more than fill me and I must admit it was quite hard for me to make myself get up each Sunday and go. Knowing that it would take from me. I needed to be filled, not sucked dry. So as we prepared to move to another town, in another state and time zone, I was excited to be in a ward that would hopefully be as the other wards I have been in. At first it was. But there was always little comments that I tried to brush off as me just trying to get use to another change. And as we ALL know, Angie does not do well with change. But the more I ponder on things, I am impressed with the thought that maybe the Lord has put me here because of the mannerisms that I have tried so hard the past 3 years to control. One of the comments we (my family) have heard repeatedly at church is that it is nice to finally have someone in Huntington to flush out the members in this town and that Huntington is a place where members of the church go to hide. At first I wanted to pack our stuff again, (and you "should" know just how horrible that would be for me after doing it twice in one month) and moving to Weiser or Fruitland. But it did not seem right. So after spending time on my knees and asking the Lord if we are here to "flush". All the old mannerisms keep pushing to get out, tell them to come to you!!! The more I struggled with it, the worse I felt. Until the day in church that I got my list of the sisters I am to visit teach. Let me just stop right there for a moment and tell you just how much I love to visit teach. It feeds my snoopyness to be able to go right into someone's home and sit and watch them with their children and their husbands as they come into the house un-aware that ladies from their ward are there. It helped to make me realize just how alike we all are. Even though I have not had visiting teachers in my home in 4 years is beside the point and I finally got my point across just as we were leaving Gooding and I was pretty proud of myself that I was not mean or rude in my doing so. So as I was handed my list, with excitement to meet my partener and get started, I let my moment to get my point across slip away. You see I live 35 min. away from the church and most of the active members in my ward. So the challenge of going into homes that had less active sisters was not what made me intake my breath and raise my eyebrows. It was that I am my own visiting teacher. Almost like being my own Grandpa I guess. I was not able to speak at first, I guess not knowing what to say. Do I stink? Am I THAT ugly? Did my old ward send a letter? Why in a ward of many sisters of my age, was I called to be my own visiting teacher? Why had the Lord asked us to drive to church each week so far but the sisters in my ward not asked to go the same extra mile to me? So I have something new to ponder and set in that wrinkle on my forehead with. My partener is as active as her husband's job and her six kids all under the age of 8 or 9 will allow her. She is a wonderful lady and I like her alot. The sisters on my list are all very friendly. One sister I added to the list with the surprise of the Relief Society Pres. because she lives SO far out there. So does that mean she does not get the blessing of visiting teachers? Does that mean that she just has to go without and made to feel isolated? And then it hits me, almost knocking me off my chair! No it was not Dylan trying to give me a hug. It was the realization that I was not suppose to "flush" anyone out. I think I am suppose to use the mannerisms that I was born with! My bluntness! My ability to stand up and say things that most people are afraid to! Just if only I can do it in a way that does not make them feel like I am attacking them! Maybe the members of Huntington do not come here to hide! That has not made sense to me since the first time I heard the bishop say it. Maybe they move to Huntington and start going to church and are made to feel isolated by the members of the ward! So today I started paying more attention to the way the memebers act towards me. I did nail one of them without really meaning to but I think it got some of them thinking. One of the Relief Society Presidence asked me today if I was a visiter. Mind you this is the same sister that I have had a conversation with in the halls many moons ago. So I said to her in my unmistakably, loud enough to be heard by more than the person I am speaking to, Madson voice that I have been in this ward since June, I just live in Huntington where no one comes to visit me. Her mouth dropped open, (she needs to go back to the denist, I think one of her caps is loose.) and she started stammering something about how busy she has been. To which I replied, most people are to busy to come to Huntington. She promptly moved away from me, I am becoming mean again? The sister that was sitting in front of me, (she remembers me) turned to me and asked me how I liked in Huntington. I told her that it is beautiful here and the people are so amazingly nice. (I just did not tell her how lazy they are) To which she replied that every time she even thinks about going to Huntington, and then she shivered with disgust. I told her that she needs to come and see for herself. She stopped talking to me as well. Is that why when sisters ask where I am from, with their hand on my arm and their warmest smile and I say Huntington, they pull their hand away from me and the smile ends? Most of them do not even know how to get here! It is amazingly hard to find! I mean with ALL those signs and everything it is no wonder they don't know! So I am here in an amazing place that the Lord has made with deer that walk all through the town day and night with no fear of dogs or humans and mountains that look like they are the sleeping dogs of gaints and if you watch them close enough you can see them breathing and not one of the members of my new ward will come here. Sister Knapp, the Relief Society Pres and one of her counselers wanted to come visit me during homecoming week. Which was of course one of the busyest weeks for the Principle and his wife. But I was still in the frame of mind that they wanted me to "flush" people out of this town and they would love an opportunity to meet with them. So I told this sister that I would not be home for most of the week but that the town was having a BBQ at the school and everyone was invited to come and eat. I asked them to come and bring their kids with them, knowing there is no school on Fridays even in Ontario. At that this sweet sister hesitated and told me that she would have to check with Sis. Knapp on that one. I was stupid enough to take that and not realize just what she was saying. We have moved from one ward that hated you because you were not rich and just because they could to a ward that likes you until you tell them where you live and then they don't like you because they don't know. I missed another opportunity after church. The 1st Counselor in the bishopric came to tell me and Eric that without asking his parents permission, they not only asked D'Kota to be the 2nd counselor in the teachers but they had already set him apart, again without enough asking his parents to be there when it happened and then had the guts to turn to me and ask me how many more seminary students I had gotten. I feel like I have tried to control the wrong mannerisms because I was speechless! I feel I was suppose to use that one and let him in one the fact that I was NOT going to be "flushing" members out of Huntington, I WAS going to lighting a fire under the members in this town to get to Huntington! Just what does it take to start your own branch anyway?