Music for a Sleepless Night

Have you ever experienced a sleepless night? The kind where emotions are so strong and ugly that sleep flees and hides really well? And the harder you try to tempt it back, the more stubbornly it hides. And sometimes an entire series of these nights makes you wonder why you even try to sleep when the sun goes down, even though logically that’s when sleep should feel the most natural.

I wish I could say I’d never met a night like that. But, unfortunately, those nights are way too common in my life. A few years ago, while sleeping in a private room (for the price of a shared, because Provo summers are the BEST), I remember turning to YouTube on my sleepless nights and listening to the same one or two songs until I started to feel at peace and able to fall asleep. I don’t do that very often any more, but last night I returned to a few old favorites and again found peace as I listened to each song multiple times.

I’m grateful for beautiful, uplifting music. I’m grateful for the combination of hope-inspiring lyrics and soul-soothing harmony. Today, particularly, I’m grateful for the incredible Mormon Tabernacle Choir and for the ability to feel God’s love and reassurance as I listen to their music. And, as much as I often hate the effect smartphones are having on society, I’m grateful for my phone, YouTube, and data which allowed me to listen to these recordings in the middle of the night.

For anyone feeling weary or struggling to hold on, here’s two songs that brought me peace on my sleepless night. I hope you can find peace and courage in them, too.

If the Way Be Full of Trial, Weary Not

Hold On, from The Secret Garden

A Dad, a Grandma, and a Hundred New Cousins

Several months ago while spending a weekend at our new house, I looked around at some of the quaint, old details of our 1940s home and thought, "My Grandma Argie would love this house. I would love for her to come visit us and see it!" But Grandma lives in Utah and cares for my 93 year old grandpa and I knew the odds of her coming to visit were pretty slim.

A couple Sundays ago, as I sat in church thinking about my life, I thought about my dad and wished I had spent more time with him when we were in Utah this summer. It made me sad not knowing when I'd see him again and knowing it would probably be after our baby is born in December. That just didn't feel soon enough.

That Sunday night, I got a call from my dad and my Grandma Argie. They announced that Dad was coming to visit the next weekend and Grandma Argie might come, too. Though the circumstances that brought them to St. Louis were mournful, I couldn't suppress my own excitement that I'd be seeing family in less than a week. Later that night, I remembered my earlier thought from church and felt overwhelmed with gratitude that God had answered my unspoken prayer. Heavenly Father works in mysterious ways and blesses us with the secret desires of our hearts when we least expect it.

Dad and Grandma came to attend the funeral of my cousin, Loyce Huston. Atkin and I met Loyce only twice. The first time was at a family reunion back in May. The second time we visited her at the hospital after she had been diagnosed with stage four cancer. At that visit, we discovered that she had also moved recently and we now belonged to the same Latter-day Saint congregation! That felt like another of God's small miracles.

When we moved to St. Louis, we didn't realize we had cousins in this city. I think Grandma mentioned it, but I didn't understand until last May when my parents and Benjamin visited and our black O'Kelley cousins put on a family reunion just for us! We showed up and met all these people who share a grandpa with me. And despite cultural differences and backgrounds and never having met each other before, these people welcomed us into the family as if we'd been there all along!

I wasn't sure what to expect at Loyce's funeral, but it turned out to be an incredible experience. Family is an interesting thing. There is something special about just being related. Of course, we can always choose how we treat the people who share our ancestors. But when we choose to accept even distant relatives as family, there is an instant tie that can only be explained by the fact that we're related. I've felt this throughout my life at family gatherings with cousins and second cousins. My shyness as a kid at Hicken family reunions never stopped me from feeling a strong sense of belonging and family unity every time we gathered. I grew to love my ancestors as I listened to my grandma and her brothers tell humorous, sorrowful, and miraculous stories from the past. I've felt this special bond when I see cousins that I haven't seen for a long time and find that conversation comes easily despite our lack of ongoing communication. It's easy, because we're cousins. At least, that's how it seems to me.

What's different about my black O'Kelley cousins is that we come from completely different cultural backgrounds and the circumstances of our relationship are awful. I come from the privileged white daughter and they come through an abused slave. But somehow that tragic past and our differences don't get in the way of us being family. As I met cousin after cousin at the funeral and started piecing together the family tree, I was overwhelmed by the enthusiasm and love of my newly discovered cousins. I just felt like family. What did God know that I didn't when He guided us to move to St. Louis? Lots of things, including that St. Louis is where we have family.

Grandma spent 30 hours in St. Louis. I wish she had stayed longer, but I'm grateful for that one day. And I was right. She loved our house. Every room and detail delighted her and, in true Grandma style, she expressed her delight with the earnest eagerness of a Southern belle. She set a high standard of enthusiasm for everyone else who comes to visit.

We got four days with my dad. We could have kept him longer, too. I'm grateful for all he did for me and Atkin while he was here, from helping with dishes and weeding our garden (which is actually just weeds right now) to offering fatherly counsel and inspired, spiritual guidance. He is a great man and I'm thankful for his humility to act as an instrument in God's hands.

I know that Heavenly Father cares about the details and the big picture of our lives. Today in General Conference, Stanley G. Ellis taught me that hard is good. It humbles me, strengthens me, and teaches me. Hard is the constant in life and the variable is how I choose to react. That was a significant message for me to hear at a time when life feels hard every day. I also learned from President Dieter F. Uchtdorf that God gives strength to the weary. Last weekend, God gave strength to this weary daughter by sending two miraculous visitors and introducing me into a new, welcoming family. Here's a few pictures from our exciting weekend:

Some of the family at the funeral

My cousin, Joseph O'Kelley and the chart that
helped me start piecing things together.

Grandma was excited to point out that we share the same height genes.

Celebrating Benjamin's birthday with shakes (and a salad).
Those smiles are partly because of our shakes,
but mostly because of my dad.

Five Months of Pregnancy in One Post

One day it was April and I decided to start blogging again. Three months later, I still hadn't written another post. Partly I didn't write because I wasn't ready to publicly discuss the most life-changing, thought-consuming aspect of my life. But now I am. Here he is:

This little human is growing inside my tummy. He's been growing for approximately five months and is due to make his debut around December 2, 2017. He's currently kicking me, which is how I know he's excited to be here. We already love him dearly.

Here's part of the story of Baby Smedley, the third:

Two early miscarriages in 2016 (the first at five weeks and the second at six) slowed my initial excitement for baby number three. It's painful to start planning and dreaming and loving just to have it all torn away in a few weeks. But this time things felt different. This time, God had a different plan.

One part of that plan was yoga. Sometime in January, Atkin and I attended the temple. Sitting in the celestial room, I felt overwhelmed by all I could or should be doing to increase my happiness. All the tools I've been given to improve life just stressed me out because I knew I couldn't do them all so happiness must be out of reach. When I took the problem to Heavenly Father, he gently told me to do yoga. Every day. And that was all. I tried to add to the list of things I should do and he said, No. Just do yoga. So I did. And I loved it. On March 16, I woke up inexplicably tired and thought, "I'm pregnant!" As the weeks passed, my initial instinct proved correct. As I faced the possibility of losing another baby, I used yoga to remain calm. Beyond the mental and emotional benefits of yoga, I believe that lowering my stress allowed my body to focus on producing the hormones my baby needed to stick around longer than a few weeks. I'm not a doctor and I believe that partly I miscarried last year because the timing wasn't right. But I also believe that God knew yoga would help my body hold on to this baby during those first sensitive weeks.

Those first few weeks I remember expressing gratitude for every day I remained pregnant. I tried hard to trust God's plan for us and to enjoy each day he gave me with this tiny person. I remember pleading with God for this child's life and telling him how much we wanted him/her to come to our family. One day as I talked with God, I felt reminded that I could trust his plan for me and his plan for this child (who is more his than mine, anyway). I felt a reassurance that this child's mortal experience would be longer than our first two had. I clung to this reassurance in the moments I felt inadequate or terrified of doing something that would jeopardize the pregnancy. I remember having a couple vivid dreams in which I miscarried and waking up afraid to go to the bathroom in case the dream proved real. Those dreams were awful. With the fear of miscarriage as my nearly constant friend during the first few months, it took time to let myself feel truly excited for this baby. Yet, every time I chose to dismiss fear, I felt confident that we'd get to meet this one. Now we've seen him and he moves all the time and he has a bedroom and a few random things people have given us and he's starting to feel more and more real all the time!

There are many ways I see that the timing for a baby is incredibly better this year than it was last year. I love the resources we are finding in St. Louis that we wouldn't have had in Utah. I love that my best friend is six weeks more pregnant than me so we get to go through a lot of it together. I love that we just bought a house (another long story about God taking care of us) and get to start a family there! Atkin and I still struggle a lot with this life thing, but I think we're more ready for a baby than we would have been a year ago. And there's people I'm grateful to have met in the past year that I wouldn't have met if I already had a baby.

In conclusion, the last several months have been an emotion journey (not to mention all the physical adventures of pregnancy!) But God has not left me comfortless. I love feeling Baby Smedley move and I love even more when Atkin feels him move. I love doing this adventure with Atkin. I certainly haven't maintained my daily gratitude for pregnancy. Sometimes it's a lot easier to complain. But when I really think about it, I'll gladly take all the discomfort, pain, inconvenience, and emotional rollercoastering if it means we get this baby. I am excited and grateful to be his mom.

We'll be hanging three stockings in our new house this year. As long as we get the present that fits into that tiny sock, I don't think we'll mind if Santa doesn't bring anything else.

Let's Enjoy Life Again

It's time to revisit the blog. It's time to allow less murmurings into my journeyings. Most importantly, it's time to invite more gratitude into my imperfect life.

And it's probably been time for the last couple years. But hey, at least I'm doing it! Better late than never at all.

Life is hard. Sometimes I feel weary and and want to quit. Sometimes I wish I could return to the three months before my mission--the most perfect three months a girl could wish for. I knew then how perfect it was and I knew it was fleeting and I knew that life could never be that perfect again. I had no classes. I had no job. I had no financial worries. I had no worries about the future (my mission president would take care of that for the next 18 months). I had no worries about romance because I was leaving for a mission! And I had more friends than I had ever previously enjoyed.

I think that was the biggest thing. Despite my inability to make friends quickly, I'm definitely a people person. People make life meaningful for me. Relationships bring the greatest meaning to my life. So those three months before my mission, my life felt full of meaning! My heart had never loved so many people so deeply at one time. Just read some of my earliest blog posts and you will see that people made my life so good.

The other day I was thinking about blogging again. As the first step toward blogging, I opened my old blog and started reading old posts. I knew I would need to start a new blog if I wanted to write again. My life isn't the perfect, cheerful, upbeat life of my 21-year-old self. I murmur all the time! No, reading this blog was just about seeing if it would spark an interest to start blogging again. Probably my next blog would feature everything wrong with the world and how the world can/should fix it. (I have a lot of good ideas about solving the world's problems. And a lot of issues with our world. So it felt like a natural subject to tackle.)

As I read, I reminisced and longed for those simpler times. For those easier times. For those months when I felt I knew myself and understood myself. For those times when I felt loved by many and my heart loved deeply back. Reading those happy, heartfelt posts further convinced me that my current life belonged on a separate blog. Until my post entitled "Life" from February 5, 2012. That post reminded me that despite all the good, perfection didn't exist back then either. I still felt emotions we deem negative. I still struggled with feelings of self-worth and acceptance. However, practicing gratitude helped me overcome many moments that could have turned miserable and to choose enjoyment over endurance.

The post that convinced me my new blog posts belong on my original blog came at the end. My first ever post describes the purpose of my blog, which evidently did not include portraying a perfect life that I could never get back. I summed up my goal in the last paragraph of that post, as follows:

"Reminding myself and others the importance of gratitude. Focusing on the good. Noticing the simple joys of life. Journeying without murmuring. Showing how life can be enjoyed and not just endured. Sharing more quotes and more songs and more videos about why life is soooo good. Because there are so many reasons to be grateful and I have so many favorite things."

I think I can be that person again. I think I can find things to be grateful for. I think I can notice the simple joys of life. I think I can stop enduring and start enjoying. So here's to remembering how to have so many favorite things.