Compliments

The best compliment I've ever received was from my Victorian Literature professor. He was about a hundred years old and was the most energetic speaker I've ever heard. I don't remember what prompted it, but after class one day he stopped me and exclaimed, "Meg, you are so full of blithe!"

The weirdest compliment I've ever received happened last night. I spoke for Whit's boss' wife's Relief Society group in their ward in Layton. It was combined with the Young Women and another ward also, so it was a packed room, which was fun. Afterwards a lady, about late thirties, came up to me with her compliment, "Sister Johnson, you're so beautiful, you must be Kyle Korver's sister! We just love him."

Past my prime?

I took a little friend (Sophia) up to Utah State last Thursday to watch her compete for a scholarship. She had to give a presentation to a panel of judges, but it wasn't just a short event- it took all day long. While we were eating breakfast, the head judge came up and met our table. Even though there were hundreds of little high schoolers there, this judge knew the presenters because there were only 15 who were there to compete for the scholarship and she'd been communicating with them through emails for the past few weeks. After she recognized Sophia, she looked at me and asked if I was her MOTHER.

Do I really look like any child of mine should be attending college?

Twenty-Five Simple Pleasures

1. eating lunch with Whit
2. cold days with lots of warm sunshine
3. wildflower fields
4. when Whit twitches a lot just before he falls asleep
5. flash drives
6. red cars
7. hot sandwiches
8. handwritten thank-you notes
9. when Whit tells me every detail of every scene in a movie just to tell me the ending line
10. handmade quilts
11. driving 90
12. statues of animals
13. colored cardstock paper
14. cupboard turntables
15. pull-top cans
16. hot showers
17. watching someone get a good idea
18. kittens
19. puppies
20. painted toenails
21. completing a project
22. heaters
23. fast copy machines
24. yogurt covered pretzels
25. competing in something mundane

My girlfriend did this on her blog and challenged anyone who read it to do the same. It was a little harder than I thought...I must be out of practice! Tony Robbins says you should start each day with being grateful. I guess I do feel better :)

Juggling

This is Whit juggling at the ward talent show. He practiced a ton and got it down perfectly (and would have executed it perfectly if the punk audience would have just not been there)...:)

The Husband...

Whit is the ward celebrity. He's playing church basketball right now and our little ward is undefeated. They're playing in the region games. They had one last Saturday and Whit was crazy good. At church the next day, everyone was coming up to him and telling him how he was so "on fire."

I kept a record of his points on the back of a bank statement I had in my purse. He pretends like he doesn't care, but he's asked to see it like four times.

First Quarter end score: 15 to 12 (we're 15)
3 - 3-point shots
2 - 2-point shots
0 - Foul shots
13 - Total Points

Second Quarter end score: 28 to 20 (still winning...)
1 - 3-point shots
1 - 2-point shots
0 - Foul shots
5 - Total Points

Third Quarter end score: 39 to 28 (still winning...)
0 - 3-point shots
1 - 2-point shots
2 - Foul shots
4 - Total Points

Fourth Quarter end score: 50 to 41 (yay!)
0 - 3-point shots
2 - 2-point shots
2 - Foul shots
6 - Total Points

And all that said, he still couldn't beat his dad last Sunday.

twenty-seven

I have now entered adulthood. I'm on the closer-to-thirty-side-of-the-twenties. Even though 26 is closer to thirty than most other numbers, it's still a little too close to 25, and 25 is a "cute" age. So, with that complex and irrelevant analysis, I can now say that I am an adult.

First, it was off to my mom's to begin my "birthday week" (we Hendlemans are always looking for reasons to party).



If you're wondering, on my head isn't a dunce cap, it's my birthday hat Cael made me. He also made me a pin the tail on the donkey game that we played.



(Grandma couldn't find the right donkey)

For my real birthday, Tom, Katie, and Chris (Katies boyfriend) came over and we ate chicken. Mmmm, delicious chicken. I figured Whit and I have been married a full year and it was about time I made one. Whit made me a fruit pizza and they all decorated it with kiwis and strawberries.

Questionable kids...

Three girls (age 8-ish) all huddled around me and were leaning on my lap asking me a bunch of stuff. One kept patting my legs and asking if I could feel it. I told her that I couldn't feel me legs at all and all their eyes got wide as they stared at me in disbelief. I smiled. But then one brazen little girl broke the silence and asked, "Well, what if we stabbed them?"

Five Years!

So today I have been parayzed exactly five years! It's crazy to think that just five years ago I was walking around in St. George. Walking around and jumping. One of my favorite things was feeling air on my legs, like on a breezy day. Ahhh, memories.

People always try to compliment me by saying that if they were me, they'd never be able to keep a good attitude. Five years (and a day or two) ago if I had the opportunity, I'd have probably said that to someone in a wheelchair, too. I'm glad I never had time to think about it, though, and it just happened.

When I was in the respiratory ICU, someone gave me a small white board and a dry erase marker to communicate. I couldn't talk or anything and couldn't use my hands (for obvious reasons and also they tied them to the bed because they thought I had brain damage - I don't).But the marker was really hard to use and I only wrote once on the board because of the immense effort it took. I wrote that I was glad Heavenly Father chose me for this challenge.

And it was so challenging - everything about it was hard. But now (five years later!), it's not so hard, I never even cry anymore at all! It's not that I'm used to it, don't get me wrong. I still try to get up from the couch sometimes and every once in a while it'll dawn on me that I'm paralyzed, but I think that I'm tougher. Stronger. Better than I was five years ago.

And it still is challenging, but now that I'm on the other side of awful, I'm seeing that it's no better or worse than the challenges other people have. It's just different. And with anything new, it comes with more opportunities and people and insights, which make it worth it.

And that's my thought on my fifth aniversary. Written just before Whit gets off work and when I should be making dinner...

I remember when I thought I'd never get married. And here I am 'Mrs. Johnson'. Hmm. I take that crying thing back, I cry a lot actually, but only because I'm so happy!

Just seeing if this works...
still figuring out this computer thing...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnAMgRki8Mo

This is just a funny video Whit took on our honeymoon. We went to a butterfly farm. I don't know how to post videos and I really need to upload some on my other site so Whit was just showing me how. (How does he just instinctively know and I had to research it forever? I finally asked Dayna and she told me to do exactly what Whit did. I don't know how he just knows, it's not like you're born with knowing that).

Anyway, this is a video taken at a butterfly farm in St. Thomas. It was really cool.