Our oldest daughter lived for a time in the Pacific Northwest, far from her family in the desert. She had graduated from college and was starting to build a career with a large company near Seattle. Then she met her eternal companion at a singles ward volleyball game and they married, somewhat late in life by Mormon standards. They both were anxious to have children. Our family was very grateful when they found each other because before they did. Larry and I vividly remember hearing frequent phone wailings from this child about ticking biological clocks and how age 29 was the end of all possibility for marriage and a posterity. Whenever the phone rang at our house in the evening Larry would say “Is it whining in Seattle?”
Well, she got her heart’s desire and then some concerning that posterity thing, with twins coming close on the heels of a son and a daughter. Life was quite a challenge for her in those early days to say the least. While she was carrying the twins we did what we could to help at truly desperate times. We were 1,800 miles away but we flew in an eighteen year old sister for example, when "Whining" was too baby-big to bend over to clean the bathrooms. People actually pointed and stared at her when she went out in public near the end of her pregnancy according to her visiting sibling. “Look at that lady’s stomach!” someone once cried out before they could remember their manners. Occasionally, a kind woman would come up to her and say knowingly, “Twins, Dear? Hang in there.”
Well, they were blessed with healthy girls. We all went to help right at first, and then they were on their own to care for themselves and four little ones under the age of five.
The dream that came true turned out to be a challenge to say the least. One day she was feeling particularly overwhelmed. Life seemed an endless round of dirty diapers and preschooler tantrums. She began to question the choices she’d made. Whatever happened to the career she had been educated for? What happened to her body in such a short time? What about her hair? Where were her real clothes like high heels and designer suits? Who were all these little people and why didn’t they speak English? You get the picture.
It so happened that right in the midst of all this angst she began to think of the Relief Society lesson she had heard on the previous Sunday, at least what she could remember hearing of it while juggling babies on both knees. It was about the second coming of Christ. The questions asked were about personal readiness for that great future event. The teacher wanted the sisters to think about their lives and how they spent their time. “If the Savior came back today what would He find you doing?” she asked. “If He walked in on you today, unannounced, would you be okay with that?”
As she was thinking about this she gazed around the house at the mess of kids’ toys everywhere, at the graham cracker crumbs scattered from the front door to the back, and at two babies sitting in their rockers who suddenly began to smell suspicious. She went to them to check the situation and found that both of them had apparently had too much apple juice, resulting in a diaper mess of such gigantic proportions that it spilled out onto the rockers, up their backs and into their hair!
Both of these babies needed an entire bath right now, even though she’d just bathed them that morning. Diaper wipes would not be anywhere near adequate for this situation. So she carted the rockers into the bathroom, knelt down by the tub and began to bathe the babies. Her three year old followed hot on her heels to watch the show.
Tears of frustration began to well up in her eyes as she knelt there. The three year old began hopping back and forth over her legs and singing. She thought……“My house is a mess! My kids are a mess! I’m a mess! I was supposed to be doing great things with my life by now! If the Savior came back today He’d find me and my college degree in a messy house on my knees next to a bathtub washing two poopy babies with a three year old hopping back and forth over my legs singing “Mommy’s gross…Mommy’s gross!”
As she soaped the squirming twins the truth came to her, of course, and she began to cry in earnest. (I didn’t raise stupid kids you know.)
She realized that what she was doing with her life at that exact moment would be acceptable to the Savior. She even decided that He might possibly say something to her that was distinctly positive….like… “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.” She felt much better about many things and said a silent thank you prayer for the Relief Society lesson.
As she finished with the last baby she turned her attention to the three year old. “Honey, why are you singing Mommy’s gross? That’s not very nice.” “Because you are gross, Mommy, he replied. “Look at your feet!” She looked. Both feet, clad in white tennis shoes were resting right in the middle of a dirty diaper. Now she needed a bath.
