This is an apple....I am an apple...

 i am truth.  i am who i am.  this can be difficult at times.  sometimes i feel the distance I've created in my life with family and being true to myself and what i believe makes it impossible to repair that divide. i can't change what i have come to believe and i can't change that they believe what they believe.

 it seems this will always be at odds.  i chose to leave and they choose to stay.  i didn't believe, they still do.  neither is wrong really, just different.  leaving was a rejection though.  for me it was living truth, but i can see that for them it's a rejection.  one brother also left, but it is different for him.  that which we believed rejected him and who he was...whereas i rejected what we believed, what we were taught to believe.

 i think for several there has been some healing over this.  I'm not sure there has ever been understanding, but if you ignore a thing long enough you can move beyond it without ever really facing it i guess.   it's mostly just never discussed.  for many i suspect they presume i have nothing of a belief system.  i suspect those with the strongest faith are the ones who have been the most secure with my choice.  they don't need to take my leaving personal, or as some statement about them staying.

 these are from today's Monday walk. 

 it was a beautiful crisp day. 

 i fear i have a head cold coming down.  i sense it has now dropped down to my lungs.  i started coughing in the afternoon and it never stopped really.  inhalers, cough meds and a hoarse voice now.  we shall see where it goes.

 leaving was not an easy choice. i  feared the repercussions.  my mothers brothers both left and that relationship was pretty strained.  i suspect it was strained despite any choice of religion.  i suspect they were never all that close growing up anyway.   i read and i prayed.  in the end the answer was that i should leave. 

 leaving was a risk, but in the end, you must eventually choose to live true to yourself or forever be unhappy.  life is not perfect.  i never found a great love to carry me through and share this life with.  i never had children and that at moments can be sad.  overall though, i am happy, i have peace with the choices i have made that have  brought me here.  i feel my choices have helped me become a better person.  more of a person where before i felt more of a shell.  i never fit in, i never measured up.  at least going it alone, i no longer feel the need to compete.  to try to be someone and something that just wasn't in me

 i recall those first years as i slipped away from the religion of my youth, a few brothers would often admonish me to just "go to BYU and find a husband" that by doing this "all would just work out".  i would just tell them that i felt that would be cruel.  to make someone fall in love with me and plan a life with someone only to one day have to say, i never believed and destroy the truth that they believed.

 after i left a friends husband and i ran into each other in a parking lot at Cal Poly Pomona.  he spoke of wanting to leave like i had.  in that conversation i had to tell him that he had made a promise to my friend, a vow, to live this life in this church.  he couldn't so easily walk away.  once you involve others it gets more complicated.  one of my brothers nearly left his family.  he too seemed to wish to leave the church.  in the end i believe he saw how much he could lose if he did.  these were choices he had made long ago, commitments made long ago.  in life sometimes you need to stand by those commitments....at the very least you need to think long and hard before breaking those commitments. he seems to be at peace for the most part.  he stayed. i simply chose to seek out the answers before i made a commitment that i would have a difficult time altering. 

 i think in those early days there were resentments.  when i would visit no plans would be changed.  church would be attended and if i wanted to visit with family it was my choice to not go to church, i was even told that by some.  so i paid money to visit family only to see them off to every possible meeting.  perhaps i should have just attended with them as a charade, but i felt i needed to be committed to the decision i had made.  when you are the youngest i suspect you are not taken seriously.  i suspect it was thought i was in a rebellion and i would come to my senses. 

 i heard my Dad had found my scriptures one time that he visited.  when he thumbed through them he saw that i had read every page.  that i had marked it up and i think ultimately that gave him peace.  i had studied, i had not made a rash decision.  my father had a very strong faith. i have decided that those with strong faiths are the most accepting of others.  they can accept you making a different choice and not have that impact their own faith, their own belief. 

 it wasn't one thing that drove me away. it was a lot of things.  it was the doctrine, which didn't make sense to me, and i could never make it feel right and whole.  the further away that i have gotten i see that those things make even less sense.  i hear or read the same responses that i heard when i was 8 or 10 or 15.  pray harder,  there is much that we can't understand now but it will be clear later, the people are fallible but the church is true...so many of these lines, they just felt like cliche's to me.  i needed more clear answers.  i guess i was never that good with faith.  i needed truth.  i needed it to make more sense.

 even when i was young things just started to not make sense.  blacks, why would God change their skin color?  why would generations of people who had not been evil be forced to be this dark color that God had changed their ancestors to.  why then, would God suddenly decide to give black people the priesthood in the 1970's?  why, if their ancestors skin color been altered due to evil behavior did they now not turn back to white and delightsome?  why did the kids in Africa that never had the church not be able to get to the highest kingdom of heaven? why if you could just accept the church after you had died, why did any of this matter?  what was the point? 

 so many questions...i always had so many questions.  then i met a friend in 7th grade and she had never been raised with any religion and she began to ask the same questions.  not out of meanness she was just curious.  the same questions i had coming through her, it was amazing to see that there were more ways to see things.  i think too, it was shocking for me to see that she was a good and decent person despite not having the gospel.  there were many good and decent people who did not have the gospel...this of course, just raised more questions. 

 i just questioned more and more and the answers were never adequate.  mostly they were just cliche's. or you just had to fast and pray until you got the right answer...which also seemed odd.  if you never got the answer that the church was true you were supposed to just continue to fast and pray until you got the answer the church was true and if you still didn't get that answer....back to fast and prayer.  it was a loop that began to drive me mad.  i never got the right answer and i was thrust back onto the loop. 

 after i left, the questions continued, only now i had to back track and start over.  what did i believe? did i believe anything?  was any of it true?  when you leave a thing that you were told was absolutely true...what is true?  you are lost for a bit.  i was lost for many years as i sought answers to the questions. 

 eventually, i realized that there aren't always answers.  that it's okay to accept that there aren't answers to every question.  that we do not all need to be religious scholars to be good people.  that Christ only expected us to each follow the most basic of teachings.  that the most basic of teachings in  Christianity were really quite similar to the most basic of teachings in all the large religions. 

 be kind, do unto others as you would have them do to you, love, don't judge.

 i still do not have the answers, but i am finally at peace with that. 

 i think humans like to be right, we like to believe that we are more right then the others.  religion fills that for us.  another why was, why would i have been lucky enough to have been born into the one and only correct church?  why any of us.  why was i born to stable and kind parents?  why was i not born in a war torn nation?  there is no sense to be made of anything. 

 i have come to believe that we all have lessons that we need to learn.  that perhaps this isn't it, that we may return here to take on other lessons.  that we may even return in other life forms for these other lessons.  it seemed impossible that you could learn all you need to learn with one trip to earth.  when i let go of the rules, i was more open to the possibilities. 

 i felt instantly less judgment towards others.  they simply had a different lesson to learn.  for them to learn that lesson perhaps they needed to be gay or in a different race or religion or nation or situation?  how could i judge anyone when this was their life, their lesson. 

 we don't all fit in a box and therefore there are many religions out there to aid people in this journey.  to help them find answers that help them take what they can from this lesson they have been given to learn. i feel none of the religions is totally wrong or totally right.

 one night i sat in a hotel in South Dakota.  i had been offered a job as a nurse there. i knew not a soul in South Dakota and i was sitting on the bed in that room trying to decide if i should stay in LA or move.  i remember the thought that it may be lonely to be somewhere i knew not one person...but then the thought occurred to me...back home i was surrounded by people and i felt alone.  i felt lonely and not understood. i was already a misfit in the world i was in...so i moved.

 in that world, by myself, i finally felt i was me.  i was able to just be who i wanted to be and to explore all the things i had wondered without any intrusion or influence. 

 after a few years i started to feel like i was settling.  i started to look into buying a home...but at that point a part of me felt a longing.  a longing for Alaska.  i had seen the license plates for years with awe.  i had watched programs in school about the darkness in winter, the beauty. 

 i took a job in another place where i knew nobody. the interview was just on the phone so i again began packing to be somewhere I'd  never been. 

 i was in a park in Rapid City and started speaking with someone else who was out walking their dog.  it came up that i was moving to Alaska.  this person said, "but what if you hate it?" and i remember just looking at them and saying, "but what if it's the best thing that ever happened to me and i never took the chance...and besides, you can always move again".

 in life you have to be willing to make leaps.  they can be terrifying and painful and sometimes there are negative consequences to those choices, but you should never allow fear or anxiety to prevent you from making those leaps.  those who fight you the hardest when you leap are often those who fear making these leaps themselves.  they can't understand or they are just afraid. 

 that was another why i asked myself a lot in the past....why when some were so miserable in their current situations did they not leave?  i had to finally just accept that perhaps i was just a little bit braver.

 i still find myself being fearful at times when i am faced with new situations or changes. 

 overall in life i feel i have not had to really wrestle with big decisions...they come to me.  i do the legwork, i question and i ponder and i research, but in the end, the answers just appear clearly before me. 

 ordered some pilgrim stuff for Skelly for Thanksgiving.  not sure what all will happen...though Speedy today had the idea that the dinosaur could be dressed as the turkey...hmm.  interesting.

 my life is far from perfect and I'm not done pondering the questions.  i still have a lot of whys that i will probably never get answered. 

 i get by with a little help from my friends and family. 

 the dogs and i have had a tough week.  it's like any relationship i guess.  some days you like each other a little less for a few hours.  haha.  of course, then they look at me with their sweet, sweet eyes and any frustration melts away.  this too shall pass. 

 i am not perfect and neither are they.  I'd say they are far more perfect than i am.  each dog has it's little quirks.  they will never be Blossom or Rio Catalina.  they are Tusker and Ivy Rose.  Ivy is a challenge...but probably because she is super smart.  she had a difficult time containing her excitement.  she adores me. i thought Rio adored me, but i think Ivy Rose has her beat.  Rio and i had a few moments of frustration but we always got through it.  I'm hoping Ivy will forgive me my foibles. 

 Tusker, squirrel chaser.  there are worst things i guess. 

 this is us.  this is my family.  i can count on them.  they count on me. 

 got a break from tennis ball throwing today.  thanks LS.  she acted as my relief thrower today.  i suspect it was a nice break for my arm. 

 another memorial above down at the beach. 

 the roads are slick, so i didn't go too far again today.  can't wait to get these blizzacks on. 

 these are from various walks in September.  still way behind on pictures but winter slows life down a bit.  i do need to dig my heels in and start planning for the kitchen remodel.  i do dread it...but i will have to make that leap and let the fear and anxiety ripple through me.  it's the only way forward in this world.

 change is tough, but it most often turns out to be good.

 it's easier to forget Ivy's exuberance when she is colored pink.  it's tough to be upset at a pink dog for very long.  she was in a very bouncy mood today for the walk .  it can make me so pissed off.  i just want her to stop jumping!!  it's so aggravating.  i am at a loss at this point. 

 liked the line between the leaf colors.

 Skelly's fishing pond. 

 the kids with the cairn memorials down on the beach.  so cute.  i do love these pups.  they really can steal your heart, even on a week when i find them somewhat aggravating.  we will get through this week and my heart will be more full for it.  thanks for enduring my ramblings..

grateful for:  A.  those who endure my ramblings and come again and again  B.  those who accept me for who i am, who have a strong enough faith of their own to not let my lack of faith feel as though i am questioning theirs. C.  a pink dog...her heart is big and i forever am in fear that i will  break her spirit.  she reminds me of a quote from a TV show...some are not meant to be tamed so they wander through life until they find one who is wild enough to run with them...okay i totally screwed that up.  but some of us are wild and we need others just as wild to run with.  may she teach me to be wild again...to follow my heart and my passions as she does.