Journal Writing

My life of journaling is extremely inconsistent. I go through hot and cold spells...where for weeks to years I will be very good at keeping a consistent journal, and then for weeks to years I will...not be good at it. For instance, my current journal was started June 4, 2004 when I got off my mission. I wrote really well in it for almost 2 months, then had an entry about being engaged, a few entries about married life, and my last entry until recently was that I was 32 weeks pregnant with a little girl (Little M). Not so good. Mr. N, on the other hand, is more consistent about journaling. He's by no means...a frequent writer...but every month or two he makes an entry. He is always trying to get me to write in my journal. A request that I almost always ignore. I really didn't think I was missing much though. I can remember things that happen, I take pictures, and within the last year I started blogging.

In preparation for moving, we have been going through all our boxes of "storage stuff" and getting rid of a ton of stuff. Many of our neighbors have already benefited from the E Family Purge of Junk. Anyways, we came across a box of my old Journals and Mission Journals and Mr. N was astounded that I have a history of being a good journal keeper. As entertainment a few nights ago he took a break from the purge of our room to read through my most recent journal. He really enjoyed the fact that it made me nervous to have him reading it. It covers 4 years...so it’s not exactly like I remember what I wrote. So, I read over his shoulder. It was extremely...insightful. There were so many little things I had forgotten! For instance, before my mission I went to school at Utah State. After my mission I was in the process of preparing to go back to school there. I was going to go down to Texas to visit my dad for a couple weeks, and even bought a plane ticket from Texas to Utah. Luckily the ticket from NJ to Texas was a round trip. I had completely forgotten that I bought a ticket to Utah.


It might be beneficial to give you a little background info on how Mr. N and I met at this point. His sister and brother-in-law (Tara & Josh) and their kids lived in my home ward in NJ. Josh was stationed there for the military at the time. I knew them, but not really well. Before my mission and after they were just another family in the ward...a family with adorable kids! Tara was in the Primary Presidency before my mission and I worked in there as well as chorister. I remember after I got my mission call I was asked to tell the kids about my decision to serve a mission. I also remember Tara explaining to her oldest, Kayla that I would be serving a mission just like her uncle who was serving a mission at the time. It turns out that uncle was Mr. N. I distinctly remember that, but really didn't give it a lot of thought. Just another family, right? So, anyways, I served a mission and returned and by that time my older sister had become good friends with Tara. Josh and Tara had just had their third baby, Kara, and my sister (elka) had one little boy. So, I guess you could say I knew them a little better than before because my sister spent time with Tara. I remember here and there talking to Josh in the hall. He would ask how I was adjusting and so forth. I answered him like any other member of the ward.


During that time was when I was struggling with the decision to go back to Utah for school. I was really torn. I bought the ticket back, but still wasn't completely comfortable with the plan. Before going to Texas (Texas then to Utah), my sister found out that Tara's brother (Mr. N) was coming to visit her in August. We were the same age, both return missionaries...and naturally she saw the potential. Josh immediately got on the bandwagon to set up a date between us. I'm not sure how involved Tara was :). I was dating a little here and there, but nothing serious by any stretch of the imagination. Around that time I got a blessing from the stake president (who was a good friend of mine) to help guide me in what I should do. I recorded in my journal (no, I didn't remember this) that I would know what to do and that one day I would look back and see the Lord's hand in my life and understand. Within days of that blessing I decided to stay in NJ. Since Mr. N was coming to visit Tara after my return from Texas, this now made the date possible. If I had gone to Utah as planned, it would not have happened. Most of this has come back to my memory from reading this last journal. I recorded in there that I was nervous because I didn't want to get stuck in New Jersey, and now I didn't know how many years I would have to wait to finish school or get married. That made me sad, but I felt good about my decision.


I recorded that my decision to stay in NJ was surprising to a lot of people. I began to prepare for a life there. I bought a car, got a job, etc. In the mean time, plans were well under way between the Williams and my sister to set up this date. I was not really interested. Really, where could it lead? Mr. N lived in Utah, and I felt I needed to stay in NJ. I was mostly doing it to humor them...and plus...dating was fun. While I was in Texas visiting my dad my sister got me Mr. N's email address. I also got to see some pictures of him (though he was really young in the pictures) and he saw pictures of me (recent pictures). As we emailed I was really surprised to find that I really liked Mr. N's personality. He was someone I could easily joke around with and have good email discussions with. I remember the day passing for my flight from Texas to Utah and remember feeling the finality of my decision. It was somewhat depressing, but I still felt good about my decision. I returned to NJ and was now a little nervous to meet Mr. N because he had turned out to be a lot more interesting than I'd anticipated. I remember talking to Josh one time and he asked about my dating life…there was one guy I was kind of interested in. He advised me, “Be sure to give my brother-in-law a chance.” By the time Mr. N actually made it out to NJ the other guy was out of the picture. Mr. N and I met. At first we were around our sisters a lot, and that made me really nervous. My sister was constantly telling me “if you don’t like him, that’s fine, but he’s such a nice guy so be sure to let him down easy!” When we actually went on that first date to NYC it was a different story. When it was just us together, I think we were both able to relax a bit more. We had a really fun time in the city, and he was so nice. Needless to say our sisters were telling each other everything we told them about each other behind our back, and then in turn passing the information on to us. I think that’s how I learned that after the NYC date, Josh asked Mr. N what his favorite part was of the date and Mr. N surprised him by saying it was the elevator ride in the Empire State Building. When asked why that was (we had gone to a Broadway show, seen the temple, gone to central park, seen time square…) he told Josh it was because the elevator was extremely crowded so I had to stand with my back pretty much nestled into his chest as we rode. I love that memory…of that being his favorite part.


Well, now that’s I’ve probably alienated all my readers, I’ll get to the point. SO many of these memories I didn’t remember! I probably wouldn’t have, either, if it hadn’t been for my journal writing. My sister also told me (and I’m not sure if this is true…Tara, you’ll have to let me know) that Josh and Tara had been trying to get orders out of NJ for a while, and it was only after Mr. N and I met that they received those orders. Looking at things now, I really can see how the puzzle pieces needed to fall into place. I needed to stay in NJ so I could meet Mr. N. I guess the same might go for Tara & Josh. I moved to Utah to marry Mr. N 3-4 months after we met, but if I hadn’t stayed, we wouldn’t have met. I now feel a renewal to write in my journal. I’m not going to shoot too high though…my goal is once a week.