Mom's Journal
Some time ago my mom typed up a year’s worth of journal entries from 1981. She had this book bound and printed, and gave a copy to me and each of my siblings. I consider it a great treasure.
She had just started writing in her journal that year in response to counsel from Spencer W. Kimball, who was the President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints back then.
There’s a lot of interesting things to pull out of the journal. Fun trivia, like the fact that it was this year when they bought a brand new sofa and love seat that are still being used today in my family room (they don’t look so new anymore, but hey, they still hold your bum off the ground). Interesting perspectives, like her revealing her lack of surprise that I was able to perform so well at a Cub Scout athletic competition because “Matt is so athletic” (I’ve NEVER thought of myself like that).
But the interesting part is a theme that seems to emerge. It was unplanned of course, but it is there.
As you start reading the journal, you can almost hear a tone in the first entries. The tone is something along the lines of, “I am willing to do this because I believe President Kimball. But I really don’t get the point. My life is so boring — who would ever want to read about it?” But she kept writing those entries anyway, about things like her start into running, involvement in PTA, canning food, sewing clothes, filling church callings, raising children. It is clear in reading the entries one by one that she often felt overwhelmed by all the other obligations that she had and how challenging it was to try to balance those obligations with being a mother. Yet she did it, did the very best she could.
Here’s what’s really interesting: As I read the journal, there are parts that seem pretty unimportant, I’ll admit. But guess what they are about? Ironically, they are often about the very things that seemed so important when they were being written. For example, my mom was pretty involved with the PTA. I give her a lot of credit for this; it is something I’ve felt for a long time that I should do but I’m always “too busy.” So I’m not taking anything away from my mom at all with what I’m saying here. But there’s a part in there where she’d been assigned to do something for the PTA, and it was at a very busy and challenging time for her, so the journal entries at this time reflect the stress in her life of being pulled in different directions and wanting to meet all of her commitments.
As I read that part, I felt two things. One, I’m proud of my mom, not only for trying to maintain balance, but for being willing to help with things like the PTA. Two, I wonder how many people remember today what she did all those years ago when she fulfilled those PTA obligations.
I’ll tell you one thing: I don’t remember her doing those things. But I do remember many of the times she spent with us that she talked about in her journal. I remember getting new furniture. I remember going sledding. I remember doing “summer school” activities. I remember her helping us with homework.
Among all of the other things she was doing, her life back then was about raising four young people and teaching them how to be adults. The theme that emerged throughout the journal was that her life, more than anything else, was about the sacrifices she was willing to make to raise these four young souls, my siblings and I.
And now, over 30 years later, what is the result of all those sacrifices?
Well, friendships since that time have bloomed and dwindled. People have moved away from and into the town where she lives. People probably don’t remember too much about the day-to-day things she did back then that, at the time, seemed so important.
But, 30 years later, both of her sons served full-time LDS missions. All four of her children were married in an LDS temple and sealed to their families for all eternity. All four children are still married today. All four families are active in the faith of my mother and father. Throughout all of high school, college, and beyond, none of these children has ever experimented with drugs, alcohol, or tobacco; none of these children has ever been in legal trouble; none of these children has ever been involved in an extramarital sexual affair, whether before their marriage or since.
The odds against this are staggering. You cannot tell me that her willingness to make raising her children a priority did not have an effect there.
And that is the theme of the journal. All throughout, her entries reflect the challenge of trying to raise kids when there are so many important things pulling her in different directions. But the happiest and most fulfilling moments are those spent with her kids. If you read the journal from a 30-year perspective, it becomes clear that her work back then was really about us. And her comments that she wrote in the typed version, when she typed it up in December of 2010, reinforce this.
So, inspired by my mother, I’ve been trying to write in my journal a bit more regularly also. I’m still not too good at it, but I hope to get better. What I’m finding is that taking that time every so often to reflect on what you’ve done also causes you to be thinking about the things you are doing when you are doing them.
I tweeted the other day, “How much of what you are doing today would you write about in your journal?” Most of the people who read it thought I was joking around. But since I’ve been writing more, I think about this all the time. I spend most of my days sitting at a computer, silently by myself, typing code. It’s something I love and am good at, so it isn’t a problem. But I’m not going to write copious amounts of journal entry about the 30000-40000 hours of my life that I’ve spent writing computer code.
Writing in my journal helps me remember that I need to have a 30-year perspective. I don’t want the theme of my life to be “I typed most of my life away writing computer programs that nobody remembers.”