Painting and Working Together

Part spring cleaning, part home repair and improvement, part insanity. We've been wanting to paint the house and I proposed that rather than planning a major offensive, we should play economist and ask what the next part is we wanted to improve. Hyrum's room (before shot). Definitely. Scratches on the white walls from about 4 different kids and their furniture.

I sketched out a schedule for us to get it done this week. If all went well, we'd be done yesterday. If not, we'd have Monday to fall back on before I leave Tuesday for a work conference in Finland. We'd mentally plan on Monday, get paint on Tuesday, clean on Wed-Thur, put the first coat on Friday evening and let it dry while we played with the Petersons, then put on the second coat Saturday and Hy wouldn't know the difference.

Nothing went according to plan.

It all worked perfectly. (after shot of the same wall)

We did minimal planning on Monday. Tuesday was exhausting and Hyrum was miserable, so we didn't get the paint. We put him to sleep in our room and cleaned his room instead. Wednesday we got the paint and supplies and I taught Hyrum to say "Where's Mommy" when we couldn't see her anymore in the store. Thur we did a little cleaning but were definitely not ready, then we had to cancel playing as Hyrum got a fever. No painting on Friday, but Joy did prep work while I watched Hyrum.

Then in one great gasp of effort, we got the entire room painted twice on Saturday, spent a few hours out of the house, and put Hyrum to sleep in his newly painted room!

You'll notice in the shots that there's not much difference between the old white (left wall) and the creamy off-white "Homestead Resort Sunwash" we chose (right wall and ceiling). It's a little yellow and we're glad it's not more yellow, though a little darker wouldn't have hurt anyone's feelings. Eventually we'll paint some musical notes and a song or two on the walls, add a border, some nice stuff like that. The real difference is that the walls are clean and the scratch marks are concealed (well, mostly, but if you go looking for them, you get what you deserve).

We're also very proud of how we worked together on this project. We have such different ways of working on things that we still find it difficult to work on the same project. Usually we break things into smaller pieces and I do my part and she does hers and we put it together and it works.

Joy has been amazed all over the place that when she turned the planning and responsibility over to me (a leap of faith since she is the more detailed planner), she also managed to not feel overwhelmed by the project, which cut down on any communicated stress between us. I in turn let her decide many of the details without complaint which helped her feel in control too. I'd rearrange what we were doing that day and she would help us figure out how to get it done. It was a very good use of our complementary skills.

And it's done and it's happy.

Joy says about the happy weekend we had, "We had a lot of time on Friday night, in memory of playing with Steve and Emilee, for our date night we played two games at the same time. I think it was just as confusing, but it was fun. We rediscovered Carcasonne and Starfarers of Catan (2 player version). I'm looking forward to playing them again."

A Non-Goal

I was reading a friend's blogpost tonight about setting some highly qualitative (unmeasurable) goals about character.

You see, [her husband] looks at goals as useless. Instead, he prefers to think about the person he wants to be. He considers the qualities he wants to have. And then, he tries to simply do those things that will bring him there. I know, it honestly is just a different way of making goals, right? :)

She then invited us to share ours. The last few months, I have been struggling between learning to be content to be who I am and knowing that who I am now is weak and flawed in myriad ways that need eventual change to become the kind of person I want to be and that I imagine God wants me to be. It's very hard for me to figure out which things I can say:

A) This is who you are, and that's okay.
B) This is who you are now, and that's okay for now, and it will be okay for a long time to come. If an opportunity comes to work on it, you might as well take it because there is another person you would eventually like to become.
C) This is who you are now, and that's okay for now, but it may not be sufficient tomorrow. Put some real effort into it.
D) Repent. Now.

My non-goal is to find a greater peace with my progression.

Nibley on the Infinite Atonement, the Existence of Life, Temples, and the Second Law of Thermodynamics

Hugh Nibley, "The Meaning of the Temple," Temple and Cosmos, Ch. 1:

This post used to contain excerpts from the above article. It has been a popular one over time. However, we'd like to keep this family blog a touch more private while still providing this information to the world. So we have moved it to our public blog. You will find it here. -- DW

Excellence

The question is occasionally asked (such as by Hugh Nibley) where the Mormon excellers are. Where are the Latter-day Saint Nobel winners, the LDS Michaelangelo, the LDS Usain Bolt.....? The concern is then usually expressed that the LDS are too satisfied with kitsch, with mediocrity, etc. The riff then generally abuses some poor popular LDS artist, like Kapp Perry, or Kinkade (who doesn't appear to be LDS but seems to appeal to a lot of members).

I've never enjoyed this motif much. I have a slightly different theory that was well expressed recently by Steve Sailer who was answering a question of Tyler Cowen's: what are the odds that the most talented basketball player is actually playing the sport? Among his response, he writes:

Then there’s the question of whether being a screw-up in most of the rest of your life might be considered a talent. Would Bobby Fischer have been Bobby Fischer if he was good at other things? As an exercise, consider Vladimir Nabokov, who for a number of years was crazy about chess (or at least chess problems). Nabokov had the energy, determination, intelligence, ability to hold many things in his head at once (think of the architecture of Pale Fire), competitive streak, and so forth to be a top chess player. But he had other things to do with his life, such as entomological research and writing great novels. Fischer didn’t.

As I've blogged earlier, the Church puts a lot of emphasis on balance. It has to - living the religion adds a LOT of extra stuff a person's life and if we don't learn how to balance competing demands, we go crazy. And what do Church authorities say? "No other success can compensate for failure in the home" and "The most important work you do will be within the walls of your own home" are some of the better-known quotes. Pres. Hinckley reminded folks that this is not an excuse to short-change your employer, but that the long-run priority of responsibility is 1) family; 2) work; 3) church; 4) self.

To be Bobby Fischer or Michaelangelo or any of a number of other truly outstanding people in their fields requires sacrifices in the other areas of a person's life. With the lack of balance and the excessive focus on self promoted by the modern corporate-artistic structure (ooooh, look at the economist try to sound like a sociologist!), it's little wonder so many turn to self-destructive behaviors. It's also little wonder that people who have achieved some level of balance in their lives and put first things first don't end up spending the 100 hours a week at work that it takes to become top.

Yes, we should seek to excel. Elder L. Tom Perry said to BYU students: "I hope that you do not plan to be just common but that you plan to excel. There is no place in this world for mediocrity; we need to strive for perfection." We also need to have a more balanced, holistic, inclusive definition of what excelling is.

[I haven't run this by Joy, but I can guess her response to the motif would be slightly different: our criticism of the heartfelt, Spirit-inspired work of others can prevent us from feeling His influence in our lives and closes the doors to our own inspiration while we are so busy judging other people.]

Let's Hear it for UTAH!

The Derrill Watson, Newly Self-Annointed Defender of UT Series kicks off this week with an interesting paper by Peter J. Rentfrow, Samuel D. Gosling, and Jeff Potter. They studied the geographical distribution of 5 major personality characteristics and ranked their relative prevalence in the United States. States were then grouped into roughly 10-state blocks [sometimes a large tie for 1st is found] representing most to least of that personality type. I'll only report the four states my family really cares about right now and the top 10, but if you want the others, you can find them here. (Hat tip to Marginal Revolution.)

Extravertedness (sociability, hanging out with others)
Top 10: Utah (plus the northern plains states, Fla, Penn, Maine, and TX)
2nd 10:
3rd 10:
4th 10: CA, NY, Conn
5th 10:

Agreeableness (warmth, compassion, cooperativeness)
Top 10: Utah (plus the eastern plains states, the South minus 'Bammer, and Oregon)
2nd 10
3rd 10: CA
4th 10:
5th 10: NY, Conn

Conscientiousness (Responsibility and duty)
Top 10: Utah (plus AZ, NM, mid-plains, Fla, GA, and NC)
2nd 10: CA (Land of the flakes? whoda thunkit?)
3rd 10:
4th 10:
5th 10: NY, Conn

Neuroticism (stress, antisocial, poor coping)
Top 10: NY, Conn and most of the northeast
2nd 10:
3rd 10:
4th 10: CA
5th 10: Utah (much of the west scores very low stress)

Openness (curiosity, intellect, creativity)
Top 10: you guessed it ... no, you didn't. CA, NY, Conn and a bunch of seaside states
2nd 10: Utah
3rd 10:
4th 10:
5th 10:

So what good can we say for NY and Conn? Well, they're curious and intelligent, but that comes at the price of neuroticism, introversion, disagreeableness, and a noted lack of responsibility. Good places to get an advanced degree, perhaps. We Californians are more responsible than our stereotype, curious, and we're chilled out enough to avoid neuroticism, but we're much less open to strangers we like to pretend to be and are only middlin agreeable. Utah and Florida are about the best places to live if you care about the quality your neighbors. On the other hand, if you like your privacy, maybe you'd be happier out here in the northeast. ;)

Please note UT- bashers, UT is not neurotically stressed out and is much more intellectually curious than you give it credit. In fairness to my own neighbors, I would add that Ithaca is more extraverted and friendly than this report would indicate.

Assisted Walking

Mommy story time. if I wait until we have a picture then Derrill will have to blog about it. The following is the story as I shared it with Pop (Hyrum's grandfather) in our IM conversation:

We have two suitcases lieing on their sides in our living room right now. They are heavy enough that he doesn't move them when he tugs on them.

Hyrum pulled himself up to stand at the longest one and slowly made his way standing (a slow walk as he kept holding onto the suitcase) until he got to the other suitcase (they were perpendicular to each other. Then he grabed on the other suitcase and let go of the first and pulled/walked himself around the end of that suitcase.

All standing. Then he let himself down to the ground (meaning he didn't fall), crawled on the floor to the couch and then pulled himself up to stand with the couch.

I was really excited about seeing how he got down so well from the standing position, I usually see him do the falling and he doesn't usually want to get down from standing so he falls out of it. But it was incredible to see him do the walking too. I plan on videoing it too, but it was the only time I have seen him do it so far.

I am more convinced than ever that he is really going to be walking soon and I am excited for him.

Several short posts 2: Mr. Mom

Joy is off in Utica today attending a training session on making use of the Church's new internet-based family history system. That means I got Hyrum all day today! As the time of her return draws ever happily nigher, (wow, that's an actual word!) I just want to say that I have enjoyed being Mom today. Whether Hyrum has or not is hard to tell.
After all, the great thing about Dad is that he shows up ready to play, or at least go for a long walk. I hoped Hyrum could stand me as the only face he got to look at all day. I'm ... not quite as responsive as my lovely and gracious companion, and I make him wait if I'm in the middle of something.

That, and I decided last night that my to-do list was impossibly long. Given that half the things on there couldn't be accomplished in one day anyway (like, continued editing my dissertation and get Per's book published and the like), it was a bit daunting. I talked it over with Joy in the morning, we set some priorities, ... and I got ALL my minimum goals in! Hooray!

Hyrum was much easier than usual, I recognize that. When I was putting the second load of laundry in, I set him on our bed for a minute (surrounded by things that would keep him from rolling off). I came back in for the rest of the clothes and he was cranky, so I handed him his bink. I came back when it was done, and his eyes were so droopy he didn't even react when I came in. ... Let sleeping babies lie, I says to myself. This was the first time he took his afternoon nap without a fuss!
I managed to mow, organize some of our shed, edit some more of my dissertation, write (so far) three blogs, unpack the teensiest bit of my office, do two loads of laundry, cook, help Josh move (Joy had Hyrum then), get him ready for Sunday, and I even found a little time to play. What a wonderful day! That feels so much more fulfilling than "Dear Diary: I spent eight hours writing two pages of my dissertation. What is the meaning of life?"

(PS - For those of you looking for a "Boy, I've sure come to appreciate my wife today," statement: 1) I always appreciate my darling spouse. One of the advantages of being home is hearing what she goes through and being thankful. 2) I may be able to work for 30-60 minutes while still watching over him, but I realized today that it would not be possible to get my schoolwork done and watch Hy full time. Thank you, Joy.)

Unbalanced

My life has been unbalanced for at least a couple of weeks as I have literally thrown myself into helping Derrill find a job. It has been difficult for me to work on anything else. But yesterday I broke the chain in some ways. I put away the laundry for the first time in two weeks. I really was so proud of myself. But the fact that it took me so long to get to it and that I would feel like getting it done was such a victory kind of woke me up to the situation that I was in.

I realized that I really need to refocus. I am good at just focusing on one thing at a time (like looking for a job), but I need a life that is more in balance. Jesus Christ was the only person that lived that had life in perfect balance, but I find that it is very important for me to keep reevaluating and seeking help from heaven for balance.

So one of my goals to help me to focus on what is most important is not only to read my scriptures daily as I have been, but to read from the scriptures and the current prophet and apostles for an hour each day (doing this first). It helps me remember the duty of love that I have for my husband, and that I can serve my family best by doing some of all the things that help our home run smoothly not just amassing all finding a job for my sweetheart. Our family needs things of the spirit, and physical things now, not just in the future.

We went to the OB doctor Monday and all is well. Hyrum does not appear to be ready to come yet, but we feel assured that he will be with us within a month. :D (even if he were two weeks late. Just in case I haven't mentioned it lately my due date is March 10, so there is just 1.5 weeks left until that time. Hurray for family and the love of God that helps us feel that all in our lives is beautiful even when we experience challenges. (You may be able to tell that I feel more centered today than my post might suggest). I have already ready my scriptures and I am about to get to the rest of the day.

I love all of you. Have a wonderful day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!