A Christmas Greeting From Me to You!

Dear Family and Friends,

Merry Christmas!

I love Christmas time. It is so magical and beautiful. As Kermit “Bob Cratchit” sings in The Muppet Christmas Carol, “The world is at her best, you know, when people love and care.” I have seen and felt much love and care this year, and I have seen how love can change lives for the better.

The many challenges and experiences I have had throughout this year, including heartbreak from a failed relationship, the sudden passing of a dear friend, intense service opportunities as the Relief Society president of my LDS ward, and most recently two ankle surgeries, have all brought many emotional and physical ups and downs, but in the end, I feel so blessed to be alive; to be in the care of great doctors and therapists who help me improve each day; to know that when I heal from the emotional and physical wounds I’ll be better than ever; and especially to be surrounded by my wonderful family and friends who truly are “people who love and care” and have supported and helped me with EVERYTHING. I am also especially grateful at this Christmas time for the birth of Jesus Christ and His atonement that makes everything we do possible.

One of my all time favorite stories is Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol.” Following a harrowing night of being haunted by the ghosts of his past, present, and future, Ebenezer Scrooge awakens to a beautiful Christmas morning, a changed man who “became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough, in the good old world. . . . [I]t was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!”

Love and peace,
Susannah

Emily

I have been so remiss in posting blogs that I'm sure some of my kind blog followers think I have abandoned the blog world, but that is not so. As you probably gathered from my last post, my life got a little bit busy in March. Consequently, I've barely had time to read others' blogs (which I've thoroughly enjoyed when I do read them), and I check Facebook maybe once a week if I'm lucky. Despite my lack of writing, I have this long list of ideas I want to share, including things that are more light-hearted compared to my last few posts, but I can't seem to find the time. The irony is that with all my plans of "great" and humorous things to write, today's post is on the serious side again (sorry!) – though NOT sad! – and is a bit spontaneous, having been prompted by a dream I had last night about my friend Emily Roosevelt. Emily died 2 months ago this coming Sunday at age 40 following complications after her heart transplant from June 2008.

So in my dream, I was at work as usual. It was probably mid-day, sometime after lunch on a day exactly like it is right now. A few of us were talking just outside my office in our foyer, as we often do, when Emily came walking in through the back door with papers in her hand and headed into her office, which is right next to mine. We all kind of chatted with her a bit, she finished what she was doing, and we said good-bye (for the time being, as if we knew we'd see her again). The interesting thing about all this was that while she was there at the office in flesh and bones, we were all aware she was in fact visiting us from beyond the grave, so to speak, and it was just super cool to see her. At first I think I kind of knew I was dreaming, but I managed to easily convince myself that this couldn't possibly be a dream because it was so real and so not weird at all. Sometimes in dreams things are a little distorted to the point that you know it's not real. Not this time. It was real. Until I woke up.

I don't think I was anywhere near consciously thinking about Em when I went to bed last night, but something triggered this dream. As I've gone through the day today I don't feel haunted or anything, but it's more of a feeling of comfort, that she really is keeping herself happily busy doing great things in the afterlife. And I guess a small part of me kind of expects that she'll just show up today, like she did in my dream. :)

Emily was my colleague from the past 7 years, but more importantly one of my greatest friends for the past 9 years. Because this has been really hard for me to deal with or understand, I've refrained from writing (or maybe have just been unable to write) about her on the blog, but after seeing her in my dream last night, I now feel like I want to share a small tribute to her that I wrote to her family the week after she died:


I first met Emily in January 2001 when I was a 2nd year law student interning in the Solicitor’s Office (where I currently work). About mid-way through my internship I was assigned to do a project for her. It felt like we became instant friends. As my internship was coming to a close in April 2001, she was so concerned that I have a proper farewell lunch, so she helped me choose a good restaurant and made sure every single person in the office could make it to the lunch. I think everyone did! And as of this writing, it still goes down in my book as one of the best most successful intern lunches we’ve ever had, wholly thanks to Em’s desire to make it a special occasion for me.

The next time I saw Emily was in January 2003 when I came to interview for my current job. Em was one of five people interviewing me that day. I think she was the first person I talked to. She invited me into her office, gave me a big hug and asked me to tell her everything that had been going on in my life since we last saw each other nearly 2 years earlier. It was like we just picked up where we left off, and so we spent the next 30-40 minutes just talking about our lives and catching up. I don’t think we really talked about the job at all! If I had been nervous at all about my interviews that day, by the time I finished with Em, I was completely relaxed. It was definitely the best interview ever!

I was hired in June 2003, and of course, Em was all over making sure I had a proper welcoming lunch. Once again, she set up the place and time, and printed the announcement on our bulletin board. It was a wonderful time and one I’ll never forget as I had a great opportunity to get re-acquainted with everyone.

In June 2004, about 8 months after Mason (her 1st son that she adopted) was born, Em asked if I could come babysit for a few hours. It was there that I became acquainted with her home and met her dog Maggie for the first time. I was back at the house in August 2004 to stay with Maggie for a few days. And thus began my 2nd career as Maggie’s sitter! (The wintry picture from my last post was taken from the balcony of her house the last time I dogsat for her.) But the best consequence of all was that I had a chance to get to know Emily and her family even better during all this time. I enjoyed a number of visits to the house to just hang out and visit and sometimes have dinner, and the couple of office parties we had at her house were seriously some of the best parties we had! There was also the occasional movie or restaurant dinner or house party or park party with friends, which were all super fun. It seemed very clear that she wanted all of her friends to be friends with each other, so she was always certain to introduce everyone. Among the visits I had with her and her family, two of my favorite visits were first, when she was on maternity leave after Liam (her 2nd son that she adopted) was born I came up one night and we all Thai food together, and second, the visit I had with her a few weeks after she came home from her heart transplant surgery. And then there were the many phone calls and emails. She was always so willing to talk and enjoyed having the company. One of my most vivid memories of Em was during the time when Liam was about to be born and the stress she and her husband were experiencing not knowing for sure if Liam would be a part of their family or not because the birth mom was changing her mind. As hard as that was, Em was SO excited, and even with the lingering doubts was so calm and collected and willing to talk about it. We had a lot of fun exchanging ideas for names. Liam was definitely my favorite name of the ones we discussed, so I was really happy when she chose that name. Emily talked about the boys all the time. She missed them a lot during the day and was so excited for any phone calls from the boys. She was a wonderful example of the most loving mother–an example I hope to emulate someday.

Emily was like a surrogate sister to me in so many ways. She is between Bec's and Dave's ages and would speak to me in very similar ways that Bec speaks to me. With Bec in Canada and the Amanda, Christina, and Erin living in China, Boston, and Brazil a few years ago, Emily kind of became my “fifth sister” and thus had the great “privilege” of listening to me talk about EVERYTHING going on in my life from family, to religion, to boys, to work, to health issues. You name it, we talked about it. When I was diagnosed with Endometriosis in 2006, something that Em had also been dealing with for many years. I was concerned and a bit scared about what I was facing, but sure enough, she was willing to sit down and talk to me about everything, including helping me better understand the surgery I was to have at that time. It was a great thing to share and helped put me at ease in more ways than she could know. In mid-2009 I had some further problems related to this condition that scared me a little bit again. Because Em had been through so much with her heart transplant and the attendant effects from that, I didn’t want to burden her with my problems, but it eventually all came out and as she always had before, she completely listened and helped me understand everything. She was so open and loving and willing to talk. And, in turn, she opened up a lot to me and shared many things going on in her life, as well. We shared a wall between our offices, so it was easy to just head out my door and be immediately in her office. She always validated every single concern or fear I had no matter how inconsequential or silly it may have been, and she offered her perspectives in such a direct but loving way. This is a rare gift and one that I am and will be forever grateful for.

Love you, Em!

Emily was also a very faithful blogger, so if you want to see more about her and all the many challenges she endured, please go to http://www.heart2heart4emily.blogspot.com/.

Winter Is Past

“For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone, the flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing of birds is come...” Song of Solomon.

Winter is past. At last.

During the first 7 days of winter the boy I’d been dating for a couple of months become my boyfriend – my first – and I became his girlfriend. For the first time in my life I was dating someone I actually liked and who definitely liked me back. For the first time in my life I kissed someone. For the first time in my life, I felt compelled to seek counseling to overcome my barriers that were preventing me from fully exploring this relationship with this amazing guy. For the first time in years the barriers to relationships came 100% down with a definite thud. For the first time in a decade I was open to the idea of sharing my life with someone.

And then on the 9th day of winter, the day before New Year’s Eve, it all came to an abrupt end. After an amazing weekend, two nights into the following week my boyfriend did yoga with me, came to my house for dinner, and then announced that he was feeling standoffish, uncertain about everything, confused and that he was sorry but needed to just go home. I've never heard from him again. Given all the circumstances of our dating and everything else which I will spare you, suffice it to say that what he did was the worst, meanest thing anyone has EVER done to me.

And so I spent New Year’s Eve with Mom and Dad. We went to In-n-Out Burger and then watched The Princess and the Frog. About 10 minutes into the movie, Dad leaned over to me and asked if I was sure that this was ok. Absolutely, because this had a happy ending!! We then had a nice visit with Mand and Curt. We also enjoyed a beautiful New Year's Day evening sledding at the park. At the time, I was feeling quite sorry for myself, but reflecting back on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day, I have nothing but happy memories as I felt so clearly Mom and Dad’s love for me. The feeling continues to this day, along with the amazing amount of love that has been shown me by my siblings, extended family, and other friends.

As a consequence of all this, I went into hiding. And for the first time in my adult single life, I was actually feeling not alone, but LONELY. (Big difference.) Not only that, I was no longer writing on the blog, I only sporadically saw my friends, I failed to do my visiting teaching for 2 months, my reading habits were no longer habits, I couldn’t even bring myself to run, my sleep patterns were completely thrown off (still kind of are), which led me to suffer through 5 separate head/chest colds. I WAS still going to the gym, watching TV, and teaching my RS lessons. For a couple of weeks I made a habit of coming home from work, turning off my computer and cell phone, shutting the house up, getting in my PJs, and watching a romantic show or movie. I was fully aware that this was a temporary fix, that I’d really have to deal with this later, but it felt nice to just do nothing.

And then 2 weeks after that horrible night he left, for the first time in my life I actually spoke with a therapist – not just about the things I had originally called about, but also to talk about this latest episode in my dating life. That first session was so critical to the beginning of the healing process that if it had been all I got, I would be forever a better person for it. Happily my therapist has been more than willing to see me again many times since, and so the healing continues.

This was also the season of Disney as I sought much needed refuge with family both in California and Florida. Nothing like a little Disney to cheer you up!

Just when I thought the season was about as eventful – both good and bad – as I could stand, the night after I returned home from Florida I was called to be the Relief Society President of my family ward. Ya, I pretty much fell off my chair when the call was issued. I failed to persuade the Bishop that he was wrong, even mentioning that this future President was in therapy. He just smiled and said something like, “Well, that’s nice. So as far as choosing your counselors,...” I was sustained two weeks later (Mar. 7, 2010) and am now fully into that responsibility. Overwhelmed? YES!! Excited? YES!! God knows me best and knows better than any of us what is best for the ward. I have known that this call was not about me, but about what God wants, as Mom was so great to remind me about this morning. I have an amazing Bishop, the best presidency ever, and so to work I go!

During the past few weeks, we’ve had many Spring snow storms, meaning it snows a lot for a few hours and then melts away on the ground also within a few hours. It was weird but each snowfall brought me such comfort. It was like winter starting afresh all over again. This was such a manic winter where I want to keep certain things in my memory and permanently erase other things from my memory. Having new snow with none of the crazy attached to it but, instead, attaching to it all good nostalgic memories about snow made me feel so good. I thrived on those snowfalls. I loved those quiet walks I took through the neighborhood on perfect white. I felt physically, mentally, and emotionally silent as I enjoyed those fresh snowfalls. It was luxurious.

The last day of winter ended with my 33rd birthday, which was as happy an occasion as it’s ever been, with many loving greetings from family and friends, a successful speaking engagement at a law conference, wonderful dinner with family, great gifts, a movie at Mand and Curt’s, and then a rollicking Sunday dinner with amazing food. And thus, the winter ended.

It has definitely been a season of contrasts – some of the highest highs in my life and some of the lowest lows. And while I have much to be sad and angry about, I have just as much to be grateful and happy about from this past winter because, as the snow has taught me, the pain and all these bad things I’m dealing with will be made as white, as pure, and as beautiful as snow.