Sophie's Story

   I've been a little nervous about checking my Facebook page the past few days. I'm nervous because every time a big current event happens people start arguing. I knew this weekend's Supreme Court announcement  regarding gay marriage could cause some very ugly arguments.   I'm bothered by the fact that we, as a culture, cannot seem to be civil to those who disagree. It is quickly becoming acceptable to indulge in name calling and verbal bullying when someone dares to voice an opinion that is contrary to what is popular.   It's time for a review of a lesson that we all learned very young. It is simple. Be nice. Be polite. When I learned this lesson it didn't come with any asterisks like be nice, but only to those people who live in our neighborhood. Be polite, but only to those who have brown or blonde hair. I was taught to be nice to every one and be polite to everyone.   I watched my parents put this rule into action. I never saw either of my par...

  I like to collect things. I collect jewelry, hats, teacups and teapots. I collect books, quotes, mugs and postcards. I also collect people. Unlike my other collections the people don't sit on shelves and collect dust or are used for hot beverages. The people get adopted sometimes without knowing it.   To date I have three older sisters, one grandmother, two awesomely cool older brothers and a flock of younger brothers. Today I have added another grandmother to the list.   Her name is Agnes. She lives nearby in a townhouse. I have been keeping a eye on her and checking up on her for the last couple of years. I have now started to visit her once a month.  Right now our visits have consisted of going out to lunch. She wanted to take me out today and she wanted to go to Culvers. It was a place that she hadn't been to in awhile and there were several workers there that she wanted to see. One of them took our order and chatted with Agnes for a li...

   After the meeting of the Small Town Toastmasters, a few of the members go to a local bagel and coffee shop. It a time for us to eat breakfast and socialize after the meeting. The past year or so my friend, Dana, and I have brought knitting and/or crochet work with us. We work on our current projects while we visit.   Dana has been working on blankets to give to three young girls in a family she is close to. Two of the girls requested that their blankets be pink.   This is a challenge for Dana because she absolutely, positively cannot stand the colour pink. It doesn't matter if it is light pink, dark pink, rose pink, hot pink, blush, fuchsia, flamingo or salmon. She hates it all with a passion.   She's crocheting the blankets anyway. I'm sure it grates on her nerves that while she works she gets covered in little fluffy pieces of pink fuzz from the yarn she is using. It probably motivates her to get them done as soon as possible.   I can see her po...

   I've seen several new articles about Nobel scientist, Tim Hunt, lately. For those of you who have not seen them, he made some sexists remarks at a conference in South Korea. His remarks were tweeted by someone who was in attendance. Many were offended and outraged at his remarks.   Depending on what you read he either resigned or was forced to resign his position as an honorary professor at a university in London. His reputation has definitely been ruined. As happens so often when comments go viral bad things have started to happen.   I have mixed feelings about this situation. On one hand there is the issue of free speech. His comment was that women in labs have romantic feelings for their coworkers and cry when criticized. If this is his experience when working in labs with men and women then he certainly has the right to say it. You may find it stupid, not funny, not true and offensive, but that doesn't eliminate his right to have that opinion and to verbal...

   Lately I've been watching clips on YouTube of humorous moments from past General Conferences of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. You wouldn't think there would be many moments of laughter in a two day conference filled with addresses by church leaders, but there are. One of my favorites is Elder Jeffrey R. Holland saying,"That is like trying to stuff a turkey through the beak!"   Many of the clips that I saw featured the late Gordon B. Hinckley, 15th President of the LDS Church.  Most people wouldn't expect a church leader in any faith to have a sense of humour let alone demonstrate it. I'd like to share a few of my favourite quotes from Gordon B. Hinckley.   At General Conference, he talked about being asked by television news reporter Mike Wallace for an interview. After talking a little bit about his reservations President Hinckley said, "I concluded that it was better to lean into the stiff wind of opportunity than to simply hun...

   My tech,Ariel, has a goal of running a 5K race every month this year. I've had a lot of fun talking to her about it. I like hearing about which ones she plans to run and how she chooses her races. I like to see the pictures that she takes and hear about how it went.   Maybe I'm guilty of a little vicarious experience because there is no way I could do anything like that. I didn't start running until I was 40 or so. I have to do my running early in the morning so my running season is limited to about four months. There is no way I would be able to train enough to run one of those. Besides that, I don't want to be one of those middle aged women trying to recapture their lost youth by doing things that younger people do.    When she talks about them they sound like a lot of fun except maybe the one in February. That would be a little too cold for me. She talks about the Hot Chocolate run where she got a mug of things to dip in chocolate fondue after the...

   L.Tom Perry, member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, died last Saturday at the age of 92. Someone posted an article about his death on Facebook with a comment, "How sad". She was probably surprised at the comment I left, "92 years is a pretty good run". I could imagine her wondering what I meant by this comment. Why didn't I leave some sort of mournful response? Don't I care? You're supposed to feel bad.   The reason why I left this comment is because I have a little trouble feeling really sad when an older person dies. This isn't because I'm a mean spirited person or because I don't like older people. In my experience most of the elderly fall into two groups. One group is those that have lived a mostly happy and successful life, who look back on their years with satisfaction and are blessed have family or close friends nearby,but have bodies that are simply wearing out due to age. Then there are those whose years especially their ...