{"id":19533,"date":"2020-06-21T05:06:00","date_gmt":"2020-06-21T05:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/abeandlily.com\/?p=19533"},"modified":"2020-06-28T22:32:19","modified_gmt":"2020-06-28T22:32:19","slug":"fathers-day-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abeandlily.com\/index.php\/2020\/06\/21\/fathers-day-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Father’s Day and Clarissa cuteness."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I had an AWESOME Father’s day. As I mentioned before, Lily and I planned our special days in advance together, so we each got exactly what I wanted. I love her!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I started the day by fishing at 8AM. Today was the first time I tied all my own knots (except the nail knot was tied for me at the fly shop). I had soooooo much fun. I pulled up 1.5 miles NorthEast of the tunnel up Provo Canyon, and hiked down to the railroad track, then walked another 3\/4 miles or so until I found a spot that I absolutely loved. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I didn’t catch any fish. This is maybe the 8th time that the Provo river has skunked me. I called Jay afterwords and he gave me some empathy and tips. I hope to go with him at some point! I was so happy to be out in nature, practicing my fishing casts, and knots. I feel so happy when I am in nature, when it is just me, God, and the beautiful world. It was peaceful and happy even though I didn’t catch anything and I spent a fair amount of time untangling knots. On the way walking back on the train-tracks, I was confronting my fear that God is a fiction and that there is no inherent meaning or purpose to live. Of course I still choose to believe, and feel I have good reason to, but that fear is still there. While walking on the track, I concluded that whether God is there or not (and I certainly hope in Her\/Him), humans have the power to imbue life with meaning and to create purpose, story and beauty. We don’t need to be subject to the situations we are in. Either God is there divinely creating purpose and meaning for us, or we as humans have a special form of consciousness that allows us to be the meaning makers, and in that way to act divine. If in fact this is all random chaos, we don’t need to be subject to that situation. We can stand up and create meaning and beauty, and I choose to do that, in addition to choosing to believe in God. Those thoughts gave me peace and hope and direction. All in all, it was peaceful, spiritual, wonderful. Thank you Lily!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While I was fishing, Lily was taking pictures and videos of Clarissa being unbelievably cute. My favorite picture and video (#6) is of Clarissa putting a piece of paper to her face and saying, “ouch!” She is so cute!!!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Video 1<\/a>, Video 2<\/a>, Video 3<\/a>, Video 4<\/a>, Video 5<\/a>, Video 6<\/a>, Video 7<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Fortunately for me, I did not miss out on all the Clarissa cuteness. This below is what I came home to after fishing. Lydia dressed her up in the most adorable outfit (and even put lipstick on her at one point) and Clarissa posed more for the camera.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I had yummy leftovers with the family (we had so much great food leftover from yesterday) and I opened my sweet notes from the family. Lydia and I were horsing around taking pictures, and we got this one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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One of my sweet notes was from my dear Nephew Soren. Isn’t he adorable!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I also saw this adorable picture posted on the wall from my sweet Mary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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After lunch with the family, we did homechurch. Today’s church went particularly well I thought. Georgia put such good thought and preparation into it. She prepared the songs, made a program, prepared answers to some of Mary’s questions about baptism and even gave me study material to give a lesson on baptism. In the lesson on baptism, I shared that baptism is one way that people can show God that they are committing to be good people, and people can find peace and feel grace when they make these commitments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After home church, I drove to my dad’s house to be with him on Father’s day. All growing up, my dad was my best friend, and we have always been close. I feel very nourished and loved when I am with him, and my heart just longed to be with him on Father’s day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I arrived, we immediately got on the topic of spirituality. It wasn’t really intentional, but it was the area where my dad and I needed to catch up the most. I never fully revealed where I am spiritually until this moment. My dad raised me in the LDS faith, and I cherish that aspect of my upbringing as my experiences in the LDS as a youth were profound and overwhelmingly positive. Most importantly, I developed a thirst for God and doing what is right, and I continue to cherish both that thirst, and the quenching of that thirst that God continues to give me day after day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I now find myself in a much more nuanced position, where I feel uncertainty at every turn. I do not think the Book of Mormon is literal. I think the church and its leaders are deeply fallible. I think there has been institutional misbehavior, and I think our origin story and early leaders have a lot of issues. And yet, the faith still feels like home, I feel God as I continue to practice it, and I want my children to have a faith tradition that gives them access to spirituality and religious underpinnings, they way that I had. I am definitely not orthodox or a literal believer. I think a lot of this came as difficult news for my dad. We went back and forth about about our views (he is orthodox), and at the end of the day ended with respect and acceptance of the other’s way of thinking. Spirituality and God has always been one of the topics my dad have bonded most over. I hope with all my heart that does not change. I do not feel I am any less spiritual or interested in God than I have been my entire life. I just feel my faith journey has taken me out of the church box, and so here I am. I sent my dad a text afterwords thanking my dad for how supporting, loving and accepting he is. He really is that way. Suzanne also sat and listened kindly the whole time. She too is such a gem, and I’m deeply grateful for both of them in my life. Again, being with them really fills me with hearth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After our big religious discussion, dad, Suzanne and I did a video conference with the two other brothers for father’s day. It was such an amazing time. David and Olivia got a new puppy and we spent a fair amount of the call watching their two dogs play together and it was adorable. I haven’t mentioned this before, but David took a new job and he and Olivia are moving to Utah! I can’t wait to have them closer!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After a wonderful visit, I drove home, scarfed some food and then watched Rio 2 with the family. It was every bit as good as the first movie. Such good entertainment!! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

All in all, such an amazing day. Thank you thank you thank you family for being in my life, for giving me this day, and for giving me so much joy!!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I had an AWESOME Father’s day. As I mentioned before, Lily and I planned our special days in advance together, so we each got exactly what I wanted. I love her! I started the day by fishing at 8AM. Today was the first time I tied all my own knots (except the nail knot was … Continue reading Father’s Day and Clarissa cuteness.<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19533","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abeandlily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abeandlily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abeandlily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abeandlily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abeandlily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19533"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/abeandlily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19533\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19653,"href":"https:\/\/abeandlily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19533\/revisions\/19653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abeandlily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abeandlily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abeandlily.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}