helloworld

One of my all time favorite movies is UP.

One of my all time favorite people is DAN.

Coincidentally, Danny is a young version of Mr. Fredrickson.

Just a little more in love, I think.

Unpredictability

Unpredictability is beautiful. Therefore, LIFE itself is BEAUTIFUL.

Lessons I've learned recently and continually through life:

GOD loves me individually and IS aware and concerned about my struggles.

"Peace is as close as we are ready for it to be." -Danny Kofoed

Old habits (and may I say opinions) DON'T die hard.

Related to all of these things, the gifts and principles of CHOICE and LOVE walk hand in hand together to make us who we are meant to become.

My life has taken an unexpected and therefore beautiful turn in the form of a man with thick rimmed glasses. He is a constant reminder of God's goodness and love for me.

He is also a reminder that God has a sense of humor.

I always said I would never marry someone younger than me. I also said that I would never get married. I would CONSTANTLY make fun of Mormons who met and got married in less than a year. I guess I am being "compelled to be humble" and both I and the Lord are laughing. What I am really saying is...

I have chosen to marry my best friend. 

I have chosen: to cast out fears, doubts and social stigmas, to change my mind and my heart, to love said best friend more purely, deeply and differently than I have loved before, to trust the Lord and his infinite love and wisdom, and to give, to the best of my ability, everything I have to God and to a man who helps me understand the nature and love of God.

Like for many people, these choices have been difficult to make. "It's like life is a test or something."

With 23.75 years under my belt, I must say I don't know very much. I DO KNOW, however, that through faith in Christ, our experiences bad or good, will be for our benefit.

I see that now as I look at a 21 year old tender mercy who plays along with my stupid games and laughs (hysterically) at my stupid jokes. A man who is patient with me, who loves me for me while still expecting me to be better. Someone who inspires me daily to love better and more sincerely God's children.

In short: CHOICE + LOVE = HAPPINESS

neverland never sounded better

I often envy Peter. To personalize his reality and forget the fable that has impressed my mind since infancy is the dream. The life of a lost boy--or lost girl--seems romantic enough. Makes my mind process his concept of time.

Is that what makes him fearless? No accountability to be accountable for. Just everyday and every moment: the next great adventure. ANYTHING. Except growing up, because life is what we live and death, it doesn't matter.

and expectations; well, they can't be dashed if you aren't conscious of them.

NEVERLAND NEVER SOUNDED BETTER.

and then, when pixies rest and fireflies extinguish their lights, those problems that don't fill a little boy's head, but a grown ups, would have no effect. Just the hushed night sounds of a land that makes you forget--even Wendy, sort of. Not completely, but periodically.

Silly girl. Where is your sense of adventure? and love--where else could you find a Peter Pan?

But then again...you aren't capable of forgetting the second star to the left and straight on til morning. or a shadow. or the smell of a thousand endless summers.

The truth: Wendy was right. She chose.

firsts.

We sit around a table with seven other people, sipping coffee at 630 am. The seven are recovering alcoholics and I am reminded that life leaves no one unscathed. You could feel that sentiment in their tones and even see it in their weathered faces. I see a painting on a wall, an orange devil with a snake tail trailing behind him. He is in an uncorked liqour bottle with a pitchfork in one hand and in the other a chain that leads through the neck and out of the bottle, finally wrapping around the neck of the shirtless, wide-eyed man outside of it. Behind the demon are large bottles tightly capped and filled to the brim with cachaça. Inside the different bottles are: a beautiful curly haired woman, a disturbing dark creature that slightly resembles a man and in another, a beetle. When they ask me to speak I say, "My name is JP and I am not an alcoholic."

In my first AA meeting, I saw a few of God's beautiful children and I felt how much he wanted them healed. One man talked about how 11 years away from the bottle meant he was capable of feeding his mother with failing health. Another referred to current challenges between family members--life is still hard, with or without addiction, but he could see the difference in a sober and an inebriated response. I once heard that God doesn't care so much about your mistakes. He cares about how you react to them.
Thinking about it, that is why the 12 step program is so inspired. I left, not feeling pity or superior to these people, but grateful for the opportunities that I have been given me. I don't understand why some people are faced with addiction and other's not. I do not understand why I was so protected in my life. I do however know that I have a loving Heavenly Father who knows my weaknesses and my strengths. A Father who loves those seven beautiful people individually and unconditionally and supports them daily to overcome the enticing of the thing that can lead them to a fate worse than death--an endless prison.

God, grant me the Serenity
to accept the things
I cannot change, Courage to change the
things I can, and the
Wisdom to know the difference.


The second first, I AM IN LOVE:

With this beautiful child:

Before, and when I say before I am almost always referring to before my mission (before life really began), newborns intimidated me. I have always loved kids-playing with them, getting them hyper and then sending them home with their parents. You can't really do that with newborns and I always felt like I was going to break them. Maybe my mommy instincts finally kicked in after 23 years or maybe it was just love at first sight with Cylus Winn Peterson, but I could hold this sleeping baby all day. The slightest twitch in facial muscles resembling a smile or the way his eyes track my movement is enough to keep me occupied for hours. Another first.
It amazes me how perfect this child is, truly we are God's finest creation.


The Last FIRST,
I finally made my I'm a Mormon Profile. Click here:



Here are just a few pictures, as of late:

Boarding at Bogus in Idaho