SOMETHING IS WRONG WITH YOU!

As a child, my life revolved around a few occasions; Halloween, Christmas, my birthday and LAGOON. The big, white, rickety roller coaster was what dreams were made of, and wild Merry-Go-Round horses couldn’t keep me from its wooden frame. 

My dad would usually be my seat mate, while my mother was found sitting on a bench in front of each attraction, reading a book until we were finished. This was absolutely stunning to me. Why would she intentionally avoid fun? So I made a loud declaration when she refused my invitation to come along.

“WHEN I AM A MOM, I WILL ALWAYS, ALWAYS RIDE THE RIDES!”

“Good for you, dear,” she replied, and turned the page of her paperback.

Then came sixteen—a magical age, to be sure. But not just because of the driver’s license and dating. No, what I remember most was rushing toward a big, blue metal garbage can after climbing off the Tilt-o-whirl. And I knew then, Lagoon and I were over.

Years later, when Sterling and I began dating, I told him that I get really motion sick, but he couldn’t hear me because he was busy swerving around on the road. 

So I told him that I get really, really, really, really motion sick. And he said, “Wait, what?” And drove 90 mph up the mountainside, flipped a 180 and skidded to a stop backwards.

This went on for months, well into our first year of marriage. Every once in a while, he’d say, “So, what exactly does it feel like? Do you get dizzy or what?” And I’d try to explain, but it was useless, because he’d never experienced it himself. 

Then one day, we went to Lagoon. And he rode the Tidal Wave. When he stumbled off the pirate ship, all gray-green pasty faced and cold sweating through his shirt, he swallowed past the restriction in his throat and garbled out, “Is THIS what motion sick feels like?”

And I nodded while clearing a path for him to rush the same blue metal garbage can, knowing my work here was done—the bliss that accompanied his ignorance was no more. True empathy had been realized.

Of course we hit rocky roads further ahead. Like the time he sat next to me in the hospital and ordered and ate an entire pizza, while I sucked on ice chips preparing to give birth to our firstborn son. 

Also, that same day, literally right in the middle of a contraction, he grabbed his forehead and said, “Oh my gosh, I have THEE WORST HEADACHE, Lis! You have no idea how bad this hurts! Seriously, this pain is awful! I need to go sit down. Hold on just a minute.”

Yeah. Rocky Roads like that. But this is not to suggest that I wasn’t also a perp. Just a few years ago, I was safe in the midst of one of my extremely rare, nearly nonexistent, healthy lifestyle periods—exercising, snacking on tuna fish and kicking my sugar habit to the curb, (it has since returned with a vengeance, tattoos, and addicted to crack). 

Also, my migraines were giving me a reprieve, and I believed I was to blame for my good fortune, so I felt compelled to let Sterling know that his poor choices were leading him to an early grave. My eyebrows and pointer finger were perpetually lifted when I spoke to him.

  He would come home from a long day at work, complaining about his aching back or wrenched shoulder, and I’d say something like, “I really think something is wrong with you. You drink too much pop. You should eat peas, like me. Then you wouldn’t be getting old before your time.”

He’d argue with me a bit, saying it probably had less to do with Coke, and more to do with 14 hour days and removing a thousand pound engine with his bare hands, but I was unbelieving, insisting he was flawed.

Until one day, the gods of sanctimony stopped smiling upon me and in one 24 hour period—AND EVEN WITH PEAS IN MY HAND AND TUNA FISH ON MY BREATH, PEOPLE—I threw out my back, had heart palpitations and started a four day migraine.

Which is when Sterling lifted a finger, pointed it right at me and said, “Well now...it looks like something is wrong with YOU!” 

Surprisingly, that did not make me love him more. Bless his heart. But I for sure had a surge of empathy as I walked in his shoes, and that helped instigate a pact; Compassion, not condemnation. Sensitivity, not shame. 

This has served us well in our marriage, and will do so even more as we morph into old age. Because heaven knows, the ailments we’re each going to face will be much more bearable if there’s someone by our side with a fistful of medicine and a kiss on the forehead, rather than a hand on the hip and a bag of peas...even though peas are pretty tasty when you wash them down with chocolate. Or so I’ve heard.

NOT MY FINEST HOUR

There are a few phrases in the English language that are so ominous, so chilling, that they have the power to drain the blood right out of your head. One of them is, “Why is there brown water on the floor?” Another one, “Okay then, let’s just have you step up onto these scales here.” And almost on a par with those is, “Youth Camp.”

For some of you who may be unfamiliar, youth camp is a yearly summer tradition in the LDS church. Here’s the recipe:

*adolescents ages 12-18

*adult leaders

*campsites

*recreation

*religion

*ticks

*spiders

*hatchet wounds

*sleep deprivation

*migraine headaches

Now let me first go on record as saying that I am well aware some of you people out there were born to camp, just like I was born not to. 

You find this recipe to be ambrosia—thrilling and invigorating—and consistently petition the higher ups to let you be a part of it. I am eternally grateful that God built people like you. Especially having found out that my sons only brought along one pair of underwear each year—the pair they were wearing—and “couldn’t find” their toothbrush or deodorant for the six days of camping and hiking. You leaders are saints.

But for the rest of us, meaning mostly me, I find this recipe is akin to a plate full of boiled spinach and eggs. Probably good for me in the long run, but very unappealing at first, second and third glance.

And it’s not that I keep this declaration a secret, you guys. All you have to do is look at me to know. In fact, last year, when they announced in our church that we’d be going on a family pioneer trek, they almost felt compelled to add, “Yes, even Lisa Bingham.” 

The last time I went was three years ago, but to me, it’s just as fresh as a cow-pie on a summer morning. It wasn’t really my finest hour, but here—you be the judge. This is a little journal/blog entry I did back then:

Night before departure: Begin painstaking prep by spending five hours in neurotic, hand wringing anxiety, followed by six minutes REM sleep before jolt of alarm clock adrenaline.

5:00 am—Dead Man Walking shower, make-up and hair assembly. No headache. Arrive two hours later at the mountainside. Bowels seize and headache begins. Stand and peer over edge of bottomless pit of profound and perpetual sleep deprivation. Pot gut squirrels swarm food supply while mob of teenaged girls move from one head to another in braiding assembly line . Eventually unpack and begin mass consumption of nutritionally void, sewer-toot producing cuisine. 

Me—(Announcing to anyone who will listen) “HEY! MY HEAD HURTS. DID EVERYONE HEAR ME? LET ME REPEAT THIS, AD NAUSEAM. I AM SUFFERING FROM A MIGRAINE, PEOPLE. IT HURTS. IT HURTS. IT REALLY, REALLY HURTS. SEE HOW MY FACE IS LOPSIDED? SEE HOW ONE EYEBALL IS WEEPING? THAT IS THE PHYSICAL MANIFESTATION OF SAID HEADACHE. HAVE I GRIPED AND COMPLAINED ENOUGH TO SUFFICIENTLY IRRITATE YOU WITH MY LESS-THAN-PIONEER CONSTITUTION? NO? WELL, THEN, LET ME CONTINUE...”

Long suffering leader—”You might want to TAKE. SOME. SUDAFED. LISA. I really think that will *help you. (*shut you up).”

Me—”I can’t. My head hurts too much. I’m just going to whine about it—relentlessly—for the remainder of our time together. And finally, on the last night, I’ll take the Sudafed, which will result in a full recovery that comes four days too late.”

Leader—(inserting ear plugs) “Well, okay then. As long as you have a plan.”

Anyway, I’m sure you get the gist of things. Not necessarily grace under pressure, which is why I swore I’d never do it again. But if we’ve learned anything from Lagoon, child bearing and running for public office, it’s that there is some sort of Men In Black flashing light mind sweep that turns “NEVER, EVER AGAIN” into, “That was pretty fun, wasn’t it?”

Some kind of bright, sparkly, new baby smelling reward that allows the sacrifice and discomfort to take a backseat, to make way for the greater good to come shining through.  

And by the last night, as you sit on an ant infested log with fifty fuzzy braids sticking out of your scalp, the anxiety is a distant memory, even if the migraine headache is not. And the girls and women sitting next to you are no longer just friends. But rather, your unwashed, river tubing, midnight toilet running, testimony bearing, s’more eating, bandana wearing, mosquito bitten, smoky campfire smelling, secret sister hearts are knit together, as only a Jesus sanctioned camping trip can do.

And now that I think about it, it was pretty fun, wasn’t it?...Hey, did anybody else just see a bright flashing light?