This Time of Year

I had a tough weekend.  I am not sure it was just that it's this time of year, and I had to sit through Primary.  But, it has been an emotional weekend.  I tend to lead a normal, well-adjusted life from day to day.  However, there are days when it just hits.

I was reminded of Ethan quite a bit this past weekend because of the wedding of our niece.  Our niece married a young man we have known for a few years.  Ethan saw him in the first play he was in for our theater. Ethan thought he was sooo cool.  He would steal his jacket from him after performances and literally follow him around.  Not only did he think this young man was cool, but he loved the musical they were in.  He listened to All Shook Up music almost daily.  We have many a video with Ethan dancing to All Shook Up.  When he was in the hospital, we played this music for him.  Our niece even came to the hospital and played the ukulele and sang to him.

This weekend brought this flood of memories back because she and her now husband met during All Shook Up, so they both were blue suede shoes :-)  They had one of the songs on their video.  She played the ukulele during the ring ceremony.  There were so many little things that reminded me of how happy Ethan would be to be there and see these two get married.  He loved his cousin, and he loved this young man.

I was reminded in the temple on Saturday (after the reception the night before) during the sealing (a ceremony where couples are married not just til death do us part but for time and all eternity) how those who were beyond the veil (those who have gone before us) were there and "wouldn't miss it for the world."  I  felt this was a tender mercy from a loving Heavenly Father because I was wishing Ethan could be there.  I know he was.  I know he was there for these two whom he loved so much.  It was a beautiful ceremony.

But this lead to tears all day Sunday for me.  I have a hard enough time sitting in primary over the last few years, but this Sunday was one of the worst...and in my new ward.  It was awful.  I couldn't stop crying.  I was miserable, and I felt that know one really got it.  This was one of my worst fears when moving---I would lose it and no one knows how to handle me.  I have friends in my last ward that knew just what to do.  I feel like I am growing up all over again.  I haven't had a day I have spent in bed all day in a few years, but yesterday I did.  I love that my husband gets it and just let me lay there.