Three days before leaving on any trip my house is in chaos. Covering the bed, mounds of whites, coloreds, and darks wait for folding, the desk across the room littered with to do lists, bills, and homework needs sorting, the kitchen floor is spotty, covered in a thin film of dust and debris, and refrigerator science experiments require ongoing dishwasher cycles as I pull out moldy smelly spaghetti, grey refried beans, mushy, runny cucumbers, and several unidentifiable past dinners. A constant brrrrring from the phone, the dog’s persistent scratching at the back door, and my five children pleading to invite friends over, increase the commotion. My heart beats faster, the veins in my neck stick out, leaving me feeling like a screaming tea pot, boiling and steaming.
I always want everything in perfect condition before we leave. It’s like I am preparing to die and I want everything in order before I go: bills paid, pets taken care of, dishes washed, and house clean - just in case we never come back. Returning to a clean house motivates me. I put away the stuff from the car instead of leaving it sitting in suitcases for days until I get around to unpacking.
The problem with cleaning is the more you put away, the more you find to put away. I look around the kitchen, starting with the stack of multi-hued school papers my third grade twins Brooke and Kendra have left for my perusal, quickly glancing through, noting their grades, I toss the stack in the recycling bin along with odds and ends from the mail pile, a used plastic whip cream container, two water bottles, and an empty milk jug. The first layer gone, I now see the dishes in the sink from last night’s dinner, as well as cereal bowls from the this morning, some still half filled with soggy Frosted Flakes, peanut-butter smeared knives on the counter left, and a dozen empty cups scattered along the bar, counters, and table. Stashing everything in the dishwasher, I peer around the kitchen expecting clean counters, and see the third layer. Miscellaneous toys, a bright green Polly Pocket coat, a red rubber ball, a dominoes tile, the dog leash, some spare change, stamps, an empty can I missed for the recycling box, and a pair of gardening gloves. These items don’t belong in the kitchen, making them inconvenient to put away, which is why they are probably still in the kitchen. Surely now I am done, but usually there is at least another layer before the dirty counter tops are in plain sight. It really doesn’t seem that bad. Somehow my eyes must get used to the clutter.
I can understand the scripture from Luke 6:42 that says, “How can you say to your brother, 'Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,' when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.” My house often mirrors my soul, cluttered, messy, layered in junk, but I get use to my disorder, finding it easier to sort out someone else’s life then my own. With a lot of gunk in my own eye, I decided to work through a twelve step program. Twelve step programs teach how the atonement can work in your life. My life was my kitchen counter. The more I worked on me, the more I found to work on. I stepped over my clutter, shuffled it around, tucked it under the rug, but when I really looked at it, saw it, and dealt with it, I felt spiritual pathways opening up, no longer cluttered by layers of accumulated muck.
Once the house is clean, packing begins. Packing everything for everyone is time consuming: matching their clothes, grabbing their toothbrushes, choosing their entertainment. Now I let all five children and my husband decide what will go in their suitcases within the parameters of my designated packing list. I don’t even double check their bags when they are done.
Scott, my husband of twenty-one years, is an experienced packer. A salesman for the first fifteen years of our marriage, he traveled all over the world, becoming adept at clothing selection, space maximizing techniques like stuffing your socks in your shoes, and keeping his toiletries to a bare minimum. Sean, a senior in high school, is also well traveled. Band trips, and science and scout camps, provided packing opportunities ranging from dinners with congressmen to roasting marshmallows around a campfire. Granted he may have packed a week’s worth of clothes for scout camp, but I’m pretty sure he wore the same thing the whole week. My middle girls, Megan and Kimber (fifteen and twelve respectively), are sensible, reliable, and consistent. I can rely on them to pack exactly what’s on the list, pack light, and be ready to go on time.
My youngest are nine year-old twins. Their interpretations of my packing list are always interesting. Brooke, the oldest twin by seven minutes, likes fashion. Choosing clothes that match (almost), she exhibits a unique style and lately has decided skirts or dresses with pants underneath are “in.” Stuffed animals fill her bag, crowding out the clothes, and convincing her to scale back to one is worrisome to her. She worries they will miss each other, and she couldn’t possibly leave any behind, and what will they do without her. In a separate bag she stuffs a blanket, her journal, a book, her Nintendo DS, and her pillow.
Kendra, the youngest twin, is a minimalist. She may take all the clothes on the list, but will wear the same outfit for several days, usually a tie-dye shirt with pink, purple, and yellow swirls she made at a friend’s birthday party, black pants, brown winter boots with no socks, unless I remind her to wear them. She only needs her Nintendo DS to survive as she will most likely take, beg, or borrow everyone else’s things along the way: a pillow, a jacket, a video game.
During our spring break trip from our home in Boise, Idaho to Salt Lake City, Utah at the end of March, with snow hovering heavy in the air, Kendra chose to leave her winter coat home, relying on a sweatshirt to keep her warm. Brooke chose a Sunday dress; sleeveless, see-through, no slip, and an oddly matched shirt to wear underneath. Kendra kept trying to steal people’s coats during the trip, and Brooke was consigned to wear Great Grandma Hutchens’ pinned up slip and her sister’s white tee-shirt under her dress. By the end of the trip Brooke managed to go through all of her clothes and need extras, while Kendra still had plenty of socks, shirts, and pants left to choose from.
I am always the last pack. For three days I clean, prepare food, set our earthly affairs in order, and actively encourage my five children and husband to get their things together and out to the car. In the end they will all be sitting in the car agitated and annoyed that I am still upstairs packing. I over pack in anticipation of weather, accidents, and unforeseen events, like unexpectedly being invited to a ball, or at the very least hiking shoes in case I get the desire to climb a mountain. By the time I get my things to the car the only place left is under my feet, because the back is already full with stuffed animals and blankets. The children have been drinking their water bottles for the last twenty minutes so we should be just out of town when they need to use a restroom, which is fine because unfortunately at my age that is about when I will need to use the restroom as well, and I would much rather it be their fault we have to stop than mine.
The problem with stopping the trip for a gas or restroom break is the time involved, usually twenty per break. My parent’s home in Helena, Montana is potentially a seven hours trip, if there is no construction, no gas breaks, and only a slight increase of speed over the speed limit (maybe seventy-eight mph). A gas break adds ten to fifteen minutes, construction at least an extra half hour, and each potty break upwards of twenty minutes. Now we are looking at an eight and a half hour trip. A trip to Montana for me and the kids is at least a half hour faster than if I take my husband. I drive slightly faster than my husband, but I also am a potty Nazi. “You can wait.” “Just a little longer.” “There’s no place to stop (which there isn’t on a trip from Boise to Helena), you’ll have to wait.” When my husband drives he is a piddler. Stopping for gas he kicks all the tires, washes the windows, and checks out the car for defects. At the mere mention of a possible restroom break, he is ready to stop, and if there is a scenic byway with something to read, we may as well pull out a picnic lunch, water the dog, and take a hike. He has always been much better about enjoying the journey, while I am all about getting to the other end. We somehow balance each other out, and hopefully give our kids the best of both worlds.
In November of 2010 I traveled to Nauvoo, Illinois, the starting point for saints migration west, to attend the wedding of my cousin Jason in the temple. The rolling hills of Illinois were covered in dead brown grass and whipping our hair in our faces and our skirts around our knees, the wind batted and cried at us. The leafless trees, dormant for the winter, reached their long fingered branches to the grey, cloud strewn sky, reminiscent of what it may have looked like as the saints were forced to flee their homes, giving an added impression of despair.
This history of Nauvoo in relation to the Mormons is relatively short. The town of Commerce was renamed Nauvoo, derived from a Hebrew word meaning beautiful. The city, founded around 1839 by Mormon pioneers, grew rapidly until at its most populated state it rivaled Chicago in size. Filled with industrious, faithful, dedicated men and women looking for a place to live their faith, the town was a beehive of activity, but by 1846 it was abandoned. Due to increasing mob violence, the death of the prophet Joseph Smith, and the unwillingness of government officials to intervene on their behalf the people were forced to flee beginning as early as February.
The town itself is laid out in neat, square plots, a testament to the saint’s desire for order as they tried to create a Zion society. Now restored to preserve the history of the town and its founders, many homes are available for tours.
Edwin Rushton, my great, great, great grandfather, arrived in Nauvoo April 13, 1842. His journey to Nauvoo began months before in the city of Leek, Staffordshire, England. In 1840 his father Richard Rushton, a silk manufacturer, heard of a new sect being preached in the town and sent his youngest son Edwin to determine its truth. Edwin’s reply was, “ . . . why not send one of the older boys,” to which his father said, “I want you to go because I can depend on your judgment.” The family joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and bent their efforts to joining the saints in Nauvoo. First by train to Liverpool where they booked passage for ten pounds apiece, second class accommodations, and a charge for luggage over a hundred pounds aboard the shop “Hope o Duxbury,” the trip is recorded in Edwin’s father’s journal as “uneventful.” Reaching the Florida stream, they were taken in tow up the Mississippi river by the steamboat ‘Star.’ Richard Rushton records in his journal, “We came in sight of a most beautiful country diversified with plantations, farm houses, sugar manufacturers, beautiful cottages, and wooded on each side of the river.” The entire trip took him just under three months. After just three years in Nauvoo they would have to move again, this time by foot thousands of miles west.
Working non-stop preparing to leave by spring and summer, the saints built wagons, gathered provisions, sold, or tried to sell, their properties, and finished the temple; it was not enough time. Mob violence escalated, many saints fled across the Mississippi to makeshift camps, few had anything but what they had grabbed as they ran from the town. Intense cold, so long-lasting the Mississippi river froze solid enough for wagons to drive across, left many sick or dying, the benefits of proper clothing, shoes, food, or shelter unavailable in the poor camps by the river. Ragged shapes huddled together, heads bowed low against the wind, humbly pleading with their God to save them. Edwin stayed behind and was one of the last to leave in an effort to help finish the temple and get the sick and poor across the river. He left Nauvoo with a feather bed tied to his back, his wife Mary Anne carrying some of their personal belongings tied up in an apron.
Just before we leave on a trip I am a grouchy growling grizzly bear. “Is your stuff packed yet?” “Are your things in the car?” “You can’t take that much stuff!” “Have you gone to the bathroom?” “Why aren’t your shoes on?” The tirade will really drag on until we are finally all in the car and on the road. I wonder if it’s only me or if pioneer women could be heard verbalizing the same types of questions: “Where is your brother? Are your boots in the wagon? Have you hitched up the oxen? Have you gone to the bathroom?” Edwin was just eighteen when he left his home in England, never to return, first by train, then by ship, then by steamboat to a new home he would only inhabit for a few years before he walked for months to a destination that was unsure, untried, undeveloped, and far different from anything he had ever know. It takes courage to turn your face toward the unknown, step onto an unfamiliar path, leave the majority of your earthly belongings all in pursuit of your faith.
Is that how we all felt in our premortal life? Leaving our family, friends, and home to be shoved into a tight little body with no recollection of what we were about for an undisclosed amount of time to try and figure out who we are supposed to be under an infinite number of different circumstances. Impossible! What was I like then, trying to figure out what to expect on Earth, preparing spiritually because nothing else would matter. I couldn’t pack anything. I wouldn’t remember anything. Was I so different than I am now? Wouldn’t I have done everything I could to prepare in heaven to be ready for Earth life? What more was there to prepare for then a life devoted to following the Father’s plan? Planning for a road trip, I usually anticipate troubles I might have. During winter I take extra blankets, boots, gloves, and food. A first aid kit is tucked under the seat along with a flashlight and jumper cables. The oil is changed before we leave, and the tires are full (including the spare). Did I anticipate the troubles I would encounter here? You can’t plan for everything.
One camping trip, pulling our newly acquired pop-up tent trailer packed to the brim with stuff: sleeping bags, food, blankets, pot and pans, Dutch ovens, shampoo, dish soap, camp chairs, and more, we got a flat. Our first flat on the trailer and despite trying to anticipate everything that could go wrong, I had not expected our tire iron to not fit the trailer’s lug nuts. Stranded on the side of the highway, we prayed to calm our nervous children, and it wasn’t long before a police officer pulled up behind us with an appropriately sized tire iron. We changed the tire and continued our journey.
No matter what I do, the infinite number of possibilities and scenarios makes it impossible to be ready for everything. I like my house in order when I’m gone, I let my children pack their own stuff and live with the consequences, I often pack something someone else will need, and just as often forget something important. Summer is coming up. Our next trip is to Washing DC, followed by camping, and family reunions. Each trip requires a different packing list that takes into account people, places, events, and circumstances. Each trip is rife with unlimited possibilities that no amount of planning can anticipate. But, comfortingly, in the end our journeys finish where they started - back home.
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