Changing, dads, and other stuff

Ok, so I've really been thinking a lot this weekend about lots of crazy different things, and I decided that it would be fun to work in wellness programs for big corporations and insurance companies. I would develop programs that would involve a whole lot of people at the same time doing very simple things to live healthier lives, like exercise a little each day or eat more carbohydrates and vegetables instead of fats, or smoke less than 1 cigarette per day. It would be a lot of fun for me, and it is something I could do on the side while I am also a nurse!
I don't think I have enough fun anymore. I am excited to move just so that we can get a chance to change our lives a little bit; right now, our idea of a date is either going out to eat or watching a movie. Since the difficulty pregnancy began, I don't think we've used our imaginations much in deciding what to do for fun or for dates, though we have taken a few sight-seeing trips that were pretty cool (like to Temple Square to see the lights). Anyway, we're going to try to do more fun things in Denver as a family, like creative games and hikes and fishing and playing basketball and scrapbooking and building stuff.
My last day at work is this Saturday, and I am extremely glad to be leaving. I've been there for about 22 months now, and C.N.A. work can be pretty intense sometimes, though I do like working with patients. Being a nursing assistant has taught me, more than anything, that we are living in a mostly conflict society which doesn't pay according to what we accomplish or how much we contribute, but instead what our hierarchal position is that we maintain. I mean, as assistants we determine probably 90% of the quality of life for our patients, yet we get paid literally less than half of what an RN there gets paid, and our job is much more difficult, dirty, and important to the patient than the medications. I'm not complaining about it, I am just stating that it is something that, if I am ever in management, am going to try to fix. Sometimes we don't give the most important jobs the credit we should, just because it's not prestigious. For example, what would we do without dedicated mothers? Yet we don't give them a lot of prestige (nobody boasts nowadays that they are stay-at-home moms; half of them feel like they need to justify it to whoever they are talking to). Instead, we look at the men and say “He's a firefighter” or whatever it is and somehow he has a more prestigious title than a stay-at-home mom who takes good care of her kids.
My parents live pretty far away from everything, up in Pennsylvania. They just bought a house, though, on Lake Wawanoka in Missouri. It is the same house where my mom grew up. I've no idea what their current plans are with regard to retirement, selling their current home, etc. but I hope I get to see more of them in the next several years. I haven't had much of an opportunity to spend time with my dad, or even speak with him on the phone, since before my mission to Ecuador. I know what he is like as a dad, but I often wish we lived closer together so that we could be good friends as well. Of all my friends, I can't think of anyone I would rather hang out with than my dad. He's always been incredibly supportive of my development, and never seems to make a quick judgment about something. He's not perfect, of course; he could have been a little taller so that I would have gotten some tall genes in me, but for now I'll forgive him for that. Ha ha! Anyway, I hope we get to do the things that I wish I'd done more with him when we were younger, like go hiking, camping, canoeing, sightseeing, working on stuff, etc. We did that sort of thing pretty often, don't get me wrong; it's just been too long since just the two of us did it. I think that the last time I really had a lot of alone time with my dad is when we built our garage at Stamps Road. My siblings helped, but I always felt like Dad kind of relied more on me to help him that year than the other kids, and I really treasure those times we spent together building the walls and stuff.
I hope I don't get so caught up in work and life that I forget that my kids aren't going to remember much of the stuff I did for them; instead, they're going to remember the stuff I did with them. The same goes for my marriage. I am really excited that we're not going to have cable tv when we move to Denver, because I have such a hard time turning the tv off and using my imagination to find something to do with my family. Steph seems perfectly able to tune the tv out and do whatever she wants while its on, but it seems to be physically impossible for me not to get absorbed into whatever is blinking on the screen. Not having cable tv will help me immensely to spend more time playing with Braeden and Stephanie during next year. There are so many other things we can do!
I once heard a talk by the late, beloved President James E. Faust called “Do Something.” He spoke on how our society is changing, and we are not looking to entertain ourselves anymore. Instead, we are looking to be entertained. How often are we willing and able to listen to music and praise the accomplishments of others, while not trying to make our own music? We watch sports on television, but we won't go play them ourselves with either our family or our friends.....then he gave the punch line. “Fresh water runs on, but still water becomes stagnant.” We have to always be changing, always be interacting with our environment instead of being acted upon.
This is a long, long post, but I've just been thinking about this stuff over the course of this week. I am going to be writing more blogs from now on, hopefully, and they're just going to be about whatever random thing I'm thinking about or doing that day.