For Carolyn Jensen Wyatt
1934-2015
My
mother was strong. She was born in Mink Creek, Idaho, and that right there qualifies
a person to be strong, but she was strong even by Mink Creek standards. At age
4, she fell off a railing outside the church and broke her neck. The doctor
said it could not be set without paralyzing her. But after a priesthood
blessing and a chiropractic adjustment, she was up and running again. At age 5,
her dad bought her a horse, a big bay named Chub, and gave her a job, riding Chub
to the fields to deliver his lunch, and on the derrick to load the hay in the
barn. At age 8, she started her first pay job, babysitting occasionally for a
couple with three children and a newborn baby, in their two-room cabin with no
plumbing, no hot water, and a coal stove on which she fixed supper for the
children. My mother lived through The Great Depression, World War II, and the sudden
accidental death of her father when she was only 11 years old. In her teens, she
had her wisdom teeth removed and went to her senior prom that night.
In
her 20s, my mom drove down the Alcan highway (that’s short for Alaskan-Canadian,
if you haven’t heard of it) in a Volkswagen beetle with my dad and two baby
boys in the dead of winter without telling anyone they were coming for
Christmas--and lived to threaten us never to do something that stupid. With my
father, she took us on vacation every year, but never to a hotel; always to camp
in the wilderness, from which she returned with a plastic bread sack full of
smelly cloth diapers to be washed. She managed the household while Dad traveled
the world with his job. She had family night every week, and family prayer
every day; this is no small feat.
Mom
canned a bushel of apricots while in labor with me, and she rode in Dad’s new
Jeep to the top of Mount Logan five days later, with me on her lap. She
breastfed her babies when it wasn’t in style because she figured nature could
never be improved upon. She was always (literally: always) the last one to bed at night, and the first one up in the
morning. She fed us oatmeal, Germade and fried eggs for breakfast because they
were healthy, and she never broke down under our complaints. She cared for her
mother and her in-laws when each was stricken with dementia. She killed a
mountain tarantula in my tent at girls’ camp when everyone else ran screaming.
She balanced the budget to the penny, ground wheat for homemade bread, and
raised her own fruits and vegetables. She survived for days on end with no
sleep while caring for my Dad with Alzheimer’s. When my father died, she posted
a note on her fridge: “Don’t cry because it’s over; smile because it happened.”
My
mom seldom caught a cold. She never had a headache. I thought she would live
forever.
At
age 74, my mother learned to use Facebook to stay in touch with her
grandchildren. At age 75, she wrote this Facebook status: “Cut a fairly large elm tree down today.
I cut another one yesterday. They were both about 40 to 50 feet tall. I found
out if you cut all the branches in small pieces, you can get a whole tree in
one giant green garbage can. It’s interesting what an old lady can do once she
puts her mind to it. My new grass, and new tree are doing great. Ya just cut
some down, and then plant another. That's life!”
When
she was diagnosed with Stage 3 Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma last spring, she never
shed a tear. Her faith in God had never failed her before, and it didn’t fail
her now. She said she’d been healthy all her life (except for a short but scary
stint with hyper-thyroidism on her mission) and she had to expect to have her
turn being sick sometime.
When
my mom was a child, her father, Harry Jensen, was known throughout Mink Creek
Ward for his faith. For example, he defied a doctor’s order to have a badly
infected eye removed, saying his ward would fast and pray for him and it would
be okay. The doctor said he would go blind if he waited. But Harry Jensen was
right; his eye healed completely over the weekend. The ward members said the
only way he would die would be in a sudden accident, because then he wouldn’t
have time to pray and be healed. And that is exactly how he died: in an
instant, when a hay rack fell on him and a nail pierced his temple.
My
mother had the same kind of faith.
My
mom decided to have the “red devil” chemo at the age of 80 because she wanted
to live to enjoy the i-phone Gordie had just given her and to see her last two
grandsons go on missions. She said she wouldn’t complain, and she didn’t. I know:
I was there every day.
For
the first time in her life, people brought her dinner instead of her taking it
to them, and we as her children were able to help her instead of her helping
us. She loved the visits from ward members and neighborhood children. May I
say, the Providence Third Ward is truly outstanding in their care of widows.
One
day I got a text message from her: “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up.” Her
chemo-brain had forgotten how to make a call on the i-phone, but remembered the
new skill of texting. I insisted she come to stay at my house, but she was back
home in a week, with part-time in-home care given by my daughter.
Mom
was triumphantly declared cancer-free in September. I know the prayers of many
of you combined with hers and ours to help her heal with less rounds of chemo
than were expected. Her blood test in October was completely normal—“Not just
improving,” said Dr. Ben-Jacob in astonishment, “but completely normal,” and she began physical therapy to regain her
muscle strength. The only medication she was still taking was a blood thinner,
and she even succeeded in her personal goal of making Dr. Ben-Jacob smile. Her
faith combined with the miracles of modern medicine had made her whole.
Last
Tuesday her grandson Aaron dropped in to visit for a couple of hours.
Wednesday
night she played “Taboo” with my younger children and me, all of us laughing
our heads off.
Thursday
the bishopric stopped by and observed that she would soon be well enough to
return to church.
Friday
Garth Woolsey delivered a beautiful custom hand-carved cane to her, since she
would soon be out of her wheelchair.
Saturday
was her best day yet; she felt stronger and very optimistic. Her new DVDs of
“The Ten Commandments” and “Ben-Hur” arrived in the mail and she was eagerly
waiting to watch them with her granddaughter Savannah on Monday.
Sunday
at 4:00 she turned down my offer to bring her to our house for dinner, but
accepted my offer to bring her some lasagna later. At 7:15 I arrived to find
her peacefully asleep on the couch with the TV on. But as I touched her arm, I
realized she was not asleep. She had left this life in exactly the same way
that her sister Coralie had left ten years before: her time was up, and her
heart just stopped. And as in her dad’s accidental death, there had been no
time to pray for healing. The strongest woman I ever knew was gone, and four days
later her next great-grandchild would be born. Just like the big old elm tree, God
“cut one down and planted another.”
I’ll
never be as strong as my mother. I get colds and migraine headaches. I cry when
I hurt. I’ve been known to sleep in. I sometimes let perfectly good fruit rot
before I get around to preserving it (although I certainly never told my mom). I
love the out-of-doors, but if my husband had ever asked me to get in a Jeep
five days after delivering a baby, I’d have told him exactly where to take that
Jeep. And I’m pretty sure I won’t be chopping down trees when I’m 75. Or any
other age.
But
if, like her, I can treat everyone as a precious child of God;
if,
like her, I can greet each day, each person, and each situation with a smile,
if,
like her, I can give without needing to receive;
if,
like her, I can survive tragedy with triumph;
if,
like her, I can love without limit;
if,
like her, I can trust in my Savior Jesus Christ and serve in His church to the
end of my life;
then,
like her, I can face death with serenity—
and
I will have been strong enough.
--Given at her funeral, November 21, 2015
