Atypically Ordinary

When I was a Freshman in high school, I started a new journal with these words: (spelling and grammar copied exactly): "I'm just another Freshman, maybe a little quieter, but that isn't true anymore (the just another Freshman part) because all of the other High Schoolers try not to be another ordinary Freshman, so the average Freshman girl probely has at least two earrings in each ear, a color of hair that isn't naturally grown, clothes that wouldn't be allowed at mutual, and a swear word for every sentence."

I still find myself thinking the same thing. I think of myself as rather ordinary, yet I know that what I consider "ordinary" is far from the average. I was stunned to learn that less than half of babies are now born in wedlock. An even smaller percentage of mothers are full-time moms, and even fewer families consist of a working father, stay-at-home mother, and children. Perhaps ordinary isn't so common after all.

I define myself as a traditionalist. This shapes a lot of my views, especially those I'm likely to blog about. The basic points of this include:

• For every bit of "progress", we must leave something behind. I find that often, what we give up ends up being more valuable than the things we gain.
• People do not know everything. The closer to nature things are, the more I'm likely to trust them, because I trust nature and nature's God more than I trust people meddling with things.
• Our modern culture, for the most part, has been corrupted, and so we need to look carefully at the things we do to make sure they really express our values and ideals.
• One of the most important things to consider is how we affect future generations.

I started this blog mainly to get down in writing some of the things running around in my head.Writing helps me figure things out. I also hope that writing things down might stop me from composing articles like these in my head when I need to be sleeping. I might be rather blunt, but I do not intend to offend anyone.

A few things about me that might give some background for future posts: I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and have been all my life. I'm the oldest of eleven children and the mother of two (one more on the way). I graduated from BYU with a degree in Wildlife and Wildlands Conservation.