At This Point Some of You May be Thinking, That’s All Very Fine and Good, But What Does It Have to do With Flying an Airplane?

I've always loved General Conference, even as a child. I've found that more and more, I need General Conference. The talks are so important to my everyday life, especially now that I'm a mother. I've found that General Conference is vital. Even still, I've always had a hard time sitting through four two-hour sessions and then attending the Young Women or Relief Society Broadcast and reading the Priesthood session.

Thus, I really liked the idea of turning on every radio in the house, so no matter what room you were in you could hear the talks, and so were free to wander. I made it a sort of tradition that General Conference was my cue to deep-clean everything. The only disadvantage to this was that I absorbing all I could from Conference, but at least I was listening to every session, and I got the idea of most talks.

Last October after General Conference I decided to take full advantage of the LDS General Conference website. Every day (or almost everyday) I would listen to a conference talk in English, then replay it in Spanish for both my benefit and Ash's benefit. I don't understand all that's being said in Spanish, but it does give me an ear for how Spanish sounds. I think it helps my learning process, and by letting Ash listen at such a young age, I know she'll be able to pick up Spanish easily.

After we listen to the talk in Spanish, I listen to it again in Japanese. Well, I don't really listen, but I make sure Ash listens. I have no hope of ever speaking Japanese but I expect Ash to be fluent.

Besides boosting our language skills, this has the benefit of bringing these wonderful talks into the my home everyday. They bring with them this wonderful peace and hope that I love. It also has the added scholarly benefit that instead of me saying things like "I remember in conference sometime, this one guy said something about..." I can say things like "In the last October Conference, David Bednar gave a talk on being More Diligent and Concerned at Home in which he said..."

In April, when the next General Conference occurred I was even more diligent about listening to the talks. In fact, I zipped through the April conference so fast that I listed to it three times before diving back into older conferences. I've been excited about this session because it will give me new material. It's the first time I've been anxiously awaiting General Conference. I've been looking forward to it as much as I was the release of the Mockingjay book (which I got from the Library the day of our flight. I read it two days. I'm only a month behind everyone else).

Sadly, the circumstances were not ideal. First, we were not home; We were in HomeTown. We went there for Drek's Brother's marriage. This meant I could not clean, I could not turn on all the radios, and I could not move around. This also meant that I was antsy: I was only in HomeTown for the weekend! I had things I wanted to, people I wanted to see! I didn't want to be doing something I could be doing at home.

And then we got sick. Very sick. Ash was throwing up all over the place, Drek became deathly ill and so did Drek's siblings. Gross. I got sick right as we got home.

Also, I discovered that since I knew I would be listening to the talks several times over the next six months, I discovered it made my restlessness worse.

I think I absorbed less of this Conference than any other Conference, ever. I suppose that's an exaggeration, but still. I'm so grateful to have that website at my disposal. The talks are already up an waiting for me. The anticipation is still there, and I am very excited to start listening to them today. I need that peace and hope after such a horrible weekend.