[MUSIC PLAYING]
Our total life span is one thing,
and the part of it that's on planet earth
is a very small segment.
We had a premortal existence, we'll
have a postmortal existence, and this period
is our relatively brief period that is just called mortality.
So even though the going is tough sometimes, we can endure.
And enduring in faith will allow us
to have that great blessing of life eternal
with our Heavenly Father, with the Lord Jesus Christ,
and with our families and loved ones, never
to be separated from them.
We prayed constantly for children.
This is our kids from when they were sealed in the temple
to us.
In fact, it was about eight years.
So we started to look at adoption.
So I had special experiences with each of my children,
knowing that they would come.
But with Essa it was so apparent.
Her favorite song was "You Are My Sunshine."
When I would sing it to her, that
was the only thing that would make her quit crying.
We had four-wheelers, but one thing that Essa did that used
to give some of our residents here in the canyon a little
heartburn--she would drive really fast.
Certain personalities click, and our personalities
clicked very well.
I would take her to school every morning, and we would talk
and we would sing.
[LAUGHS]
She had just turned 15.
She wanted to take fall pictures in the leaves with Kelsey
and Savie.
And I said, "Honey, you call me as soon as you're done,
and I'll come and get you all so you don't have
to walk all the way back up."
And she said "OK."
And so I said, "Love you," and I said, "Be safe,
and I'll see you in a few."
And she said, "OK, I love you, Mom."
It is kind of an interesting situation--something that you
don't see very often--in our canyon,
and that is where two trains intersect right there
at the road.
You just don't see that.
I mean, all of the 20-plus years that we've lived here,
I've seen it once.
One of the trains was already passing by,
and they wanted to get close to it and take pictures.
But as they were taking pictures,
the other train came around the curve.
The engineer honked.
He could see them.
He was doing everything he could.
They never knew what hit them.
I would gladly trade and have Essa be here.
You wait for so long for your children to come,
and you feel cheated, in a sense.
But I have to trust in knowing that Heavenly Father knows
best.
You can't argue with the Lord, with Heavenly Father;
you just can't.
It is important that we know that this is just
that little teeny spot, and the veil is thin, and we move on,
and we move forward.
She's where she's supposed to be now, as
hard as that is for me to say.
Now I need to endure, and our family needs to endure.
We need to make sure we make it back to our Heavenly Father.
We are here to be tried and tested,
to see that we can remain faithful.
God is our Father, and we are His children.
He loves us, and He wants us to come home to Him.
The knowledge that is most precious to me is to know that
I am a child of God, that He loves me as I love Him--that
His Beloved Son, Jesus Christ, effected the Atonement so that
I could have the blessing of immortality and eternal life.