Angels Among Us

I am so excited to put the last 3 months behind me. Looking back, I'm actually very impressed that I made it through alive. I'm still recovering from my last night working graveyards...but I'm finding solace in the fact that I NEVER have to work graves again if I don't want to. And I can assure you...I absolutely DO NOT.
But along with quitting my job, because I was going insane, comes the stress of being without a steady job for awhile.

Although I hated my job at the hospital, there are some very good things that came from it.

I gained very good experience as a phlebotomist. To the point where I could go pretty much anywhere and be able to fit right in.
I realized how much I love going to church, and how I craved it when I wasn't able to go.
I have a new appreciation for people who can and like to work graves. As well as an empathy for the ones who can't but do.
I gained a wonderful new friend who started with me. And from that, I was able to test the waters of missionary work for the first time in my life.

And most of all, I was reminded, yet again, of how absolutely wonderful my family is. On the weeks that I was working, I was pretty much useless. I have no idea how I would have gotten through that without my wonderful family. They would go and put gas in my car while I was sleeping. They would make dinner and lunches for me so I wouldn't have to worry about it. My mom would wash clothes, clean my room, and leave little notes on napkins in my lunches. They would stay up until I left every night at about 10 and wave to me as I left.
And last week, when I had a dentist appointment and interview in the same day and the following days when the roads were really bad, they drove me to and from work so that I wouldn't have to worry about driving my car in the snow.

Needless to say, I was much too eager for my time at the hospital to come to an end. At the end of every week on, my friend Jana and I would go and get breakfast at this little cafe down the road from the hospital. She gets off about half an hour after I do, so I just go there and wait inside. Yesterday was unique in the way that I got off about an hour before she did.
So I went inside, bought myself a pumpkin gingerbread mini bunt cake and lemon water and settled myself in a corner to wait. About 40 minutes into my contented post-work trance, one of the cashiers starts coming over to me. I thought she was coming over to me to say, "Umm....you've been here too long. We need you to leave."

But no.

"Hi. Someone bought this for you."



"They said it was to brighten your day."

Pretty sure my mouth fell open as I stammered out an, "are you serious?"


There are some people that are so in tune with the Spirit that can just tell when someone needs a little help.

One of my favorite quotes from conference is from Elder Holland a couple of years ago.

"I have spoken here of heavenly help, of angels dispatched to bless us in time of need. But when we speak of those who are instruments in the hand of God, we are reminded that not all angels are from the other side of the veil. Some of them we walk with and talk with--here, now, every day. Some of them reside in our own neighborhoods. Some of them gave birth to us, and in my case, one of them consented to marry me. Indeed heaven never seems closer than when we see the love of God manifested in the kindness and devotions of people so good and so pure that angelic is the only word that comes to mind."

Be kind. For everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.




.ashley.