Last Post. I'm Done.

Mom passed away this morning. With her and Laman gone (along with Hoshea being recently killed by one of tribes we are planning to raid), there’s a lot more responsibility on my shoulders to lead the family and take care of the widows. I feel like the marriage relationships in our family are generally stronger and healthier than what I remember the Jews having when we lived there. So I think that adds to the pain that Ashtaroth and Zilpah are experiencing. Then for Ziplah, add on the fact that the man who killed her husband is now in charge of the family, and you can see just how difficult this whole situation is.

If there’s one thing Mom and Dad taught me, it was how a husband and wife are to love one another. I know I haven’t blogged much about their relationship, I’ve probably been more focused on all the negative crap going down. But in the background of all this crap, it was always clear to me that Mom and Dad had the sort of marriage everyone should strive for. Their relationship is the ideal I hope to see reflected in all the relationships within our family—the Lamanites.

This will be my last blog post. I’m going to need more time now to focus on the responsibilities of leading our family, and healing the wounds in our relationships. One of our native friends thinks he spotted Nephi’s camp a couple days ago, and so on top of eking out a living here in this wilderness, we need to be prepared to defend ourselves against Nephi’s traitorous ambitions.

I wish I was sending this blog out on a more positive note, but I have no such peppy messages to offer. Life can be filled with sorrow, and sometimes there’s no balm in Gilead. I hope that sharing our story allows you to be wiser than we were. I’ll probably compile this blog into a book or ebook and I’ll let you know when that’s available.

(I don’t want to make any money off this, so I’ll probably just self-publish the book at cost. Unfortunately, I’ve heard sometimes Amazon forces you to sell the book at above cost. If that’s the case I’ll just find a charity to donate any revenue to.)

Man, I hate Nephi.

If it weren’t for him and Dad, we wouldn’t be in this situation. I’ve been the good guy all along, and look at the fruits.

Pray for us. Adieu.

Tragedy

I don’t even know how to start this blogpost. We’ve experienced tragedy to the point that my usual slightly snarky tone is now massively inappropriate. Two nights ago, Laman and I were trying to talk to Mom, and she opened her mouth and actually spoke to Laman for the first time in weeks. But it wasn’t helpful. She chewed him out as thoroughly as Dad ever did. She told him it was his own fault that Nephi had left, and that Nephi was never a threat to anyone. That Laman and I had cut ourselves off from God on our own account by driving Nephi away.

What happened next is all a blur, and I’m still trying to put it all together because it happened so fast. I remember Laman actually hitting Mom. Hard. She was sitting up in her bed, and it knocked her down. He attempted a second swing, but I jumped on him to stop him. I was behind him so when I intervened, I jumped onto his back and put him in a chokehold to restrain him. He struggled at the chokehold for only a couple of seconds before he lost consciousness and fell to the floor (I didn’t know cutting off someone's breathing could drop them that fast). But when he hit the ground and I released the hold, he didn’t start breathing again. I couldn’t get him to respond, and my brother died right there in my arms.

The family didn’t expel me because when they saw mom’s broken jaw, they knew I was only trying to defend her. But that’s no comfort to Zilpah and her children who are now left without a husband and father. Trying to process all of this has been more than I can handle. I don’t know how to put into words everything going on in my mind. It’s just that, you know, I didn’t even really want to kill Nephi, who was an actual threat that might’ve required it. I can’t believe the brother whose life I took was Laman. Laman has been trying to protect our family from the moment this whole craziness started. How is he the one that deserves to die? How is it even possible that I killed him? I only had him in the hold for a couple seconds?

Then to top it all off, Mom is far too old to recover from a broken jaw and a ripped apart family. She likely has only a few days left. I don’t know if I’m going to be able to keep blogging about this. At first, it was therapeutic for dealing with the stupidity of our situation. But our situation has moved from stupidity and craziness to misery and tragedy.

Laman and Mom Problems

We’ve conducted two more searches for Nephi since I last wrote. Laman is getting increasingly frustrated with our failure to find him. He is more convinced than I am that Nephi intends to attack at some point. We don’t want to give him that opportunity, so we’re trying to make sure we find him first.

Mom insists she doesn’t know where Nephi is, and Laman’s paranoia is creating a real rift between the two of them. Mom won’t even speak to Laman anymore, and all he does is yell at her for not letting him know that Nephi was planning to bolt. I think it’s obvious why she didn’t say anything. While she tried to keep harmony, she generally sympathized more with Nephi, and had her health allowed, I’m sure she would’ve left with him. Laman knows that too, and for that reason, he worries that Mom might betray him.

Yesterday, during one of their one-sided “discussions," he even clenched his fist and started to raise his arm. But I caught his attention with a “dude, better cool off” stare, and he relaxed, and just walked away mumbling about why he even tries since there’s no reasoning with a traitor. So as I was saying in the last post, Laman is growing as he takes on the leadership role, but his own demons are exacerbating his weaknesses and causing this division with mom. Her health isn’t great, so I don’t think Laman needs to be so concerned with her. Let her live out her last days in peace. Then we can turn over a new leaf of pragmatism in the family.

Old age should be like this picture—a peaceful place to reflect on

the peaks and valleys of life.

On a somewhat related note, with all the search parties during spring planting season, I’m worried our crop this year might not be sufficient for the growing family. Laman said he has plans to “supplement” our food by raiding the camps of one of the native tribes that recently attacked our native friends. There aren’t as many of us in our group, but we have way better weapons, so we shouldn’t face much of a threat. I’d prefer we were a little more self-sufficient, but this plan allows us to deal with the threat of Nephi and help our friends deal with the threat to their survival. So I guess it’s the best possible option, but I don't like it.

O Brother, Where Art Thou?

We got back from searching for Nephi yesterday. We spent nearly a week looking for him, but a couple days ago, Laman decided it was enough, and we started to head back. You would think a bunch of people with their herds, kids, tents, etc. would be easy to track, but we totally lost their trail within a couple hours of searching for them on the first day. Their trail seemed to lead right into a mountain and stop at its base. I wasn’t very familiar with that area, so I guess I’m remembering wrong, but I swear there wasn’t even a mountain there when we were hunting in that area last year. And our native friends were really confused by the mountain too, so maybe it’s not just me. Anyway, this threw a major wrench into the whole process, as we now had no idea which way to go.

Laman was saying we need to “think like Nephi” to figure out where he went, but that’s not exactly an easy task. For all we know he built another boat and sailed off to someplace else. I’m only half kidding.

On the way back to camp we were hungry, and Laman managed to shoot a mountain lion. I was initially hesitant about eating it because it’s not clean. Laman pointed out though that the Law of Moses was a covenant given to the Israelites that was attached to their inheritance of the land of Canaan. Therefore, it provided a law regarding the animals of that land. But if we want to survive in this new land, we must receive the spirit of the land from those who know it best—its wildlife. We cooked and ate most of the mountain lion, but Laman left a small part uncooked that we then ate. He said that just as God had allowed us to survive on raw meat in the wilderness to protect us from the consequences of Dad's actions, we would continue to show our remembrance of God's protection by this token.

Laman isn’t normally the type to get too religious, so it was good to see him open up a bit more to the things of God. I see the mantle of leadership falling on him as he ponders not just the physical, but also the spiritual welfare of our family.

Anyway, we’re going to strengthen our defenses to ensure we’re prepared for any future raids Nephi might conduct against the family. He’s chosen to break off and no doubt views us as threats to his claims of authority. He’s stolen the brass plates, which we too risked our lives to acquire. I’m sad he’s chosen this road. Now Nephi is a brother by blood only, not by any real relation.

Gone Girl(s and Boys)

This isn’t going to be a very long post. Just wanted to update you. We woke up this morning to find Nephi, Sam, Jacob, Joseph, Zoram, their families, and Tamar and Ephrath had all disappeared. Their tents, flocks, and food were all gone. Mom is still with us, but her health is bad, and she’s not taking kindly to Laman’s interrogation regarding Nephi’s whereabouts. While in there, I noticed the brass plates were gone, so Mom must have known that Nephi was going and gave them to him. I didn’t mention that to Laman because I didn’t want to send him over the edge. Laman, Ahijah and I are headed out shortly to track them down. We’re taking some of the natives we’ve befriended with us because they’re more familiar with the land. We’re leaving Hoshea in charge of the family.

On a weird note, I woke up really late this morning. I felt like I'd been asleep forever. The sun was high in the sky, and I was surprised I didn't see anyone else up yet. So our search party is getting a later start than we should. We didn’t drink any wine last night, so I have no idea why we were all out for so long. Unless Nephi slipped something into our dinner… But the families each had dinner in their own tents last night, so no idea what’s up with that.

Clear and Present Danger

It’s been almost a month now since Dad passed away. There’s a lot of tension right now in the family. Laman has assumed the mantle of leading the family, but Nephi, Sam, and Mom seem unaccepting of that fact. I feel like overall, Laman is doing his best for the group. He’s not prone to the whimsical “visions” that lead to suffering the way Dad was. He can be harsh, but it’s generally in trying to keep Nephi from leading everyone off on whatever foolish misadventure he’s conjured up. Mom has really been keeping the tension manageable up until now. Laman and Nephi both respect her, and so I think she’s the real force that has kept this group together.

But I’m worried things are going to get worse, and Mom’s limited in what she’ll be able to do. Yesterday, Nephi and Laman got into a huge argument. Nephi has been working on gathering gold, silver, and copper in order to make some tumbaga plates and start writing his own scriptures. Laman however thinks that Nephi should be working to provide more for the family. Of course, wrapped up in this whole argument is the subtext of who is really in charge. It ended with Nephi reminding Laman what the angel told us years ago outside of Jerusalem—Nephi would rule because Laman and I were wicked. Laman didn’t have a good retort for that, but you could see the anger boiling inside of him. The next day, Laman and I were out hunting and I was trying to calm him down a bit about Nephi, when we had the following conversation.

Me: Honestly, I think we’d be better off if we ignored him more. You’re the eldest, you have the right to rule, so just rule. As long as the family follows you, let Nephi do what he wants.

Laman: Lemuel, I don’t think you see what’s really going on here. Why did Nephi kill Laban?

Me: He said God told him that it’s better for a wicked person to die than for our posterity to fall into apostasy.

Laman: Now, think about your interactions with Nephi. How does he view you and me?

Me: …as wicked people who…might lead our family into apostasy...

Laman: So you see, in Nephi’s mind, he would be justified in killing you and me.

Me: You’re being paranoid. Nephi wouldn’t kill us!

Laman: Did you think he’d kill Laban?! He didn’t have to. He could’ve just taken his clothes, grabbed the plates, and we’d have been gone before Laban woke up. Ishmael died as a result of his actions too. And he abducted Zoram for no reason. Think about it, he didn’t have to bring Zoram out to meet us, did he? Why did he do it? Nephi’s lust for power knows no bounds, and he saw an opportunity to pick up a servant while demonstrating his superior obedience to Dad. The fact is with Dad gone now, Nephi’s going to make his move. If you want your wife left as a widow and your children without a father, keep your head in the sand. But I have a responsibility as a father to protect my family, even if you want to evade yours.

Me: uhhh...

Laman: Of course, your wife probably won’t be a widow for long. I’ve heard Nephi’s quietly preaching something to “the righteous” about adoption into the family of God, and “sealing" other women to himself. I think that basically means he’s marrying them. So I guess your wife could join his harem, and she’d be alright.

Me [trying to stay calm]: Now you’re just being a jerk. Look, Nephi’s loves power, but he wouldn’t go that far.

Laman: The kid keeps surprising us, Lemuel! I don’t want the next surprise to be fatal! I’m done talking to you about this; take some time to really think about it. Think about your family. Isn’t it your job to protect them?

I hate to say it but Laman kind of has a point here. With Dad gone, Nephi is a real threat to Laman and me. This is the sort of thing that’s littered throughout the books of the kings—brothers killing brothers to secure their rule. I don’t know what to do. Nephi’s my own brother, but I’m worried he might not value my life the same way I value his. With Laman, I at least know that he has the family’s welfare at heart. I hate this situation. There are just no good choices right now.

Which Dad Do I Remember?

Dad passed away yesterday. Right now we’re busy with the burial ceremonies, so I won’t have a ton of time to write.

This whole thing is really weird for me; I have a lot of mixed feelings. Most of growing up, Dad was amazing. He was this tough dude that would go out on the dangerous caravan trading routes and bring home riches. He was always kind to me too. I really looked up to him. Then he started listening to those weird apostates like Jeremiah who were attacking our religion and God’s chosen leaders. Once he joined that clique, he only ever seemed to be disappointed with me.

And then for the last twelve years, he’s brought nothing but increasing hardship on our family. And he thinks I’m the problem! He was warned in a vision that Jerusalem was going to be destroyed, and then once we get to this new land, he’s also informed via a vision that Jerusalem was destroyed. He offered that as proof that he did the right thing in destroying so much of what our family had worked to build. But if his first vision was crazy (or possibly a deception by evil spirits who tempt proud men like Jeremiah to rise up and condemn the rest of the leaders), then his second vision was likely also inaccurate. Then at the end of all of this, after I followed him out here against my better judgment, and put up with Nephi constantly trying to outdo the rest of us, after all of that, he tells my kids I’m wicked and that their curse will rest upon my head. He’s basically teaching them to not honor their father and mother.

So yeah, the part of me that’s still the kid back in Jerusalem is sad to see Dad go. But adult me has seen nothing but hardship and difficulty from Dad’s decisions, and so I hope our family can turn over a new leaf now where we won’t be led into suffering through the whimsies of Dad’s dreams. Laman might be a bit harsh at times, but he’s essentially a very practical guy. The challenge that’s coming will be Nephi. It’s clear he wants to be in charge, and his leadership would be just as poorly thought through as Dad’s, but it would have an added problem: he has a chip on his shoulder because he wants to be in charge, but he’s the younger brother. So who knows what he’d resort to if he thought he had a chance to take charge.

"Long live the king"

Anyway, over the next few days, we’ll finish up with the ceremonies for Dad. I’m going to try to focus on the good times before everything went south (literally).

Betrayed

As bothered as I was at the end of my last post, I’m more annoyed today. This morning, Dad called in Laman’s kids to his tent for some parting words. Then he called in mine. I listened in to what he was saying (since they’re my kids, I have a right to know what he’s telling them). He basically told them that they’re great, but they have rotten parents who are going to bring cursings down on them. He then said he’d bless them anyway so their curse would land on my head. Yeah, he undermined me in the worst way directly to my own children.

Again, thanks Dad.

Really gonna miss ya.

What dad brings upon our family

What I bring upon our family

I don’t know how else to address this topic because I’ve covered this sooo many times already. I’ve worked my butt off trying to keep this family alive while accommodating Dad, Nephi, and their whims. They cast their opinions as unassailable truths and refuse to see any legitimacy in the viewpoints of others. Then, anyone who disagrees with them is so evil that they’ll seek to turn that person’s children against them.

Dad's Parting Words

Sorry it’s been so long since the last post. We’re planting again and getting ready for another year. Dad’s health has been really bad, so we’re taking care of him too. Obviously Mom does the most for him, but I’ve really been trying to help out wherever possible to. It’s just frustrating because it seems like he doesn’t notice.

For example, yesterday he called Laman and me into his tent and reamed us out about what happened on the boat. That was over a year ago now. Laman and I have both been working our tails off to help the whole family survive since then, but there’s no recognition of that. Just drudging up old mistakes we’ve made.

He then echoed a bunch of stuff Nephi said about prophecies of our descendants in this land. Then he wrapped up pulling the biggest guilt trip ever. “Hear the words of your trembling parent whose about to lay in the grave, from where no traveler can return. I only have a few days left. So awake from your deep sleep of hell, and shake off the chains that bind you and will bring you down to eternal misery.”

He then went on to explain that we need to obey Nephi, which bothered me of course, but I could tell really ticked off Laman (although he didn’t say a word). He then pointed out that if it weren’t for Nephi, we’d have starved in the wilderness south of Judah. But what he forgot to mention is that he and Nephi were the very reason we were starving in the wilderness in the first place.

Dad then went on to say that Nephi was only “sharp” with us because the sharpness came from God. I feel like that’s only half the story here though. You could say he’s just using the sharpness of God, or you could say he lacks empathy and humility. He refuses to see the other side of issues when we disagree, and I think that’s the root cause of the contention.

Mine and Laban's destined position

He wrapped up by saying that if we don’t listen to Nephi, he’s going to remove his blessing from us. So yeah, apparently everything Laman and I have done to support this family doesn’t matter one bit if we aren’t willing to bow to Nephi.

You now, it’s hard to deal with the impending loss of Dad. But he makes it so much harder when I now realize that I never really had him in the first place. To him, he was always Nephi’s dad, and he apparently wishes he wasn't mine.

Spiritual or Temporal — Part 2

Wow, that was long! Well, I know who in the family inherited Dad’s ability to go on and on in a talk. Anyway, Sukkot is in full swing, and this morning, Nephi addressed the family as Dad requested for our Hakhel observance. I’ll save you time by hitting the highlights.

• 600 years from when we left Jerusalem is when God will come down to the world. (Odd that it’s such a nice, round number. Also, at first it seems like Nephi’s putting himself out there to make such a specific prediction, but he won’t be around in 600 years, so not really.)
• When God comes down here, the wicked people at Jerusalem will kill Him. (Yeah, we all know how you feel about the people at Jerusalem, Nephi.)
• When He dies, bad stuff will happen.
• The people at Jerusalem will be scourged, scattered, hated etc. because of what they did. (This doesn’t make sense to me. I thought Dad and Nephi were saying the Jews at Jerusalem were about to be destroyed by Babylon when we left. But now it’s actually not for another 600 years? Why did we leave then?!)
• God will eventually gather all of Israel
• Many of the scriptural prophesies about Israel are talking about our family. (Seems kind of arrogant and/or self-centered in my view.)
• Then he read some of Isaiah’s prophecies about Israel. (I didn’t really understand what he was getting at here. Were these prophecies about Israel and our family meant to be understood as a spiritual scattering and gathering or a literal scattering and gathering?)

So an even more brief summary is that

• Jerusalem is wicked (so wicked they’ll kill God (not sure how it’s possible to kill God))
• Good thing we got out of there because it’s going to be destroyed, and
• We’re special because the prophets were talking about us.

That’s basic Nephi 101; nothing really new here.

Afterward, I was asking Nephi if the stuff he’s talking about symbolizes spiritual occurrences or physical occurrences. See what I’m thinking is how can people physically kill God? It’s not possible, right? So this has to be referring to the spiritual events that occur when someone rejects God. From the point of view of their spirit, God is dead and can no longer aid them because they have cut themselves off from Him. Right?

But Nephi said that what he’s talking about is both spiritual and physical. The prophecies come through the spirit but refer to real physical things that will occur. So yeah, I still don’t get how that works. Again, man can’t actually kill God. It’s got to be symbolic. That’s the only way it makes any sense.

Nephi then said he didn’t dare speak anymore, and we need to believe the prophecies on the plates. But I do believe them, it’s just that Nephi and I understand them differently. Oh well.

The Interpreter

Sorry it’s been awhile since the last update. Our promised land (assuming we don’t have to move again) is fertile, but also takes a lot of work. We just finished our first harvest and we’re going to be having a big feast in a couple days to celebrate.

The locals I mentioned in the last post gave us some pointers on prepping our fields, and then nearly all of our seeds took to this soil really well, and so the harvest was much better than we expected. God has definitely blessed us here.

Yesterday I finished building an altar. Given our harvest is a gift from God, it’s important that we offer sacrifices of thanksgiving as part of our feast. I’ve never built an altar before, but given the materials and tools I had on hand, I gotta say, I did quite well.

Dad asked Nephi to teach the family as part of the celebration, and Nephi seems ecstatic. Dad’s been pretty sick, and so Nephi has been taking over a lot of Dad’s duties which rubs some people (read: Laban) the wrong way. I’ll be honest, it kinda bugs me too. Partially because he’s my little brother, but mostly because of the way he goes about it. He’s so confident in his interpretation of the scriptures. In my experience there are kind of 6 levels of support the scriptures can give to a person's interpretation.

1. The scriptures explicitly support an interpretation. At this point, it’s not really even an interpretation. For example, the scriptures plainly state that Abraham received a covenant from God regarding his posterity (us).
2. The scriptures implicitly support an interpretation. The scriptures don’t come right out and say it, but the stories told, or the statements made make a lot more sense if the interpretation is true. For example, it’s my own personal view that the practice of taking multiple wives is just a horrible idea. Now the scriptures don’t come right out and say that, in fact we have stories of Abraham, Jacob, David, and Solomon all having more than one wife. However, not one of those stories goes well. Abraham and Jacob both experience tons of drama because of it. David and Solomon pretty much lose their souls because of it. So my interpretation of the scriptures is that multiple wives is a horrible idea. None of the prophets say it, but I think the scriptures implicitly support my interpretation.
3. The scriptures neither support nor refute an interpretation. Sometimes the prophets say things that are just kind of open or it’s not explained what they’re talking about. For example, when Zenos talks about an olive tree and the grafting back and forth of branches from tame and wild olive trees, he doesn’t come right out and explain exactly what he means. Dad and Nephi have both offered their interpretations of what Zenos’ story means. And as I’ve looked at what he’s saying, it appears to me that their interpretation is consistent with his story, but is by no means the only possible interpretation. Other interpretations that the prophets taught back in Jerusalem are also consistent with the story. So who’s right? I’m still in the process of trying to figure out some principles/rules that can help me answer that question. My operating rule before was to listen to the priests and prophets God had appointed to lead His people. But the last decade of experiences has destroyed that operating rule for me.
4. A roughly equal number of passages support an interpretation as refute it. This one is tricky, and it’s the source of another conflict I’ve had with Dad and Nephi. There are so many passages where the Lord promises He will protect and flourish our people. Yet Dad and Nephi have a roughly equal number of passages they often cite to indicate Jerusalem was ripe for destruction. So again, how do you determine who’s right? Well I have no idea. As I stated above, my operating rule on stuff like this has been pretty well smashed.
5. The scriptures only support an interpretation if you pull some serious mental gymnastics. This generally involves taking a passage and reinterpreting certain words to mean something different than those words are commonly understood to mean. Then using those reinterpreted words to make the passage support an interpretation.
6. One passage on its own supports an interpretation, but you have to ignore lots of other scriptures that refute that interpretation. Back to the multiple wives example, the law does allow for taking more than one wife, and so people think it’s okay. But to do that, you have to ignore all the stories of heartache and salvation lost among those who have taken more than one wife. It’s just a bad idea.

Anyway, numbers 3 and 4 have been a constant source of disagreement between me and Nephi. And it doesn’t bother me necessarily that we have different interpretations. Instead what’s annoying is his complete confidence in his interpretation and an unwillingness to entertain the possibility that my interpretation might also be valid.

So yeah, that’s what I have to look forward to when Nephi takes center stage in a couple days. I think instead I’ll try to focus on the cool altar that I built.

Twelve Angry Men

The state of their spear technology

We ran into some locals yesterday. It started off pretty tense. It looked like a hunting party of about twelve men, so they were armed (although their weapons weren’t too impressive). Doesn’t look like they know how to do much in the way of metal work. They were talking a lot, and obviously we couldn’t understand what they were saying. Then two of them began to argue. My guess is they had differing opinions about what they should do with us. As it started to escalate, Jacob walked up to them and began to speak to them. Like, in their language or something. They were very surprised at this (as was I), but he talked to them for a good 20 minutes.

Their demeanor changed throughout the conversation, and they went from being suspicious toward us to curious. Jacob took them on a tour of our campsite, showed them the tools we made and how they’re used, and introduced all of us to them. By the end we all embraced and they left.

Afterwards:

Laman: Holy cow, Jacob! How did you know their language?!

Jacob: I don’t. But the Spirit of the Lord told me to go up and talk to them.

Me: In Hebrew?!

Jacob: Well, that’s what I assumed it meant, and as I began speaking, I realized they were understanding me. I assumed they were given the ability to understand us, but then I noticed you guys had no idea what I was saying, and that’s when it occurred to me I was speaking their language.

Nephi: See Jacob, this is what we were talking about the other day. When the Spirit tells you to do something, you obey and you’ll be given the power to accomplish anything.

Lehi: There are many gifts of the Spirit. God has just demonstrated one of them for us through Jacob, and it saved all of our lives.

Me: So can you teach me some of their language??

Jacob: I wish. I don’t remember any of it.

Laman: How is that possible?

Jacob: I…I don’t know.

Me: So what did you say?

Jacob: I just told them why we were here, that God brought us here to escape the wickedness of the city we came from. I explained to them our belief in Christ and that we have no desire to do harm to anyone. I told them it was this same God who gave me the power to speak their language, and that if they’d like, I can teach them of God. They said they needed to bring it up before their leaders. I showed them around the site, showed them the tools we’re capable of building, and introduced them to you guys. That’s about all.

Me: Dude, we owe you.

So that was pretty cool. Actually, no, it was really cool to see Jacob step up and do something like that. Also, gotta admit, I’m kinda glad it was Jacob and not Nephi. Because…well, I’m sure you know why. ;)

NOW We Made It to the Great Valley

Whew! Been busy. After landing, we had to pack up everything and head to wherever Dad and Nephi believed we should settle down. I was worried we were in for another eight year journey. Luckily after about a month of travel we got to a place they were happy with.

Also, I should mention, we didn’t have our camels anymore to haul all our stuff. I was thinking since we were carrying enough gear that we needed camels to transport it all, we’d better plant our roots near the seashore or this is going to be a total pain. So none of us could believe it when Dad said we needed to haul everything farther inland. Luckily it turns out, Sam is some sort of animal whisperer. We came across some kind of beasts of burden that were tame enough that he could get them and break them. Not sure what they were doing hanging out in the middle of nowhere, but I won’t complain.

We’re in a beautiful valley now. There’s only one navigable entrance into the valley on the south. A river runs into it from the north, but the mountains there are steep and the canyon too narrow to traverse. We’ve planted our seeds and are hoping they’ll grow here in this new, foreign soil. And, Nephi has been gathering ore to build tools. By the time harvest season comes around, we should be properly decked out.

Land Ho!

We spotted land this morning, and will probably be arriving soon. Figured I’d write up this post real quick because once we’re on land, it’ll probably be a lot of work to find a place, get things set up, and get settled. So it’ll be awhile before I can post again. Just wanted to let every one know that we’re alive, and most likely going to survive this trip. Well, time for me to gather all our gear and prepare to land.

Sorry quality ain't great. This is really zoomed in.

Are We There Yet?

Well, it’s been about 3 months now since we shoved off from Bountiful. Things have been pretty uneventful. Mom and Dad got pretty sick during the storm, but have recovered. It’s still boring as ever out here, but we don’t dare have any fun because we don’t want to be killed. I wish Nephi wanted to have fun. God would probably be okay with it then, and we could all enjoy ourselves.

Or maybe I’m being too negative. Maybe I’m not looking at this the right way. Maybe God is just, but His justice is higher than our understanding. So it seems like injustice, when it really isn’t.

Of course, if God’s justice is incompressible, that also seems unjust. It would leave mortals with no way to understand Him and what He considers justice. This would destroy our ability to comply with His demands for justice. We’d be breaking His laws with no knowledge of how to do any better, and we’d be punished for it. So maybe that doesn’t make sense either...

The whole situation makes about as much sense as this ^ dude.

Well, I’m hoping we get to land soon. I’ve seen about enough of this boat.