Yesterday I got a call from a friend who needed to borrow some books from me. She is teaching a lesson in Relief Society on the Atonement next month and wanted to get started searching for information for her lesson. I was looking for a particular book so I called some family members to see if they had this book. As I was visiting with someone, we were talking about a difficult situation she is in. It reminded me of a story in one of the books I have read about a man who was dying. The doctors didn't give him much hope to survive but they really couldn't find anything wrong with him. As this man went to visit him he realized that this man had been severely abused by his father and hadn't spoken to him since he was fourteen years old. He then told him the story about an experiment that was conducted at a rattlesnake farm in Salem, Oregon. "One of the caretakers took one of his large rattlesnakes and put a forked stick behind its head so it could not coil to strike. Then he began to tantalize it with small chicks and other food. The snake kept trying to coil unsuccessfully, and venom dripped quite freely from its fangs. Within minutes the snake stiffened and died." "The Caretaker then commented that a rattlesnake can stand just about anything except its own venom. When it cannot discharge the venom as fast as it is produced, it dies of its own accumulated poison." This story reminds me of myself sometimes. Last night at five o'clock Rich informed me he had committed to taking the Sister Missionaries to the Temple to watch a movie with an investigator. My Monday evenings are busy with"The Biggest Loser, and "Bachelor," I didn't really want to go to the Temple but Rich couldn't take them by himself. So off to the Temple we went and had a wonderful time watching the movie about Joseph Smith. Rich commented this morning on how easy our lives are compared to the pioneers. I don't know about him, but I think it's been pretty hard being a rattlesnake.
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