Week 14: My Angel, Janae Lauren Pew

For my last post before traveling to the U.S. for Christmas, I have chosen to pay a long overdue tribute to my beautiful wife, Janae. Janae is quite a private person and I'm sure she will be a little embarrassed by all of this talk about her. But, she is doing so much for me right now as I'm far away, that I need to send public praise and love to her through this post. In this case, I think it will be easier to ask for forgiveness than for permission.

I first met Janae when we were students at Brigham Young University-Idaho. In the fall semester of 2002, I was starting my Junior year and had returned from my 2-year mission to Northern Chile. As many readers know, but others may not, returned LDS missionaries are counseled to actively seek out marriage when they return from their missions. At this point I had been home from my mission for about a year and had already had my heart stomped on by 2 previous girl-friends. I decided to take a break from actively seeking out a spouse and focus more on my music studies. I had just returned to be a music major after a semester as a business major. Janae was just starting her college experience and was a young, 18-year-old, freshman music major. At the time, I was playing quite a lot of chamber music with violinists and cellists. One of the nicest things about being a male music major at BYU-Idaho, is that there are only a few dozen other males, but several hundred females.

Janae first caught my attention during a violin studio masterclass. I was attending and would be accompanying a couple of the violinists. This cute new freshman violinist took her turn performing the first movement of the Mozart 3rd violin concerto. What really caught my attention was that she consistently played in tune. This is not always the case with violinists. So, it was very nice to experience her pitch perfect performance. It was all the more pleasing because she was very attractive. I thought to myself, "maybe I could accompany her sometime."

We soon became aquatinted and I made it a point to stop and talk to her whenever I got the chance. I walked her home one night after a concert and we enjoyed talking together about our similar interest and excitement for chamber music. We also starting playing chamber music together. A particular favorite was the slow movement, "Adagio", from Brahms' 3rd violin sonata, Op. 108. (We still get this piece out, often when we're having disagreements, and it seems to solve everything.) We began to spend quite a lot of time together around the beginning of December and as the holidays approached, we became, more or less, official "boy-friend & girl-friend". On the last Thursday of school, 2 days before I was to return home to California for Christmas, we were sitting in her apartment eating lunch. She suddenly turned to me and asked, "so, are you thinking that you want to marry me?" I was completely caught off guard. Like I said before, I was not interested in a serious relationship after having a couple bad experiences. At that point, I hadn't thought at all about marrying her. I was simply enjoying our time together.

Well, after that, I couldn't stop thinking about it. She sent me home with one of those long, hand-written letters on nice paper with a ribbon on it and smelling of her perfume. I had planned to read the new Harry Potter, book 4 on my plane ride home. But for some reason, I couldn't stop reading her letter. I read it over and over again. During the next week, we talked for several hours a day on the telephone. It was very strange, but we seemed to grow closer and closer as the days passed that week. On Christmas Eve, we stopped during our conversation all of a sudden. We both said, almost in unison, "this is the real thing, we need to get married." My parents, who didn't even know I was dating anyone, were extremely surprised when I told them. We flew her to our home a few days after Christmas to meet my family. I then flew to Utah to meet her family a few days before returning to school. We shopped for a ring together and I made a formal proposal.

On our first day back at school, I was rehearsing the Beethoven Triple Concerto with 2 friends of mine in preparation for the concerto competition. The violinist, who was a friend of Janae's but in the same year as me, turned to me during a break and asked if I would like her to arrange a date for me and Janae. She had no idea that we had been dating or that we were in fact already engaged. We had kept everything very quite. Being a rather small music department, romance gossip was rampant so we had decided to keep our relationship quite. When I explained to my violin friend that I had already taken care of that myself and that we were know engaged, she was flabbergasted. I had to quickly explain the whole sequence of events. Well, the news spread after that and we soon joined the ranks of music major couples. We were married and sealed for "time and all eternity" at the end of that semester in the Mount Timpanogous temple, American Fork, Utah, 16 March 2003. It was the happiest day of my life. Janae turned 19 only 40 days before our marriage. And no, we did not get married so quickly because she was pregnant. We did not have our first until September of 2005. What else can I say, we were madly in love. We couldn't deny it and decided to start our lives together right away. It was the perfect choice.

 (See, I was once thin, handsome, and not so bald!!)

(Coming out of the temple a few minutes after our marriage/sealing ceremony.)

(Our parents and grandparents--Pew's on the left, Hansen's and Bluhm's on the right.)

We spent the next 4 years at BYU-Idaho. After I graduated, I taught full-time for the music department while Janae finished her degree in Violin performance and pedagogy. We had our first baby, Aubrey Christine Pew on 17 September 2005.

Janae nearly died from eclampsia and had multiple seizures. It was horrifying. Luckily, she made a full recovery and was able to get back to her schooling after taking a semester off to recover. About 18 months after Aubrey's birth, we learned that we were expecting our 2nd baby. This time, Janae did not want to have a C-section. She wanted to try natural child birth without any pain medication or epidural. We took a 12-week course in relaxation for birth and she had our boy, Zachary Alan Pew, on 11 August 2007.

(Less than an hour after giving birth to Zach. It was a 42 hour labor, but she only had to push for about 10 minutes.)

She had no pain medication and was incredible at coping with the painful contractions and complete birthing process. She did not even shout or cry out in pain. She learned to completely block out the pain and stay focused on what she had to do to give labor. I don't think I've ever been more proud of anyone, especially after the disaster of our first birthing experience. I think that was the first time that I really started to realize what an angel I had married. I saw something in her that day that completely blew my mind. Even as I'm writing this and remembering that day and those feelings, I have to wipe the tears from my eyes. What I did not yet mention is that she had this baby knowing that in just 3 weeks, were expected to be in Cincinnati where I was to begin graduate school.

We made the long trek across the plains of the United States and began to settle on the Kentucky side of Cincinnati. Already, it seemed like I had asked too much of my poor, sweet wife. Now, I was busy at school and leaving her to take care of the two, very small children without me. I helped as much as I could, but I was gone a ton.

She joined a local gym and got a job working in the day care one day week to cover the membership fee. It was a hard time for me, going back to school after being a full-time professor. She was a great support.

(Helping at Aubrey's pre-school field trip.)

(Aubrey's third birthday party. . .)

(. . . Janae made the princess birthday cake)

I think she started to really enjoy motherhood during this time. She was always so good and making the kids feel special on their birthdays by making them special ladybug or shark cupcakes form scratch. She also started teaching Aubrey to play the violin. She began cultivating a loving spirit in our home and in our family.

During the first year of my doctorate, we had an unmistakable prompting from God while we were attending the temple. It was time for another baby to come into our family. A similar prompting had come twice before with Aubrey and Zach. By this time, we knew how to recognize the prompting and knew that it would be a great blessing. 

The day I found out that we were pregnant with out third, I had a composition lesson at school with the head of the division of musicology, theory, and composition. I was so excited, I couldn't help share the good news. When I told him that we were expecting, he hesitated for a minute, and I saw the thought go through his mind, "are you CRAZY!!?!!?" But, he was very nice and congratulated me. By this time, I think I had proven that I was a dedicated family man, but that I was also very dedicated to my education and chosen career path. I don't think I ever gave him real cause to worry. At least I hope. Anyway, Corynne Louise Pew was born on 10 October 2010 after another natural child birth. Janae was amazing again. She had such control over her emotions while feeling intense, 60 second, skull splitting contractions, that the nurse was skeptical about her being in labor. When she saw that she was almost fully dilated and the bag of waters was ready to burst, she finally believed that we were not first-time parents and knew what we were doing. She was about to send us home. It's a good thing she didn't because Corynne was born 45 minutes later.

(Are women supposed to look this good less than an hour after child birth?)

(About a week after Corynned was born. Janae has already dropped back to her pre-wedding weight of 125 pounds.)

Not too many months after Corynne was born, I received this Fulbright grant that I'm fulfilling now in Poland. When I applied, we had hoped that there would be enough funds for the whole family to relocate together. Unfortunately, the funds were not sufficient. We had to decide between not accepting the Fulbright, or being apart for 7-9 months. We prayed and prayed and talked and talked trying to decide what to do. We finally decided, with the enormously wonderful help of my parents, that I should take the Fulbright. When the time came, we found renters for our condo in Kentucky, boxed all of our belongs into a storage unit, stuffed the three kids into the back seat of our sudan, and made the 1600 mile trek back across the plains to Utah.

(The morning we left, Zach's fourth birthday.)

And now, though Janae and the kids are living with my parents, I've made her a temporary single mother. I've left her all alone to the bedlam in a house full of little belam-ites. She has over a dozen violin students each week. She drives the kids back and forth to school, pre-school, dance, violin, and soccer (I'm sure I'm forgetting a few). She's playing in my Dad's orchestra and in a string quartet with her friends. On top of all of that, she's working 2 part time jobs to help us pay the bills while I'm away. Just this morning on the phone she was telling me how for the first time in over 3 months, she was able to go to the store by herself. She said it was like heaven. 

Oh my goodness, I can't believe that I'm asking so much of my wife. I am eternally indebted. She has given up her whole life for me. She has brought our three jewels into the world and given them life.

I can hardly find the words to express how much I love and cherish and thank her for all that she does and is in my life. She is so kind, so loving, so caring, so like the Savior.

I sometimes write her dorky little poems that take me way too long to put together. I can hardly get them to rhyme. Here's a bit of one that sums it all up.

Each night when I pray
I give thanks, for you,
and sense that He always knew

what my life was lacking,
what I most needed,
for what I had pleaded,

a helpmate and friend,
a partner and guide,
an angel, by my side.

Janae, I love you!! You are the love of my life. To the depths of my soul I cherish and adore you. I hope I can deserve your forgiveness for putting you through so much. I hope that I can be the kind of husband that you deserve. Thank you!! Thank you!! Thank you!!