The Beginning of My Senior Year

This was the first day of school my senior year of 1970. I was still not too cool to smile at the camera. And I am amazed how trim I was in this picture. I was a starting interior lineman on our team, and although Malad was small, our coach quoted others by saying that our team had the best offensive line in all of Southeastern Idaho.

The shirt I wore in this picture was blue, and it was my favorite. I can not believe I actually had notebooks in my hand.

During my sophomore year, I had a pair of Tony Lama boots made of Water Buffalo hide. They were really comfortable, and I enjoyed them, but the extended time it took me with a cast after knee surgery that year, meant that the pair would never look like boots that went together as a set. The left one looked new, which makes sense when you consider that was the leg that I had surgically repaired.

The boots I am wearing in this picture were the Texas tan calfskin boots I wore for the next two years, including my first year in college. At a time when shoes were inexpensive, my dad let me have a pair of boots that were over $100, and the fringed, hippy coat was even more at $125. He let me know that if I started to act like a long-haired freak, I would lose the coat.

He never took the coat. I never could have grown my hair out like that, because I would have looked more like Shirley Temple than David Crosby. The nature of my hair is why I always wore it short, and I still do. Kids teased me about it. But I did the freaky music, and I still love the music from that time. It was a great year.

I was a jock. I was a musician. I found my soulmate. And I was a little bit of a hippy freak too.

Pop Pop as a Peep Peep

I thought I would put these pictures on my blog to remind my Annie how cute I was. And as for the title, it is to remind me to be a Pop Pop and not a grouch, or in my Annie's words, "a Poop Poop."

It is easy to figure out why my favorite color is blue. It was the preference of those who dressed me. And I kind of continued dressing that way.

In the picture below I am not in blue, but my head was just developing its own powers of gravity. As a one-year-old, I probably already wore a size 6 hat.


And after looking at this picture, so much for the theory about my wearing blue.





I don't remember seeing the picture at the left at home. The bow tie is fun, and I wish I still had that little jacket for my grandsons.

I was about this age when my parents went to the Fourth of July parade, my mother having dressed me in Bermuda Shorts. They were a bit long, just shorter than knee length, and they had a plaid pattern with colors of light and dark blue.

My dad teased me all the way to the parade about those shorts, and after I arrived and stood in front of the car, one of my neighborhood friends and his brother teased me too. I never wore them again.

Kristin

This picture of Kristin in front of the "Allen" home we had in Malad before our move to Idaho Falls is one of my favorites. Ann bought snapdragon seeds and planted them in the flower bed next to the front steps. Kristin loved playing with them, and I remember plucking one of the blossoms and squeezing its base until the flower opened, making it look like a dragon. She loved the flowers there.


The picture below is one taken a few years before our move to Idaho Falls. Kristin was to be in first grade when we left Malad in August of 1988, having first had Tammy Price as a kindergarten teacher. Tammy Price was the only Malad teacher that all three had in school.

This picture looks like it was just before kindergarten and maybe the same time as pre-school.

I think the move to Idaho Falls was an easier one for my kids, because they viewed making new friends and adjusting to new situations as an adventure.

The summer at Utah State showed me that. Ann and I rented a student apartment in a complex near campus. All three had friends from many different countries.

Of all the school pictures we have of Kristin, this one is my favorite, because of the smile and because of the outfit. Because Ann worked in the school system, we knew when to prepare for "picture day."

The Osh Kosh M'Gosh overalls she wore was something I loved seeing on my two daughters, but I do not think they liked them.

I don't remember the name of the game in the picture at the left, but I remember Ann and Kristin playing it for hours. Whether a board game of something like this, it was something she enjoyed.

This picture is also fun, because Annie is wearing the Benetton sweater I bought for her at Christmas I liked so well. I always liked her in the color green.

Kristin loved the Santa visits at grandma and grandpa's house on Bannock Street. This picture will be fun for Jack to see, because he loves the family room in the basement. The stairs are visible in the background.

Kristin wears her Christmas pajamas in the picture, and Santa is about to give her the large package in the golden wrapping.

The first German exchange picture of Kristin is probably in Salzburg. Because she only had the two smaller bags, it had to be on one of our trips we took that year, and the brick looks what I remember at the station in Salzburg. This was a very difficult trip. Grandma Thomas passed away, after a year when Kristin and Ann spent a great deal of time with her.

What is most ironic about the complicated story is the fact that the German cooperating teacher in Hamm lost his mother after a long illness on the previous exchange. I helped fill in and do as much as possible while he and eventually his family were in Bielefeld for services. As I remember it was about a week.

There was not a great deal of compassion shown to us when this happened. I took Ann to the airport by train, and we made the arrangements very quickly, so I was unable to talk to Kristin before Ann left. The last thing I told the teacher before leaving with Ann was that he was to say NOTHING to the American students until I returned.

He was a total jerk. The man, who I believed was my friend, made this melodramatic speech as soon as he arrived at school. He loved he limelight.

My students later told me about it, and how when Kristin began to cry, he was abrupt with her and told her to stop. Even as I type this, it makes me angry to know how abrasive he was with us, when I did everything I could do to help him through a similar situtation.

I still regret not having Kristin travel home with her mom. Some mistakes you can never take back.

Kristin's second exchange trip was not easier for me, because the cooperating German teacher was even worse. At least the former one led me to believe that we were friends. This one was a jerk from the beginning. But all of us made the best out of it.

I had asked him to book two trips--one to Paris and one to Berlin. He did not do either one, so I arranged for everything via Internet, fax and phone. The Berlin trip was fantastic.

By the time I found he had done nothing, it was too late to do anything in Paris, and I had the disadvantage of not being fluent in French.

The picture of Kristin at the right is at the Brandenburger Gate, or at least I think that is where we were at when I took it. It was cold and rainy that day. In the distance you can see the Siegeseule.

The weather was bad that day, raining most of the time.

In the picture at the right, we were all having fun. As luck would have it, I planned the trip during the German National Soccer Championship. I would take the students into the city to meet the crazy fans long enough to have fun, and when I could see things in the city center getting out of hand, we would go see the sights. The Bavarians--like the ones in this picture--were the most fun, but they did not win that year.

From the time that Jack was just a tiny baby, he loved to take someone's hair and put it in his ear. I added this picture, because this was one of the early trips I did after chemotherapy.

Kristin and Jack are in front of Ann and me on the Peter Pan ride. I add this picture because of the look on Kristin's face while Jack did that. He had been doing it all day. This is also the shirt she bought for Jack in the Rain Forest Cafe.

In January of 2005, my doctor gave me two weeks to two months to live. I was very sick. One day Ann asked me where I wanted to go just for fun.

"Let's go to Disneyland!" I was serious. Ann was shocked for a brief moment, and Kristin giggled. Ann laughed too. I think we all thought it might be my last.

On the trip to Salt Lake City, I was so weak, that I held my arms on the steering wheel by placing my right one on the arm rest and leaning the other one against the handle on the driver's door. My arms trembled a bit. I refused to say anything, because I did not think Ann would go through with the trip, but I knew I would be alright as soon as I arrived at the park.

It was a great trip. I still love it there.

If Recliners Could Talk

Before the adventure--the horrific realities of hip replacement surgery, of leukemia AML diagnosis, of chemotherapy, My Annie and I sat in recliners in the TV room, each with a little grandson in our arms. I held Jack. Annie held Tommy.

Before Tommy's birth in May, we have a picture somewhere of grandma holding Jack and of Pop Pop holding our new English Bulldog pup Guido.

I loved that dog, but this is my favorite picture, because there is nothing like holding grandchildren. And the advantage you have as a grandparent is that you never sense the looming threat of teenage years approaching, because the moment is too far away, and you learned with your own children an important lesson: never wishing they were older. Each part of a child's life is so precious; it is the ultimate pleasure to enjoy every moment, watching things you were too busy to notice where your own children were this small. But a time will come when they might become arrogant like Pop Pop was at 18.

I hope they don't, but I will always love them any way. I know my Annie will. She loved me when I was arrogant, and she loves me at times when I still am.

The Last Christmas With My Grandpa

This is a picture taken in December of '55 on Bannock Street. I will always remember that house--the wool carpet with the large leafy patterns, the arches dividing the dining room from the living room, the recessed spot where the phone was in a hallway, and the bright kitchen.

It was small. There are so many positive memories there.

And there were so many positive memories of the entire house.

In the basement, there was a fruitroom. An apple peeler was on a wall. We would talk Grandma Liza for years into taking an apple and letting us watch her turn the crank while the machine carefully peeled the fruit.

It is in this basement that I believed my Grandpa Cles was waiting for me. I would see him in my child dreams in a part I couldn't recognize.

When I went to grandma's for a time, I would go into the basement and spend time looking for him everywhere there. On Thanksgiving of '56 I did that, and my grandmother came looking for me. When she asked me what I was doing, I told her I was looking for my grandpa.

It was the only time I ever saw her cry.

Pictures of Arrogance

I guess I thought I was cool when they took this picture. With my hippy shirt and shoes to match, it was a picture I admired, until I recognized some things when you get old.

Cool doesn't matter when you snore, whether falling asleep sitting in a chair or lying on a couch.

Cool doesn't matter when new hair grows in your ears and not on your head.

Cool doesn't matter when you discover that "old people smell" is you and not the other person in front of you in a line at the cashier at the grocery store. And suddenly when you look down wishing noone--including you--will notice you, your eyes catch a glimpse of the houseslippers you are wearing, not because you forgot to change them, but because your shoes aren't comfortable.

Cool doesn't "cut it" anymore when you are old.

At the right, in the photograph taken during our trip to Canada, is another "cool" view of me in my pimp glasses.

I now recognize what my dad must have thought several times a day, inserting the instep of his Red Wing size 10 1/2 right swinging, leather-laced boot firmly and swiftly against the back pockets of my jeans.

Stopping in Pocatello Valley for a Picture

This is one of my favorite pictures of my dad. He was very proud of this truck. It was just at a point where dad could buy a few things for himself, something I never really saw him do.

He bought a nice Minolta 35 mm camera, and on the way to the ranch, dad just stopped and asked me to take the picture. I never remember his doing that before that day, because we were always in a rush to get somewhere to work.

I am glad we have this picture.

Just after dad bought this truck, dad was adjusting the new scope on his rifle. He lay across the hood, fired and when he looked to see where he hit the target, my dad noticed the crease across the hood left by the bullet. A black powder stain also stained the silver paint.

It was around deer hunting season, and I had an old deer tag. I found it, marked it with the date of that day and fastened it to the mirror on the driver's side. Dad did not think it was funny, but it still makes me smile.

I wish we had taken more pictures. And I wish we took more time to have fun. But at least I remember some incredible moments where I spent so much time with him.

Our Family Dog Curley and My Cat Rastus

This is the way my mom and dad's backyard looked before dad built the roof over the patio and bricked it. He wanted to put in windows, making it a type of sun room with the possible addition of a hot tub.

I remember how my dad struggled when he first started moving about in the morning. His joints were stiff like mine, and I know he looked at the benefits of a hot tub like that.

He even considered putting one ajoining the master bedroom at the ranch.

The picture also shows Curley, our family's English Springer Spaniel. We taught him to be tolerant of cats, and my big yellow tom cat is lying next to him.

I trained that cat like a dog. Each Sunday I would save the best pieces of roast beef from Sunday dinner, and I would have him sit in front of the avocado green fridge in the kitchen. If he jumped for the food, I would make him wait until he remained still. He would move his head from side to side, and his expression was a broad smile. It was strange, but people loved it. The look on the cat's face was very funny. I would put the beef--one large chunk at a time--in front of his mouth. And the cat would take it politely.

Six months before my return from Germany in 1974, my cat disappeared. In fact my parents told me they had not seen him for a long time. Then one night of the first few days I was home, he appeared. We made a fuss over him. I can't remember if I gave him any beef, but then he disappeared again.

I will always remember the fuss that Curley and my cat Rastas made over my being home.

I hate cats, but I loved that one. It was because he was more dog than cat, although part of the reason for my tom cat's frequent journeys was his affection for female cats. He either died, or someone else found him to be a great cat too. I hope it was more the latter, and most importantly, I hope his new owners did not operate a Chinese restaurant in Northern Utah or Southeastern Idaho.

More From Grandpa's Wallet

Grandpa had a number of these insurance cards in his wallet, all listing his name and address. I am not sure why he kept all of them, since I am sure that some were issued earlier, yet without an expiration date on the card, I assume they were all in effect and reflecting a current policy.

It is interesting how things change. Everything like that was so much simpler then as compared to what happens now. Medical insurance sends a card to present to the hospital; however, this one is different. It appears it is something you would carry in the event of an injury where you could not speak anyone for any number of reasons. It is actually something that companies should offer.

Grandpa's Farm Insurance card below lists the insurer as John C. Ward & Son. And it gives the coverage information at the left. It is also interesting to note that the spelling for grandpa's name is J O H N and not J O N. My dad's legal name was the same way, but he preferred the shortened version and always wrote his name that way. I don't remember if he changed it when he signed legal papers, like when he bought Rulon Ward's farm or the land from Jule Harris.
When dad bought Rulon's place, I received a call when I was at school in Provo. I drove to Brigham and was with dad at Walt Mann's office--the lawyer my family used for decades. Dad made sure I was there, and it was the beginning of serious talks about when I would be the owner of the ranch.

Things change. Dad's cancer came at the same time as a grasshopper infestation that devastated crops in the mid to late 80's. And even after things looked better, dad only lived about five years after the major cancer surgery. It came back with even more uncertainty.

I remind myself often that it really does not matter now. And most importantly, given the demands that work was on dad and me when we were both healthy, what could I have done since 2003 with this situation. Things would have been worse, because unlike dad's cancer, mine would never have allowed me to return to the physical work we did on the farm.

My cancer forever changed me, making me more vulnerable with lung problems and affecting me in so many ways in my physical strength. In 2004 I briefly lost the ability to walk, and after chemotherapy, it still remains a challenge with the aching joints and stiffness that restricts my mobility. But at least I can walk.

The Farm Bureau card and the left was current at the time of my grandfather's passing, good from November of '55 until November of '56. Great Grandpa Ward passed away from colon cancer in '55.

The fifties were times of change for our family too.

The card below is for the old crawler tractor. It was completely different than the one we had on the farm when I was young.

It had a starter motor rather than glow plugs. You would start it up first and let it run for a short time before starting the tractor. The card gives details about care for the engine. I'm not sure whether that was just during the initial "break-in" of the motor, or if they continued that throughout the life of the machine.























The pictures below, and I added them, shows the machinery I talked about in this blog. None of the pictures were obviously in grandpa's wallet. The picture at the left shows that last caterpillar we had on the farm. My mom and dad are in the picture with Ann's son Brent as a baby.

As I remember, this tractor was the first of two purchases that dad made after grandpa passed away: this tractor and a self-propelled John Deere 55 Hillside combine.


When grandpa was alive, they used a pull-type combine. Grandpa ran the combine by elevating the cutter bar by hand with a wheel, and my dad drove the crawler.

Neither machine had a cab. And neither piece of equipment was a luxury item. Both made work more efficient, and on the farm it was a necessity.

Dad taught me at an early age that this is where you invested money rather than other things. It was a lesson he emphasized to me every day sometimes, making sure I "understood," because farming in desert country meant not only working hard but having the tools to ensure that the land would produce the crops.

The next purchase was a new self-propelled combine, the 95 John Deer Hillside. It had twice the cutter bar capacity, so we could cover twice the amount of land in the same amount of time.

The first picture, the one in black and white, shows the rigging dad used to shade him from the sun. I remember dad welding it and attaching the canvas. Since I was still young when dad had the smaller John Deere 55 Hillside, I don't remember for sure what he had on it, but I thing he had rigged something similar.

Temperatures were very hot in August on the ranch, and in a day of harvesting that began very early and ended after dark, dad needed that to have shade from the sun.

The second picture shows the combine with a cab. Dad had it installed later, so that I could operate it with my severe allergies. Dad had me ride combine with him without it for a day. My lungs filled, and I had a reasonably severe reaction. We just didn't know it at the time. All we knew was that my riding on the machine without a cab would not work.





















The picture at the left also shows the water tank from the Crenlow Cooler. I put clean water in it every day.

On the top of the cab a vent is visible in the picture. There was a large plastic housing that held a fan in place. Hoses pumped water into it, keeping the cab cooler. There was also a large filter that I cleaned and changed every day. As long as I kept the filter clean, the air did not bother me as badly, but I still became very sick from the allergies every harvest season.



Grandpa's driving license was also in his wallet. There was no picture at that time, and it was simple--not covered in protective plastic like the ones we have now.

It was also valid only two years. Grandpa received in in November of '55, and it was to expire on his birthday in August of '57.

It also shows his height as 5' 10" at the time. Dad always told me that grandpa was over six feet tall. His weight was accurate, so I do not understand why he would have written the height differently than it was. My dad's height was the same, and I always used that for mine as well, although I am shorter right now.

My last license was good for 10 years. And by the way, I also did not put my weight down as it really is.

The receipt at the right is for that same license. It was also in the wallet.














The business card at the right was also in grandpa's wallet. It was for the Hill Top Service, a small station that still is on the road on the way to the old Deep Creek Inn.

It was been vacant for a long time, and now, even the Deep Creek Inn is no longer in business.

The Hill Top was an interesting service station. Dad called the owner Old Swivel Neck, because the owner sold beer to teenage minors. The way the owner looked both ways up and down the highway before he loaded the beer is why dad called him that.

I know enough about my grandpa to know that he would be embarrassed to know that I have this card, but I think it is interesting because it is part of what was in the wallet when he passed away.

And it may reflect on his sense of humor. Boise had an old "greasy spoon" diner in the heart of downtown. It was the T & A cafe, and yes, the initials refer to twice as much as Hooters. The food and not the waitresses were the reason you went there, unless you feared the cholesterol.

I am not a pervert, but I kept a napkin from that restaurant and still have it. It was similar to the cartoon picture on the backside of the business card above, but my napkin had a different caption. "Where the elite come to eat."
I always thought that the comment was more than funny; it was hilarious. I figure my grandpa kept this card for the same reason.

After Old Swivel Neck died, a local "good" member of the community of Malad and farmer had a $10,000 bill at the station. When the widow called the "good," church-going man, he told her that he owed her husband, not her. He never paid a dime, and she did not seek legal help.

One of the man's father's nicknames was Rock Wool Charlie. He would add rocks in bags of wool after shearing his sheep to get a better by the pound price for wool. He got caught. But it didn't seem to make him shy, because he was the same type "good" person his son was, rarely missing Sunday services.

I go every Sunday, but I hope no one has a complaint like this about me.

If my dad were standing looking over my shoulder as I type, he would whisper in my ear, "Just tend to your own knitting and don't worry about the problems of someone else."

My grandpa would say in my other ear, "Now, did you see and hear that, because if you didn't, you shouldn't say it." Both did not like people saying bad things about others. My dad and grandpa didn't talk trash. They were too busy on the farm to frequent any of the rumor establishments in town.

When I was upset about someone saying things about me, dad had an interesting response. "Is it true? Others know you and know the truth, so it doesn't matter what people say. Most will know the "kind" of people who spread lies like that."

It was tough to take that advice. And I didn't. I held a grudge for decades and still do because of things said about me by this person. But dad was right. And I will eventually forget the grudge.

The notes at the left and below are things my grandpa wrote down and put in his wallet. Like my dad, his thoughts were continually about the farm. I haven't been on the ranch since '92, but I still have the agenda in my mind that dad had in terms of what he wanted to do in the next few years--pipeline, fences and completion of the water storage tank on the top of the hill across from the ranch.


When I was young, my dad had me write down the number of loads of wheat we harvested in a calendar book like this. Dad would get them from Jones Hardware, the John Deere dealership he and his dad did business with for years.
The notes were important, because I remember at least once when a person who bought grain from my dad and loaded it from our grain bins was not honest. Dad made sure the man made things right. Whether he did it purposely or not, the notes kept everyone honest.

Dad also used them to keep track of the number of bales we purchased from Leonard Clark, and he kept notes about the cattle--dates when we put them in different pastures or fields, so that we did not overgraze the land.






The card below is grandpa's draft card. To the left of the image is the side with the postage, showing it having been sent as a post card to the ranch in Snowville. As I remember, grandpa had a farm deferment.

Grandpa's Wallet from 1956

The wallet is the one that my Grandpa Cles carried with him just before he died, and most of things in it are still from when he used it.

There are exceptions--two red papers that would each be around five $100 bills. There were two of those but the dates were since my grandfather's passing.

There was also a check written out to my dad from my Grandma Liza for interest on the ranch. I wish that I had known what that was, because the date on the check was August 13, 1958, which was over two years since the death of my grandfather, who died on February 9, 1956. I have no idea what it was. No one cashed it, but the check was in the wallet. From what I could see, Grandma Liza must have used it to put money she occasionally withdrew from her account at the bank, probably for Christmas or other occasions.

The inside of the wallet is interesting; however, it shows my grandfather's social security card, and given the strange things that happen when people find a number, I don't want to place a photo copy on this site, unless I am sure it would be secure to do so.

This fifty dollar bill at the left has an interesting history. In the weeks before my grandpa's passing, whenever he and Grandma Liza were with my parents--and probably me--at
a Malad restaurant, he would look at my dad when they brought the bill and say, "All I've got is a $50." Everyone would laugh, and dad would pay for the meal. My grandfather was very generous, so it was not a matter of his allowing dad to pay the tab. It became a fun family story. This is the actual bill that was in grandpa's wallet. The date of the bill is 1950.

The two $2 bills below are from 1928. I wish I knew if my grandfather had those in his wallet, and why he did that, because I do not think they were there.

A $2 bill was such an odd currency to see when I was young, and because it was so rare to find, my grandmother would pay for them whenever she saw them while working at the bank after my grandfather's death. When I was young, most people viewed them as a luck charm, and later when horse racing in Malad became popular in the 60's-80's, most people used them at the races to place bets.

Grandpa Cles would not have been at the horse races, not because he was against gambling, but because there was always work on the farm, especially in the fall. I could see him at the county fair, but not at the races, and I am pretty sure that the races didn't exist at that time in Malad.














The owner identification card below is for the '56 two-tone green and white Century Buick that grandpa bought my Grandma Liza. I remember a mechanic telling dad and me that many considered it a sports car at the time.

Given my dad's response when I talked grandma into buying a '67 Camaro Rally Sport with the hideaway lights, I find it a bit funny, unless you realize that you become wiser when you are older. My dad didn't want his mother in a car like that in the 60's, and it would have been a sweet ride, four on the floor with a large engine and dual exhausts.

The Buick is at the right. The photo is from September of 1959, my first day of first grade. I remember my friend J. Verlo Rose had a shirt similar to this one, although the color might have been different. His was red with a large "V" pattern on the front. I think mine was red, but the same pattern was similar although not as dominant as the one that my friend had.

The Cost of Playing a Joke on My Annie

The Big Red Boat was our first cruise. Ann told me she was going to book it, and when she ordered a rental car, I made her promise that she would get the smallest Japanese compact she could find.

It wasn't because of the cost. At the time, teenage Florida gangsters were shooting German tourists who rented nice cars.

Ann did exactly like I asked.

The car was horrible. It killed every time I tried to start in first gear. On the morning we left for the coast to board the boat, it was hot, and the road was showing hot spots of oil on the asphalt. A long line of Japanese tourists walked outside the hotel, cameras swaying from side to side around their necks.

I was tired of the car stalling, so I popped the clutch. I heard the tires squeal and even saw smoke in the mirrors. The mass of Japanese tourists went crazy. My Annie and I are in at least 10 home movies and 150 photograph albums. They enjoyed it, and we did too. It will always be one of my favorite memories of that trip.

While in the Bahamas, Ann wanted to go snorkeling. When they asked me if I could swim at the front desk, I hesitated. I was nervous about swimming in the ocean. Ann was so disgusted with me about being hesitant like I was.

Once while body surfing on Manhattan Beach in L.A., a large fish brushed my leg. And it was very large, like a log beneath the water. It was only about seven years since Jaws was in theaters, so I always was nervous after that.

They--the ones in charge of doing the snorkeling--made me do a swim test before I could participate, because I was hesitant at the desk.

Ann and I went to the boat's pool at the time they had the test scheduled. The pool was all of 20 feet in length, and I was to join the mob of six-year-old children. All of them were hoping to pass, so they could do the adventure with their parents.

Ann grinned and laughed out loud. I swore and walked away. I was not going to be in the pool with little kids, even though I could swim well.

Ann and the young man who was going to give me the swim test met me at our room door as I was trying to open it with the key. The kid was nice, but he was so patronizing. He set up another appointment that wouldn't embarrass me, but it was too late. I was embarrassed already.

I passed.

My Annie and I bought underwater disposable cameras and boarded the small boat that took us to an incredible coral reef. I made my way to a small diving platform at the rear that looked like what boats at home had for water skiers. They told me to jump into the water.

I was nervous--the Jaws thing again. I slid into the water. It was warm like lukewarm tub water. We all had to wear inflatable life vests like my Annie wore in the picture at the left. I padded around the boat the entire time, never coming in to rest once, unlike almost all of the other swimmers.

During the adventure, Ann would swim beside me and remove my swim goggles. Water would get into them, and I would have to empty the water and put them on again. She did it twice. She would hum the music to Jaws right before she did it each time.

Before going snorkeling, we bought these little containers of fish food. Ann had two or three, and I had that many too. My Annie was coming in for another shot at moving my swim mask, humming the muffled sound of Jaws.

I turned and emptied all my containers of food beneath her. I made sure that I shook them perfectly in this beautiful circular motion. Thousands of Nemo and Dori fish went into a feeding frenzy all around her. Among the tiny masses of blue and yellow, I could see Annie squirming, and I could hear her. "Blub, Blub, Blub!"

We both surfaced and looked at each other. She damned me all to hell, but she smiled when she did it, so I knew I was alright.

At the left and below are photographs of the fish we saw. Parts of the pictures show the reef too. It was beautiful.

When we boarded the boat, I took off the T-shirt I wore like everyone else to prevent sunburn. I walked around the boat, leaning over to look at the water. Everyone acted strangely. And they made these strange sounds, like they were choking on food or something.

They would look at me briefly and then turn their heads quickly to look in the other direction. I even looked to see what they saw, but it was an empty horizon, or at least that is what I thought they saw.

My Annie sat at the back of the boat, smiling from ear to ear and really pleased at something. I walk back to see what is so funny.

She smiled at me like she always does when she teases me. "Feel your suit."

I pat both of my legs. "No, feel your suit." I did it again the same way.

Annie stands up and takes my hand, directing it to the back of my suit. I touched bare skin at the back of my suit the size of a volleyball.

I never had to worry about people recognizing me aboard the boat. They never noticed my face. I still wake up in the night sometimes, hearing the journalist who reported the Hindenburg tragedy, and I hear his voice among the groans of others on that little boat that took us to the reef. "Oh, the humanity," I hear them say in unison, and some mothers cover the eyes of their small children.

The picture at the right shows a beach on the Big Red Boat's private island. It was so beautiful, the colors under the water, the empty beaches, the soothing water. The day was quite warm--hot enough that the sand actually burned our feet. We had to get towels and throw them in front of us to step on as we made our way to the water. That's how we did it. The water close to the beach was shallow, but there were large rocks immediately under the water occasionally, like the ones higher on the shoreline in the picture below.

Some of My Favorite Things

Jack always slept on my stomach when he was a baby. And he would sleep soundly. I remember one night after I was recovering from the chemo the first time. It was getting late, and we were all watching TV. Jack leaned up and looked at me. He was ready for me to tell him a story and go to sleep, something that was not easy as he became older and decided he liked watching television too. I would tell Jack stories, and we would listen for the train to whistle in the distance every night.

This is when Anna was small and I could still give her raspberries without her squirming and pushing her clenched fists into my throat. On our last trip to California, Ann and Jack and I picked up Lydia, Tommy and Anna at LAX. They stepped from the elevator, and both Anna and Tommy ran to us.

Anna looked up at me. "Can I pick you up and hold you?" She studied me for a few long moments.

"O.K." She grinned at me as I reached down and picked her up into my arms. She looked at me.

"Can Pop Pop give Anna kisses?" She thought about this for a long time before answering me. "Yeahhhhhhhh," she said.

My memory of Tommy was the last time Lydia and the kids stayed with us when they lived in California. Lydia flew to Salt Lake City, and I picked them up at the luggage claim. As soon as Tommy saw me, he raced to me and jumped into my arms.

And I will always remember spoiling my grandsons with Star Wars toys. Darth Tommy appears in the picture above. On that visit we bought the boys Darth Vader helmets that let them speak with the voice changer. It was fun. I still had not bought Tommy a new light saber, so the soup spoon worked well with the potential of using the force to make nutricous lunch.

And most importantly, my memories of Tommy are having my boys on both sides of me in my easy chair, while we rattle the house with Surround Sound while listening to one of the Star Wars films or Polar Express. Grandma always cussed me when the house shook.

There are many memories of the boys at this age playing in the cabinets. We made sure the cabinets were safe, and the boys enjoyed jumping out and scaring us.

And I could never forget the memories of my Annie and kids. The picture above shows our first house in Malad, the one north of Pioneer Park. Just before we sold the house, Ann and I planted strawberries in the large area by the new fireplace we had installed.

Here is Cles, all ready to leave for the ranch with me and grandpa. That was at a time when dad had the old green and white Ford.

I only remember this picture faintly, but I remember how cute Lydia looked at that age. We never wore orange on Lydia, so this picture is particularly fun.

And here is Kristin's toe picture. I have looked for this for years, and I was not able to find it. This was my favorite picture taken by the school photographer.

And here is my favorite car, my '29 Model A pickup. I wish I could drive it tomorrow, and I wish I could still fit behind the steering wheel. When I was young, I used to shut of the valve supplying gas to the engine. It was out of site in front of the passenger's side of the seat under the dash.

It only worked once while taking a girl for a ride. That's the problem with small towns. Girls talk anyway, but in small towns it is much worse. On a second try, the girl was looking up under the dash for the valve.

The passenger door on my truck was a bit bad. I would have three friends sitting next to me, and we would put the fourth one--the one we didn't like--against the door. I would take a curve on a corner fast, always a part of the road with a large patch of gravel or a vacant lot full of grass and rocks. At the worst part of the turn, we would nudge against the victim. The door would spring open, and we would laugh as he would run five or six stips with waving arms, until he tripped, fell and disappeared in a little cloud of dust. If we really disliked him, we would drive away and leave him on foot.

I hope I never did that to my cousin Randy. I loved him like a brother. I treated him like a brother, but then again, the way I sometimes teased and tormented family members, maybe I dad. But I hope I didn't.

Malad was an interesting town. Mean people with a bizarre sense of humor. The Germans call it Schadenfreude, laughter at someone's expense.