My Favorite Part Of Christmas

My earliest memory of Christmas was having a pinion pine in our front room, one as high as it was in breadth.  The family home on Bannock Street always had just a hint of sap on the ceiling after my dad and I lifted the tree into the house.  

In the fifties, we had tinsel icicles that I loved.  You could slip your feet across the carpeted floor for a few feet, and gently touch a sister's ear lobe.  It the dark you could actually see the spark.  I loved that.

But those days ended in the 60's, when we began using  the Electrolux vacuum cleaner to spray snow flock on the pinions, making an artificial layer of snow that coated the tree and replaced the smell of pine with a hint of ammonia.  It had been a long time since being around any small children, so I refused to associate the wondrous thing with a diaper.  With large lights of red, green and blue, it truly was something beautiful to see.

And then as soon as that seemed to be the way that everyone decorated their tree, everyone opted for the natural approach.  By then, I was in college.  The night my dad set up the tree, I returned home from college, went to an oral surgeon, and had four impacted wisdom teeth removed.  I sat in a chair for the lighting.

"Jonie, what do you think of the tree?" I gazed in a stupor with fat, swollen cheeks, my senses numbed by pain pills.

"What tree," I responded.  My dad told me the next day how they laughed.  That was just a few short weeks before I left for a two year mission to the Germany Central Mission.
I returned in 1974.  My dad was disappointed that I didn't return for Christmas.  Having stepped off the plane on January 9, 1974, I spent one weekend home, and I began classes at college, which was a partial disaster.  Similar to looking at a Christmas tree in a stupor two years before, I spoke with a slight German accent.  It took me a week before I could understand English in lectures.  
By mid February, Ann and I were engaged to be married, and within only a short time, I built the tree stand like I had seen my dad do in our garage on Bannock Street.  In those early years, my dad would help me lift the tree into the house, one touching the ceiling and as wide as it was tall.  They were beautiful trees.  And of course, it had to be a pinion.
My allergies were worse after returning home from the industrial area of Germany, where I lived for two years.  I began to notice that I became sick every year during the holidays, and magically, I recovered after taking the tree outside.  It was not many years before I noticed that my children shared that "illness."

We bought our first tree in 1990.  There was one more natural tree in Idaho Falls, but it was an Austrian Pine.  Finding a pinion was impossible.  The artificial tree lasted until Christmas of 2006, and by then it was well-worn.  We bought the current one in 2007.  
In the second year of having this new tree, we found that all children decorate trees the same way my own children did it.  All decorations appear in a tiny circle in one area.  We "ooh and aah" at their achievement, and after Jack went to sleep, we do the same thing we did when our own children decorated.  We rearrange everything.  But the process makes us smile at the memories of our own three children doing the same thing.  

The Lesson of Christmas Lights

The whole lighting thing was different this year and even hinted at the global economic situation. I had to call the yard care business after the day the installation was to have been completed.  They maintained that we had not submitted a check, even though that was not what they had said they would do in our contract.  I reminded them that we had received no bill, and that I always paid half when they placed the lights on the house.  We left for Disneyland just after that conversation, and they were to be installed when we returned.
It didn't happen.  I called them again.  And this time they promised to be there within a day.  It didn't happen either.  After another call, a person arrived for the check, although no lights had appeared.  I was beginning to regret having done business with them, and by then I had mentioned it at least twice--once over the phone and a second time in person when they appeared at my door, especially given the fact that we not only paid our bill on time, but we also did it early the previous year.
Finally, I heard the hammering one afternoon, and I felt better, until hours later when I went outside to see the 48 inch wreath that was to be at the top of the garage.  It was all of 12 inches. I called again.  They seemed to have forgotten, but I reminded them that I was looking at our contract that basically guaranteed specific requests for three years.  One basic point was that the wreath was a 48 inch wreath.  It took three calls to correct that, and they did the tree in the front yard incorrectly too.  Oh, and there was no discount that they originally promised that was to be five percent.  They forgot everything like that, but it was only a small amount in my opinion, so I let it go.
Eventually everything seemed to be alright.  We enjoyed the holiday lights and everything seemed fine.  Christmas came and went.  Ann took these pictures one evening after New Years, and according to the agreed time, the lights disappeared.  It was even a week after I unplugged them.  With the economic situation already a concern, everyone in the neighborhood darkened their lights at least several weeks early, and strangely as it seemed, I did the same thing.  I am after all the person who would light them every night until Valentine's Day.  

I actually even looked forward to their coming the next year.  We had forgotten the bad vibes we had from poor service, and I even began to dismiss their poor memory, because after all, the lights were pretty.

And then I noticed the rain gutter on the south side of my house.  I called them immediately.  They made a classic statement.

"Wasn't it already like that?"

I know that Santa Claus is on my roof on Christmas Eve on a yearly basis, but other than that, no one has been there since the installation of the gutter.  During the past summer, a subcontractor actually looked at it momentarily while we examined the vinyl siding on my house, but we looked at everything from the ground, and he never climbed to the roof, and given the fact that if I had been the one who slipped from the top of the cornice and caught myself on that thin patch of metal, not only would I have ripped the entire section down, but the University of Utah would have had seismic recordings of my hitting the ground.

It took four calls to get something done.  They showed up, and I go outside to see the repair. They told me that they would bend it back, so that it looked just like new.  I reminded them that unless it miraculously appeared as it had before the damage, I would not accept it.

It wasn't.  I went from my jovial, friendly self to angry, pissed off me.

I called the next morning.  

"Isn't it looking OK now?"  That was the owner's response.   

In spite of my anger, I was still nice but there was edge in my voice as I explained that it wasn't OK.  Two weeks passed.  I called one more time.  Another bill arrived, and this one had the stamp PAST DUE in bold red print.  

I was not friendly when I left the message, especially when I reminded them that since the middle name of their business was Quality, I expected nothing less.  They called Monday morning.

Nothing happened.  I called again.  This time I was rude when I left the message, and I received a call that finally made me feel better, but that was after I reminded them that I would never allow them on my place again, and I would take care of the repair and send them the bill before paying, just so we knew exactly where everyone stood.

Workers showed up the next morning.  I'm so glad that there are construction jobs for people who obviously have spent time in jail or prison are about to spend time in either one or both, because the two who came to do the repairs appeared to be qualified to do either one.  But they fixed the rain gutter, not as nicely as I would have liked, but at least there are no longer the imprints of two size 10 shoes in the light brown metal.

I don't think the Ward house will have Christmas lights next year, but it was fun while it lasted.

I Cried Once--When Wingers Removed The Patty Melt From Their Menu

When Annie Grins For A Picture . . .

Ann and I booked a cruise during the late 90's. At that time, someone from Florida called, offering us this incredible "free" cruise for just paying a minimal air fare and listening to a "presentation." It wasn't a big deal, because they said it was a "no pressure" thing that only would last an hour. We jumped at it. And when we found it was a Bahamas Cruise, it was even better.

Neither one of us had ever been to Florida, and the thought of sitting on a beach in the Caribbean was too much for us to comprehend. It was just too tempting. Besides, we thought we could say "no," because we never had trouble saying "no."  I remember both of us thinking that, although we never seemed to refuse talking to those callers repeatedly tempting us with yet another "deal."  And I notice that other people say the same thing, just before they buy a condo from a high pressure salesperson in a cheap sport jacket and a pair of white leather shoes.

We arrived in Orlando. The news had been filled with reports of foreign tourists shot by little Florida gangsters, who attempted to hijack expensive rental cars before brutally killing the driver and passengers, so I had a solution: a super idea. We rented this tiny Japanese compact that was almost too small for us and our luggage, and we knew how to pack, so you know that there was not a lot of room in that car.

The morning we were to drive to Cape Canaveral was one that affected me with a bit of nervousness. We had coins for the toll roads, and I began to worry about something I had not remembered to bring.  It was very warm that morning in late May or early June. The road bled black patches of tar in long strips on highways. It was a beautiful day.

Since leaving the car rental spot to get our "free"vehicle, I had continual trouble with our tiny import--a piece of automotive genius that no gangster would want, unless blind gangsters had somehow begun to discover a life of crime.  Letting out the clutch would not do the trick. You had to pop it after pushing down on the accelerator pedal so that it wouldn't stall.   I hit it, right on one of those tar patches on the highway.   Ann and I had our windows down and the sunroof completely exposed.   I heard the tires squeal, and in the mirror I could see white smoke form a tiny but beautiful white cloud that would have made me beam with pride at the age of 15. 

At my age, I didn't know what to do, so I just let my imagination roll with it. "Waaaawhoooooo!"  I howled loudly. Ann sank into her seat and covered her face with her hands.  A bus of Japanese tourists had just unloaded in front of our hotel.  They loved the show we did for them.   "Cowboys!" one shouted while pointing at us.  I have never seen so many cameras clicking at the same time, and in spite of the bright sun, their flashes popped repeatedly in the Florida sunshine.  We smiled because Ann and I knew were now famous in Asia, once again because of my notorious behavior.

During the first days at sea, Ann asked me to do her a favor, and she made me promise that I wouldn't say no before responding. "I really want to do this," she said.

As soon as I determined that it had nothing to do with a parachute and water skis, I decided there wasn't too much I would be afraid to do, so I consented.

"They're going to do some snorkeling in the Bahamas, and I really want to do this?"

I had been nervous about swimming in the ocean because of an experience I had while body surfing in California with one of my early German exchange groups. The tide was strong, so it was difficult to get back to the shore, and there was something even more ominous: a very large fish brushed my leg, a fish as large around as a good-sized telephone pole. 

Most people thought it was a dolphin whenever I related the story, and although I hoped that it was true, the event was still too close to the time when Jaws was a movie in theaters with at least three sequels. But I promised to go snorkeling with her on that day of the cruise, especially after Ann's eyes showed disgust when I began telling the story she referred to as the "damn" body surfing story.

"Let's sign up right now." She didn't let me even think twice about it, and she knew that if I put some coin on the deal, I wouldn't back out of the activity. Ann and I walked to the front desk.

At that time, I was swimming a mile per day five or six times a day at the pool in Idaho Falls. "So are you a good swimmer?" The young man at the counter on an upper deck of the ship was adding names to a list.  He looked at me when I hesitated.

"Well, I swim a little bit." Ann's face flushed.

The young man looked confused at my comment and Ann's reaction. "You meet me at the pool in 40 minutes, and we'll check it out to ensure that you can swim a bit." Ann walked silently ahead of me all the way back to the room. I could see her talking to herself."

"A little bit," she repeated every ten or twenty steps while shaking her head. By the time we returned to the room, I put on my swim suit, a T-shirt and we returned to this fifteen foot pool at the middle of the boat. Twenty people were there, all under the age of four.

The young man saw me and came over immediately. He had a serious look on his face, one that people wear when they are trying not to laugh loudly and uncontrollably.  Ann grinned broadly.

I cursed and began walking toward our cabin. "Where are you going," Ann said.

"I'm not going to make an ass out of myself."  People, sitting around the pool on cheap lawn chairs, stopped talking and stared at me in disbelief, because I actually said a bad word in front of the four-year-old children who were trying to pass the same swimming competency test. I walked quickly to the room, where I could make an ass out of myself privately.

I shut the door.  Suddenly there was a gentle knock. "Ann, I'm not going to embarrass myself with a whole herd of rug rats paddling about in the pool!"  There was another knock.

"Mr. Ward." I opened the door to see the young man standing there with a snorkel mask and fins in his hand. Ann looked over his shoulder at me, still grinning broadly. "Just come down to the pool. The children are all finished, and we will do this so no one will notice you at all."  The young man smiled politely.

I passed the test. Ann said something like, "Doesn't he get a Barney the Dinosaur sticker or something for doing well."  That was the only time I ever heard her laugh at her own joke. This time the steward laughed too.

We boarded a flat-bottomed boat the next day with forty people or more. We anchored about a hundred to two hundred meters offshore over a coral reef, and it was our turn to jump into the water.

Ann jumped in like they told her. There was this step, just like most motor boats have for water skiing. Instead of jumping in, I sat on it and slid into the water.  

It was always more about fear of sharks in the water than anything else. I knew I could swim.

In the beginning of the snorkeling deal, Ann caught me off guard. I thought she was swimming in for me to take a picture. She approached with hands outstretched, and I could hear this humming, faintly similar to the Jaws theme. Just after I took the first picture, she pulled my face mask enough to let water flood it. I cursed and stuck my head into the air and replaced my mask.

Ann did it three or four times, and then I finally decided enough was enough. They had given us little containers of fish food, and I had four or five around my neck. I could hear the Jaws theme, but this time I waited for the right moment.  I released three containers of fish food beneath Ann.  Hundreds of tiny yellow-striped and blue fish began a feeding frenzy. I could see my sweetie's arms and legs flailing at them as she swam away.

I did that two or three more times.  All was well with the world, and I was so proud of myself. 

We never returned the entire ninety minutes to two hours that everyone was in the water. After we finished snorkeling, the steward laughed again, and he really thought it was funny, when Ann told him about my swimming at least a mile daily.

There are a couple of things you have to know about my sweetie--sooner or later she gets to have the last laugh, and she never poses for a picture, unless she clowns around while doing it.  The picture at the right made me angry.  

We were near the city of Weimar in the former DDR or East Germany, and we were on this boat ride that was really beautiful.  I had this picture all set, and just as I took it, here is the pose she did for me, and she refused to let me take a single photograph of her.

When my Annie smiles for a picture, something is "up."

When we climbed back on board the boat to return us to the shore before getting back on the cruise ship, I walked around taking pictures.  People wouldn't look at me.  In fact, they swung their heads quickly, just like drill team dancers do when they perform at a basketball or football game.  And that's what they were doing here.  

People shunned me, and I began to feel self-conscious.  I looked at the back of the boat and took a picture of Ann.  She was the only one looking at me.  Everyone else looked somewhere to avoid a glimpse of me.

I should have known when Ann posed for the picture with "the grin."  

I walked to her, and she kept smiling broadly.   "What's wrong!" I was almost angry, because I felt silly, and I wanted to know what Ann thought was so funny.

"Feel your suit," she said.

I tapped the front of my swim trunks several times.  "No, feel your suit!" she repeated.   I did the same thing again.  Ann stood up, took my hand and placed it on my backside, where I felt nothing but bare skin.  There was at least a ten inch rip in the suit from my sliding into the water instead of jumping in like they told me to do.  People tried to ignore us while we talked about it.  No one laughed.

I worried for hours that I would have to see those people for rest of the trip, but I was wrong, because they never really were able to get a good look at my face.

Winter is for Children

I put this blog together, so my grandchildren would see that there was a time when their Pop Pop didn't call snow a bad name by referring to it as that white s@%t that's on the sidewalk and driveway again.  

There actually was  a time when my dad would take a long rope and tie it securely onto the bumper of our pick-up or car, and drive slowly while pulling me on a sled and several friends on their sleds too.  We could only do it when the roads were covered with a thick layer of packed snow, so I actually looked forward to that too, instead of cursing local city officials for not getting snow removed quickly.

And it was also a time when I went to work with my dad and grandfather.  My dad would bundle me up in boots and hat and this old plaid coat that was thick and warm.  We drove to what we called the hay lands, an area where farmers cut summer grasses, rich in timothy and sometimes a bit of clover, to feed cattle in winter when thick snow blanketed pastures.  It was here that I watched my dad and grandpa load a late 40's or early 50's two ton truck with a load of hay before taking it to an adjacent field where we fed our cattle.  In those days, we brought our cattle into Malad rather than driving to Snowville every day to feed them there.

The old way was safer and cheaper, but it was before farmers and ranchers had to live with laws requiring fees for each cow and calf and bull regarding brand inspection.  

While I am sure that it prevented some thefts of cattle, I have a difficult time thinking that cattle rustlers would transport loads during daytime hours.  Thieves never worry about being accommodating.  They never stop by the house of the brand inspector who lives on the highway just for fun either.  

And even my dad loved snow too.  The picture shows him bundled up for snow in a wooden box atop his own sled.  

I wish he were here to tell me if the picture was in the back of Great Grandpa Ward's place, because that is my best guess at this point, although some of the sheds look familiar to what we had on the ranch.

Even when I was older and in my 20's and 30's, I loved snow, because it was a time when we were able to ride a snow machine, and although we did it rarely with having to feed cattle every day, we still were able to do it occasionally.

The picture below is one of the early times when we participated in the sport.  My dad bought two green machines for a few hundred dollars per sled, something that would never happen today when enthusiasts pay as much for a snow machine as they do for a car.  It was a new sport at that time, a time when it was fun to do something with my dad besides the work we did every day.

The mountains around Malad were loaded with places to ride.  I think this picture shows a trail just above Jess Ward's ranch on the way to Powerhouse, although it may also have been the trip dad took to the cabin one year.  Tom Perry went with us, because dad was nervous that the snow on the roof would create problems.  

When we opened the door and entered, the entire inside of the cabin was coated with a layer of frost, just like what appears on car windows in winter.  We started a fire, and after a few hours, the inside was warm.  Riding the snow machines that year, however, was something that required thick coats and helmets with visors.  Even then we wore a bandana to cover our face, because hte daytime temperatures were never higher than 20 below zero.  We had to worry about wind chill, which explains why we dressed like we did.  

The beauty I found during those winter trips was incredible.  The mountains around Malad had beautiful places to ride too, and to this day, I will never understand why someone there doesn't groom trails for snow machines in winter and bike trails in summer.   At one time there was someone who groomed trails, but that was when everyone rode their snow machines in the mountains.  I don't think it happens as much now.  It became a rich man's sport with the advent of advanced technology that created massive snow machines with cooled engines.  The simple way is sometimes a better path.

Winter was a beautiful time there in my memory.  Everyone decorated yards and businesses for Christmas, and there was always a huge Christmas tree in the center of town.  The fifty or sixty foot tree was a traffic hazard and also a hassle for city police trying to catch teens who stole colored light bulbs, but it was still fun to have that tree there.  Now the town uses a smaller version in a parking lot, and I think it is also an artificial tree.  In years past, property owners would donate one overgrown pine in their own yard to be sacrificed by city officials wielding chain saws.

I wish that I could have been old enough to remember my grandpa feeding cattle with Great Grandpa Ward's team.  Now that would have been a sleigh ride to remember, although the work involved requiring loading that hay rack with a pitchfork was not an "E-ticket" ride at any Disney Park.  It was difficult work.

In spite of the work involved in feeding cattle, I still have fond memories of the evenings with my father.  The skies were sometimes crystal clear, and stars shone brightly in a massive ocean of cobalt blue.  I will never forget the sound of cattle feeding in the silence of winter.  The season in my memory was a beautiful place. 

Minnesota: A Place Meant for Summer Visits

Minnesota is a beautiful place to be during the summer.  There are rolling hills of corn.  Every farm you see is well-kept: the fences appear freshly painted, old machinery does not litter the landscape, homes and sheds are in order.  It basically looks like people, who take pride in what they do, live there.  

And even the summer storms are beautiful.  When it rains, it is torrential, and as bizarre as it seems to appear, I love to hear the echo of thunder that shakes windows in homes, although I hate the fact that tornadoes are a thing to worry about there too, which is something that we have here only rarely.  But even then, every time it rains, I look for things I am accustomed to here in the high plains desert, like the smell of ozone after a storm when everything smells so fresh and clean.  

In summer, you can hear the sounds of crickets and frogs.  To watch grandchildren pick them up and play with them is not only fun, but it also reminds me of my doing the same thing.  

The picture above is of Tommy and Anna at Soldier Park.  Minnesota recognizes that parks are important.  There are incredible examples of playground equipment that any child loves, designed to give them the exercise they need by getting out of the house and away from computer games and television.   

Jack loved the park there when he was with us in September of '08, but there were already changes in the air while we were there.  It began to be cool at night, requiring a light coat and closed windows at night.  In the heat of summer, the windows stay open, if not to create a little cool fresh air, then definitely a chance to hear those frogs and crickets.  The night sounds were still there in September.  You could, however, still notice the anticipation of winter.  

Driving became a NASCAR adventure with people who cut you off frequently or suddenly recognized that cars have horns to be used if someone waits a fraction of a second too long at a light or stop sign.   The smiles were no longer there, and no one seemed to be experiencing karma.  They seemed to know that winter was coming.  I don't blame them.  In fact, the reason I probably interpret the sadness is because it is how I feel in winter.

I can't imagine what they must feel.   Seeing the "white stuff" is depressing enough, so I have no way of understanding what they must feel when they find weeks where daytime temperatures rarely climb to plus degrees.  In fact, the only thing that helps we survive Idaho winter at this point in my life is knowing that somewhere in Minnesota, it is most likely forty or fifty below zero any given night in January and early February.

We will visit again this summer.  I will drive across Montana and Wyoming and the Dakotas, hoping to make it well in advance of the invasion by fans of Harley Davidson who feel that it is their constitutional right to bare themselves at any given moment.  There should be a law that forbids anyone over the age of 45 from acting stupid like that.   

But being in Minnesota means visiting Tommy and Anna with Jack, a rare time when we have all three grandchildren together in one place at one time.  It means driving to the Dutch restaurant to see the workers bring a plate with a European pancake smothered in berries while saying very loud, "Pfannekuchen."  Oh, they don't say it in German.  They use the Dutch word, although I am sure they mispronounce it badly, but it's still fun to be there and watch the fun and eat the great food.

A Loosely Based Interpretation of Star Wars By One Of My Annie's Gifted Students

Star Wars: Retold (by someone who hasn't seen it) from Joe Nicolosi on Vimeo.

Just when I thought I had seen everything, I find something fun like this, and I have to share it on my blog.

I Wish Joni Mitchell Would Write A Song About Karma

Just when I thought I could resist reading any letter to the editor in Idaho Falls, it happened. I take a quick glance at titles, refuse to allow it to act upon my day, and do the crossword. It helps to do that ritual, because if I read one of the letters, I undoubtedly get angry. It's kind of like that movie The Sixth Sense, except unlike the young boy. I see stupid people. And they irritate me.

So when I opened the paper on Wednesday, January 28, I began the ritual true to form, and then it appeared: a title in bold letters. It was like the late 50's horror film I once saw entitled, From Hell It Came!

Teachers must sacrifice

There has been much discussion on what the state government must do to stay within a balanced budget during these sad economic times. When the subject of budget cuts surfaces and especially eduactrion cuts are suggested, the uproar begins. In the "Our View" section of the Post Register on January 14, the article states that if education gets less, then the quality of teaching will be less. For every 10 dollars, nine goes to salaraies and benefits.

Being in the building business, I know what it means to have to bid on projects including homes for teachers. If I want the job, I must bid the project at the lowest possible cost, but the people do not want the lowest possible quality. No, they still insist on the best top quality as if I were the highest bidder. Where is the double standard today? Everyone should have to sacrifice at a time when economical tough times occur.

Perhaps teachers should bid for their jobs and experience what everyone in teh competitive world has had to do forever.

Now, I don't have any problem with the word sacrifice. As a teacher I did it for 25 years. I never owned a car that didn't have over 100,000 miles on it before I purchased another, except for the last red Ford I owned with a bad transmission, but that is another story.

I also spent thousands of dollars every year out of my own pocket buying classroom materials and doing other things that I didn't have to do. It was money that I chose to do, but it was a sacrifice for my family. And money is only the beginning. I sacrificed a great deal of time too. Whether after or before school, I spent hours in my classroom creating an atmosphere that students could enjoy and developing materials that would help them learn. It is what you do as a teacher. I did it, and I know others who did it and still do.

I paced for a while. During the afternoon, I even listened to some mellow 60's music that usually has a calming effect, but it didn't work. Then I turned to the annoying journalists on ESPN who hate some of my favorite teams and ridicule some of my favorite players. I thought, Hey maybe they can annoy me enough to forget about the man from Sugar City who obviously hates teachers. But like the not so nice woman in The Wizard of Oz--who by the way reminds me of my fourth grade teacher (See, I dislike a few in my profession for good reason too, but it doesn't make all teachers bad.)--I hated the man and his little letter too.

My letter began to form in my mind, and suddenly there was this smile that began to crawl across my face. I sat at the computer, while my Annie watched something on TV. "What are you doing Jon?"

She knew I was up to something. She saw all the danger signs of my having read another one of those--in her words and not mine--damn letters to the editor in the Post Register. And then I looked at the finished copy. I can never be sure, but as I looked at it, the words "It's alive!" came from my mouth. I smiled in satisfaction with my creation.

As a retired teacher, I gratefully acknowledge the Sugar City businessman who is a builder and who took it upon himself to teach me and other educators what we should have done years ago—giving our expertise to the highest bidder.

I never succumbed to the highest bid when it came to teaching, and after 25 years—almost 16 of which were in a district whose students were exactly why I am glad I didn’t go for the highest bid when a job in Oregon came calling, when a job in Nevada came calling, and even when a job in California came calling—I stayed because I believed in what I was doing here.

And so did many other excellent teachers, who in the past 25 years have not seen exorbitant pay or benefit increases. That’s why you, as a builder, don’t build expensive homes for teachers, and that’s why you don’t see new, expensive cars in their driveways every year either.

You see, teachers believed that the state and even individual school districts would use “rainy day funds” when economic bad weather appeared, but call me pessimistic if you must, but I always knew what politicians and officials would do when that day came: initiating cuts rather than using those funds for schools.

Don’t you love people who always think someone else deserves to stand in line at the local soup kitchen? When the new world emerges for teachers, maybe you could submit a bid on my outhouse.

I was so pleased with myself. "I've got a letter to the editor I want you to read," I said to my Annie.

"Please don't. It took months for some people to forget about the last one. I don't want the hate stares at church, and I don't want you to be a whacko, just like the others who write letters to the editor."

I would do anything for my wife, except throw away my collection of Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin or Emerson, Lake and Palmer CD's. So I put my response on my blog.

The Circus That Came To Town

I never liked hunting.  It was the red licorice I liked, and I liked the chocolate kind too. Whenever we go on a road trip that lasts more than a few hours, we always buy some, and the taste reminds me of when I was young.

On the opening day of deer hunt, my dad would put our lunch in a saddle bag, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for both of us.  That is where I learned an important thing about peanut butter and jelly: they taste better after you smash them.  My dad would make them, carefully wrap them, and then smash them.  

He watched my response the first time, and then he explained the ritual.  They are going to get that way anyway, so why not just get down to it, and besides, he would explain, they taste better that way.  The funny part about that was the fact that they are better when smashed.

The ritual was the same for years.  Sometimes we were successful, each of us shooting and tagging a dear, but mostly, it was a day of riding horses in the mountains, listening to the occasional distant rumble of a rifle.  Whenever I smell sagebrush, I think of those great times with my father.  But my dad always reminded me that the work started after you shot a deer.  It wasn't that I was lazy, because I am not, but I also had this thing about gutting the animal.  I would have to leave the area, because I would start to get light-headed: a sure sign that I would never have been very good in any branch of the medical profession.  

People told me that deer meat was great.  That statement is a classic.  It's right up there with the phrases like "fun run" or one describing the new age grocery product that is a scientific mystery: fat free potato chips. Running is never fun, and fat free potato chips taste like thin wooden shingles passionately tenderized with who knows how many chemicals.  People devour masses of them in good conscience, thinking they will magically make them thin by sacrificing themselves on the altar of a fat free diet.

To make a long story short.  Deer meat sucks.  I tried to soak it in buttermilk.  I cooked it with onions and herbs.  I even tried spicy sauces as a marinade, but whenever I tried to cook it--regardless of how I did it--dogs began barking near and far, not because they were hungry, but because they sensed something more hideous than Alpo.   

Because I refuse to eat deer meat, I find no inclination ever to hunt again, because my best friend, my hunting partner, and my maker of peanut butter sandwiches passed away in February of 1991.  Those trips with my father remain only in my memories now.

I kept my guns, because my father gave most of them to me.  The rifles and shotguns will eventually go to my son, because he actually wants to hunt.  I have no problem with that at all.   However, no one in my family will ever get my handguns, because it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why people have them.  

Call me a liberal, but I figure that if it takes a gun to defend myself on a daily basis, I am living in the wrong place.  And given my family's temperament, I will not give any of them a handgun.   

So at this point, I decided to go to a gun show in our town this past weekend to see if I could sell my Smith & Wesson .357, a pistol that I bought when I was young.  At the time, Ann and I decided I needed it before going to the cabin my father owned one weekend.  At that time I had ten days to finish a Shakespeare home study course in order to graduate from ISU in 1979, and there had been a number of attacks by a black bear in the area of our family cabin.  I bought the gun, and the pistol is still in the original package in pristine condition.   Given the present economic situation, I figured some extra money would be nice at this point, but I learned an important lesson. 

As soon as I arrived at the gun show, one very nice man saw me and motioned for me to take his parking place, since he was leaving for home.  I was about to find out that he was the only nice person at the little "get together" for right wing radicals.  I walked in the door.

There were hunting rifles, and I don't have a problem with that.  But no one seemed interested in any of that, or at least not many did.  They gathered and salivated at this table with automatic weapons.  And yes, they were officially semiautomatic, but everyone knows that people there know how to alter them.  The vendor spoke loudly, "Why, after the Obama-na-tion, these have tripled in value."  He was trying to be funny in his appraisal of the inauguration of America's new president, whose politics he obviously didn't like.  I guess he wanted everyone to know that he believed the democratic process was an abomination, because he didn't agree with the majority of voters.  Regardless of how unfunny he was, and how stupid he and others were, I really hated the wretch.  And I hated his customers too.  I had seen enough.

See, I have a difficult time understanding why a person would want an Uzi or an AK-47 or any automatic weapon.  It's because I saw three kids shoot a deer once.  It fell against a large chunk of brush, and they continued firing their 30-30's.  The animal had long since hopped into another dimension, and the carcass had forty or fifty holes in it.  Why would a person need an expensive weapon to do what I watched three idiots complete successfully so many years ago with their own deer rifles?  And if these "Great White Hunters" think they need more than two rounds to shoot wild game, they should practice before going into the hills.  That's why it's a sport.  My father only needed one shot.  But he was an incredible shot and an exceptional hunter.

Every one--those buying formidable weapons and those resenting the fact they are accessible--knows why people want them.  They are not for hunting.  Once I saw this couple in a store, the husband admiring an expensive assault rifle with a bayonet.  "It's shaped like this so the blade entry wound does not heal."  

The salesmen then told the customer, dressed in tatters like his wife, about the price tag of the weapon: almost $2000, and that was almost 20 years ago.

So in this time of economic difficulty when I figure I could get $600 or even more for a pistol, which I have rarely used, I decided that I will not place it into the hands of those people I met at that show.  Not only are they crazy, but their parents were never married.  

In the town where I grew up, there is a word, used immediately after "crazy," that locals once used to describe Utah fishermen and hunters who invaded our reservoirs, fields and mountains every year.   They still do, but now because of the large number of people living in Utah, many new residents of my hometown are Utahans, who chose to live there permanently to get away from newcomers in the state.   Or maybe they just wanted to get away from large cities.  Regardless of their reasoning, many of those "crazies" now live there.

The people I saw at the gun show, who deserve being called both of the words I mentioned, are kind of like a particular Utah fisherman, who reportedly went into a highway rest stop for a bathroom break.  He leaned over to pick something up, and his glasses fell into one of those toilets that once existed.  It was the kind that still exists in most parks, the chemical kind which doesn't need flushing.  This fisherman could see the glasses floating in the horrific dark waters below, so he went back to his truck to retrieve his fishing pole.  

While dangling hook and line into the abyss, another motorist accidentally opened the stall and saw him with his fishing pole trying to retrieve the glasses.  The embarrassed fisherman reportedly had an interesting comment.  He looked at the puzzled bystander.  "I've been here all day without a single tug on my line."  

The traveler shut the door of the stall and returned to his car, probably to speed away in horror.  

Like I said, I refuse to consider selling a pistol to any of the fine people I met that day at the gun show, all clamoring to arm themselves against imaginary adversaries in order to keep safe.  I hope someone will protect the rest of us from these people I met at the gun show, young and old and all buying automatic weapons and boxes of ammunition instead of food and clothing and necessities for their families.  

No terrorist in their right mind would want to meet people like this.

January 1, 2009

In January of 2005, things were not good. I lost the ability to use my legs. I lost the ability to reason. The visit at the oncology clinic of Dr. Mulvey was a disaster. Hallucinations were bothering me. Before my arrival, I was sure that opening up a certain set of drawers in a random way would allow the light to go on in the bedroom that morning. Things worsened. Ann sat by me in the chemo room at the clinic, and everything she said, I still remember saying, "Prove it!" I kept repeating the words. I didn't recognize anyone by name, by the end of my day there, I had everyone in tears--my wife, other patients, the nurses and staff. My doctor seemed to choke up a bit too. I could not get my legs to move, so after a blood transfusion I had had to receive, I sat without being able to get up out of the chair.

Finally they were able to move me into a room. I remember the doctor telling my Annie that he believed the cancer had spread into my spine and brain. There was not much time left. In the room, he asked me if he could try one thing. He injected some chemo into my spine with a syringe after telling me how much I was loved by so many people.

An ambulance took me to the hospital. To make matters worse, I had had a bad line, tubes going under the skin across my chest and ribcage and connecting to the jugular. Within a short time, the new line that created the staff infection--as if I didn't have enough things going on at the time--was gone and a new one replaced it. A local dermatologist took a sample of skin to have it analyzed, but the chunk was the size of the tip of my thumb, not a smooth move considering the fact that I was on blood thinner. For two days, they could not get the bleeding to stop.

I have to remind myself that I was in a first class seat on the Crazy Train at the time, so as good a memory as I have always had, I will never be sure that I was aware of everything or that I recall everything as it happened. The last night before everything changed, Dr. Mulvey and Megan his PA were in my room. I enjoyed seeing them. I trusted them with my life, because they were incredible, but they were my friends too. Dr. Mulvey whispered to her, but I guess he didn't know an important fact that I always told my high school students: I can hear a gnat flatulate at least 500 meters away. He told her, although I don't remember the exact words, that he didn't know what to do, because I was losing blood as fast as they could put it into me through additional blood transfusions. The staff infection was very bad, and I had a high fever.

He came in the next morning with a solution that he dreamed in a dream. He used a sanitary napkin under the bandage to stop the bleeding. It worked. The bleeding stopped. In another week or so the infection subsided. I returned home very weak, so weak that I could not walk five feet without stopping to rest. Dr. Mulvey told Ann that he figured I had two weeks to two months to live.

My Annie worked hard to make me feel comfortable. She was so sad. One day, she told me that we needed to go somewhere for fun. She asked me, while I sat in a chair, where I would like he to take me.

"Disneyland!" I answered immediately. I also said I wanted Jack and Kristin to come too. When I told Dr. Mulvey, it shocked him. He laughed, and then when he saw that I was serious, he said, "Why not!"

The day we left, it was a bleak day in February. I insisted on driving. My arms shook the entire way to Salt Lake City, but I said nothing, because I was afraid if I said anything, my Annie would take me straight home. We arrived at the hotel, and we left the next morning on an early flight. The trip was fun. I only wish the rest of the family could have been there too, similar to the trip we had taken in late May of 2004 when my cancer seemed to be in remission.

I rented an electric cart, and we spent every day at the park.

When I returned, Dr. Mulvey saw me within days at an appointment. "What ride are you going to tell me about?" He looked at me, expecting me to say that I rode the train around the park a couple of times. I told him about my rides on Tower of Terror.

His response was a classic. With eyes the size of silver dollars, he listened to me tell the story. "You've got to be kidding!" And he began to laugh. Within a month, I started swimming again. First I swam half a mile, and a week later I began swimming a mile a day. In two months it was two miles, and a couple of times I swam four miles. The people at the pool were so good to let me stay in a lane to get the exercise I needed.

In the fall, an administrator asked me if I could return to work. It please me. I thought it to be an incredible compliment, but it made my friend and doctor angry. His reply was another classic. "You remember that drug trial we did with you in conjunction with Loyolla University? According to them, you are not alive."

Like all of Dr. Mulvey's patients, I miss my incredible doctor and friend. This past September, Ann and I traveled to Mayo Clinic in Minnesota to get help with the circulation in my legs, and while there, we visited one of the leading oncologists in the world. When I told him the story, he told me my doctor was right. In fact, when I asked him how many patients survived that drug trail, he told me I was it.

I would be a fool to recognize my survival as anything less than a miracle. Dr. Mulvey is one of the best oncologists in the country, but he told me something important one day. "Jesus must really love you Jon. He wants to keep you around." He teared up when he told me that too.

Rubbing my religious beliefs in someone's nose is something I never do, unless I feel they want to know or if they ask me, but I will say that anyone who thinks that there is not a God or that faith does not make a difference is the foolish one. Friends and family who witnessed what I suffered know this fact, but the reason for this blog is not to talk about this. It is about looking at what I have four years later.

1. Realization that I have a devoted and loving wife is something I have always believed, but now I know it to be true.

2. Recognizing that family is the most important thing in life is a blessing.

3. Having children married to soul mates who treat them well like mine treats me is a small piece of heaven.

4. Laughter of grandchildren is the real nectar of the gods.

5. Loving every second of life is what really keeps you young at heart, although frequent trips to Disneyland with grandchildren are a major asset in maintaining that goal.

Having Cles and Leslie stay with us for a few short days after Christmas was so incredible, but it went by so quickly. And it always does that. I write the same thing when Lydia visits, whether it's for a week or a month.

We saw them just before they left on a shuttle that took them from our hotel in Salt Lake to the airport. Ann and I spent the rest of the day with Jack.

The first stop was at Gateway Mall, where we went to the Apple Store. We finally bought our Apple Computer, after talking the name of Bill Gates in vain for at least 10 years. I hope he knows what he can do with Vista.

We stopped in Layton. After checking Toys 'R Us for any additional Star Wars toys that had been unavailable in our area during the Christmas shopping season, we went to Target which was just a short distance away. Ann called me within minutes of entering the store. They had piles of Star Wars Galactic Heroes Cinema Scenes, and they also had the one I wanted to get Jack and Tommy for Christmas, Jabba's Skiff.

Jack spent the rest of the trip clutching the new toy in his arms. Tommy will get his when he returns to Minnesota. I will mail it to him.


So how is January of 2009 different than 2005? I can't begin to express in words what I feel with every beat of my heart. To see the happiness of a grandchild when I spoil any one of the three of them or all three at the same time is what I live for each day. It is a family tradition for those who knew key people in my family.

It is wonderful to take my Annie's hand and press it to my lips as often as I can. She rolls her eyes every time I do it, just like she will when she reads this, but I will never stop doing it. It is so nice not to hear her sob gently in the darkness over the loss she feared would happen. After almost 39 years, we still enjoy each other, although we will never have the money to drive a Porsche, a Cadillac or even a used Mercedes. We won't have a mansion on the hill above Idaho Falls either, but we do have fun every moment of the day.

And did I mention that I not only filled one I Pod with over 19,000 songs or about 1800 albums, but I am still putting my jazz and classical music on another. There might be a big of room for some books and of course music my children enjoy while they travel with us. It's nice to hold my entire music collection in the palm of my hand.

But I still hope for the day when my Annie and I live in a spot where it is always warm and comfortable, where I can have palm trees in the front yard and citrus trees in the backyard, where my childen and grandchildren can visit often.

The Advantages of Being OCD

In As Good As It Gets where Jack Nicholson plays an author who suffers from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, there is a part near the end of the movie where he looks at the artist's suitcase and says, "Great packing!"

While my daughter went through her things today, she and my wife found a packing list I made whenever I began putting my suitcase together for an exchange trip.

Here it is:

Levi 8 blue 5 black 1 shorts 2
socks 13 grey 4 red 3 blue 4 brown 2
(cowboy) underwear 12
deodorant
shirts 14 green 2 red 2 beige/white 3 blue 3 brown 1 maroon 1 orange 1 rust 1
slacks 1
clippers 2 toe 1 finger 1
money pouch/passport holder 1
gifts
tickets, etc.
rain poncho 1
shoes 2
water socks 1

I never forgot anything whenever I traveled, and I always began packing two weeks before the trip. My large bag always had 35 pounds or less, and the carry on was only 10 pounds.

The entire group also had a number that they put on their bag with duct or electrical tape. It made it easy for the group to find our bags when we arrived in Germany. I separated the group into two groups, each one waiting at different ends of the baggage claim conveyer. A group of 25 could retrieve bags in 30 minutes, something absolutely necessary when you had a train connection to make.

Cles and Leslie Visit Snow Country

Jack looked forward to having Cles and Leslie visit. Cles teases Jack, just like I do and just like I teased Cles when he was little. It's the gift that keeps on giving. My Grandpa Williams teased and tickled me unmercifully. I remember getting tickled until I couldn't get my breath. They are some of the good memories I have of him. The first day that Cles and Leslie were in town meant that we made a trip to Toys 'R Us or as Jack calls it--Toys 'R Bus. We spent at least two hours there, while Jack examined every toy in the store, and while Cles tormented me by trying to buy Jack any number of play weapons. Ironically, I may have to buy that toy machine gun he showed me.

The time went too quickly. As soon as they arrived, we tried doing everything we had been wanting to do. But on New Year's Eve, we started back for Salt Lake City. After our dinner and spending some time at Trolley Square, we returned to the hotel, where Uncle Cles taught Jack how to prank call Pop Pop.

The trip wouldn't be complete without Cles and Leslie emphasizing the need for Jack to love North Carolina's Tarheels. There was a game that night, and Jack enjoyed it with Cles and Leslie, although I figure that he liked the exercise more than the game.

Jack's First Aggie Experience

When we arrived at the game, Jack was mystified by the arena and the vibes. We entered at the end of the arena, just above the tunnels where the players emerge. One is visible at the right side of the picture. I watched Jack stand for a moment, and then he sat down in an unoccupied seat at the top. After watching him for a moment, I had him stand and go with us to our seats where this picture happened.

He watched the entire game without taking his eyes away from the floor, except when grandma took him to the concessions and Utah State Bookstore booth, where she bought him a T-shirt.
He was proud of his new shirt. And grandma getting him that and some other fun things too. He came back with popcorn and other goodies. The funny thing about their concessions is the fact that the popcorn still smells just as nice as it did when I was in the old Field House at my first game there in the late 60's. My only disappointment was that the band was not there, since it was still during Christmas break.

When Ann and I were at Utah State in our graduate programs in the late 80's, there were two things that made the game unforgetable--the band, and throwing rolls of toilet paper as far as you could throw your roll after the Aggies scored their first basket. They don't do that anymore. I'm sure Mr. Whipple felt the "squeeze" from that move by the NCAA. For those "young whippersnappers" who have no idea who Mr. Whipple was, he was the grocer who warned customers not to squeeze the Charmin in commercials in the "olden days."

As for the band, I remember the fun things they did. They would start with a drum, and then they would chant, "The Green Iguana!" Why they did it, I have no idea, but it was funny, and they waved a giant plastic lizard all while they did it. Minutes later, they would hold a large plastic chicken fryer in the air, "Tastes great!" Then they would hold the Green Iguana in the air again. "Less filling!" The arena would erupt in laughter.

The new generation just doesn't know how to have fun.
We were excited about the fact that Kristin could go with us to the game. Ann and Kristin came in the Bug after she finished work. Connie worked the magic again and was able to get us tickets.

Jenny enjoyed being with the group at the game, and as evidence that Jack is now getting older, he refused to sit by her when she asked him. He was embarrassed. I find that funny, because when he was just little and first able to talk, he would talk to any girl over the age of three and under the age of 80. "My name is Jack," he would tell them. They would say how cute he was, and it just encouraged him to do it whenever we went into a store.

I find it interesing how my daughters do not like their picture taken. They are shy about it. I am the same way, but I dislike my picture taken for a different reason: I don't want someone's camera to steal my soul.

I can't believe we didn't take more pictures, especially of Leslie and Cles. We only have these few of Leslie, and there is not one of Cles. The rode to Logan with Jack and me. Jack watched movies the entire trip with Leslie. Cles sat in the front and helped me select 60's music that wouldn't irritate anyone. We arrived at Connie and Doug's house, expecting to stay for an hour or so before leaving for the game. It was impossible to get Jack to leave. He loved playing with Connie's kids.The game was fantastic. Utah State won. Jack experienced a first, his first college basketball game, and we all had a great time with Cles and Leslie a few days before they left for home.

The Things We Remember About Erma

Kristin wanted a drawer to her desk that was in our garage, and after she found it last night, she began going through things she kept in it. There was a card from her Grandma Thomas, one that expresses so many things that were fun about her.

I remember Erma a number of different ways. One year after she lived a while in her new house, she had the entire family come to dinner. There was a large table set in the dining area for adults, and she also had rolled out carpet in the two-car garage and set up a table there for grandchildren there too.

During the dinner, I went to check on our three children, whenever I heard anything that sounded like the little dears in the garage were having "way too much fun." I had already set my plate down twice with food, and after returning to a spot to retrieve a fork or knife or getting food for one of my children, I noticed my plate was gone. It happened again when I checked things in the garage to ensure that my children were not doing anything to hurt the new house. Again my plate was gone. It happened five times.

The last time it happened, I finally found out what was happening to my food. Each time that Erma saw a plate unattended, she took it to the sink and discarded the food and put the plate in the sink. Erma was an incredible host, and she was just making sure that everything was tidy. Ann and I still laugh about it when we think about that day.

But the other thing are the things she made for us. The inside of the card that Kristin found talked about that very thing.

When Ann and I were in high school and both attending Second Ward in Malad, we had a Sunday School teacher we all loved and enjoyed. Brent Howard was incredible. He read the lesson and emphasized the main points we needed to know, and then we talked together. What made him so incredible is he listened to us. Brent was a fantastic teacher, because we knew he "liked" us, something not necessarily true with all those who taught our large group in Second Ward. It was our group that boasted having "run out" many teachers who did not care about us, or at least that was the impression we had about them.

Once a week during the summer, our class organized a swimming party at Downata Hot Springs in Downey, Idaho, which was only forty minutes away at the time on the Interstate and old highway. Our group would ask Ann to volunteer her mother to bake a cake for us each time, and she did. It was always a three-layered chocolate cake with rich, dark frosting.

This picture happened at least 12 years before those parties at the pool, but most of the group is here, except for me. My family lived on the ranch during the week, but when I was older, my dad always made sure we drove to Malad on those evenings when I had these parties. I rarely missed one, unless we were harvesting grain or some other major problems took place.

And like all of my peers at Second Ward, my children loved Erma's cakes too. She made one every week and had it ready for when we visited her on Sundays.

Oh, and Erma also made individual puddings and tiny bowls of jell-o for grandchildren too. They were always waiting in the refrigerator, just in case they were still hungry after cake and ice cream.

This is the last photograph I think we have with my Annie's family together like this. Things change so quickly. I still remember the jokes Marvin told me at the restaurant that day. They were not off-colored, but they were hilariously funny.

After Erma's passing, the only place in the house that showed carpet wear was in front of her fridge. And I am sure that the grandchildren will remember opening its door every time they visited grandma.