Someone once posed a question to me in regards to the worst feeling I could imagine. I guess depending on the place you are in at the moment the answer could be multifacted. But throughout my winding journey in experience, I would have to say heartache/lonliness is at the very top of my list. Lonliness encompasses such a vast array of other emotions that it can overwhelm one at a moments notice. The evenings last for an eternity when one is alone. The nights are darker, the fears magnified, the sadness of loss of all that you have been and the unknown of what will become of the 'you' in the future. The heartache of lonliness brings one delving into what could have, should have, might have been done differently. Where did one go wrong? Was all the past a counterfeit? What was real? Was there anything real and genuine and sincere at all or did it just slowly die along the way? 3:00 am the inner alarm clock goes off and one finds themself sitting in solitude of every kind. Tears flow freely at that time of the day. No need to put on the happy face for the rest of the world, and for yourself for that matter-got to keep it all together-otherwise you might have to see yourself as less, as a failure in some way.

I have two friends in my circle who I thought were two of the happiest, most compatible wives for their respective husbands, who were the best mothers, the epitome of homemaker extraordinaire....we all know them! We may even be them. When both of their marriages came to this sudden, out of nowhere, nightmarish end-and for reasons not compatible with happily ever after, my heart aches for them both. I know their pain. I know their feelings of self worth-mostly that it is in the toilet right now. I know the loss of themselves and what they have invested soley in for the past twenty or more years. Where does this leave them? What does this say about them as women? As wives? As mothers? As friends, neighbors, members of the PTA and so on. I see them going through life stoicly and with a firm determination to come out alive and on top somewhere. And I see that their heart is crying over the simplest things they observe and wonder if they will ever have that again. So heartache and lonliness are at the top of my list. But knowing the pain increases empathy and compassion and genuine feelings of comraderie. And hope.......

Now, since I have rambled on to a lighter subject. Brylie has been tko'd by the team of trampoline/swingset crew. She was jumping on the tramp and then jumping to the cross bar of the swingset, swinging like Mowgli and jumping from the jungle vine to the entangled jungle floor and low and behold......she slipped-probably on a banana peel-and landed on her right elbow. She had just been told to knock off the monkyshines so she was coming to me, trying to control her sobs and with her 'tail between her legs' . And by joe, it looks a little out of alignment. The pain doesn't seem to go away. So off we go to the emergency room where she is checked by the very same doctor that mended her broken left index finger in March. I'll probably have child protective services knocking at my door. Low and behold it is broken. So she gets a neon pink cast from shoulder to fingers. And it is the second week of June. And she can't go swimming now until the cast comes off in six, yes, count it, 6 weeks. Summer without swimming-one might as well be in a monestary. She is taking it like a trooper though. She is a determined and willful fashionista diva. Do you know how hard it is to keep a 7 year olds fingers/fingernails/cast clean in the summer time when everything is done outside in the dirt, the grass and the rocks? Climbing trees. Riding bikes. Being seven. Not good. But we will survive. And today is anticipated and heralded as another jaunt in our summer adventure. Yeah, Bry!!

Picture it, the Valley, 1978. Yeah, Sophia is my hero. Two little girls with ponytails and ribbons, little sneakers with jingle bells on the laces-so I could keep track of them-picture perfect angelic loves of my life. When we are in the moment of diapers and bandaids and potty training and trying out independence we have no idea what the future holds in store for them. We read to them, take them on hikes up Red Hollow, four wheeling on the sand dunes, dutch oven cook-outs, getting firewood for the winter, PTA and playdates. Coloring books, learning to make beds, pick up toys, say I'm sorry, take in every stray that comes along, indescribeable joy that they bring to my heart. Still now, even when I recall certain memories, forever etched upon my heart. Even tears are now a part of the beauty of the tapestry that was woven by being family. One night I had the most intensely vivid dream which is still a replay, sometimes even when I'd rather not think about it. I dreamt that I was walking up a fairly steep and rocky road with a deep ravine off one side. Shauna was walking with me as I drug the wagon behind me. Sami was in the wagon. I turned to look at her and the side of the road was breaking off and the back of the wagon was sliding into the ravine. I was desparately trying to find a way to save her, my baby, and all I could do was hold tightly to the tongue of the wagon, and then I woke up. In a cold sweat. I could not shake the feeling of doom and horror for a couple of days afterwards. Several years later, real life hits. No dreams to wake up from. My baby is falling into an abyss and nothing I can do will save her. No matter how much I love her, no matter how hard I try (and cry and sometimes yell), no matter what experiences I have had to gain in the school of hard knocks can never, no never, change the fact that she will make her own choices, experience her own consequences (and the ones of our own making are sometimes the most bitter) and gain her own wisdom at her pace, in her way. And I still love her. And that's what momma's do. And that's what my momma has done through all she has endured with four daughters and a son. And a lot of grandkids and great grandkids and a few great great grandkids! I admire my momma for that. She still has an open and welcoming heart and home for all her family........I want to be more like her. I want to grow up to be "momma". For all of them.

the center of my galaxy.....God's Country

Home. My home. My favorite place to be. 295 s. Main, Glendale, Utah. We moved there when I was four, almost 5. It was the grandest adventure to explore all the rooms, all the left behind furniture from the previous owners, to slide down the stairs, paintworn and all, on the seat of my corduroy overalls. It was HUGE. There were numbers on the bedroom doors.....what's that all about? There was a Warm Morning Stove in the 'work room' downstairs and an Old Majestic coal and wood stove in the kitchen. And, the coolest, there was actually indoor plumbing!!!! We were uptown folks. ( No more parading down to the outhouse in the night, all four sisters in line.) We had a coal shed, a granary, a sort of garage that became home to daddy's leather, his saddles, his bridles, bits, saddle blankets, tarps, an old push lawnmower, the sheep shears we used to clip the lawn edges with, and a multitude of other necessities. We had a barn out back that housed the sweetest smelling hay, the not to aromatic manure from the cow and the horses, and we could actually make little 'homes' in the bales of hay at the top-unless of course daddy caught us. There was a pig pen out back but all I recall on that was the joy on momma's face when daddy was dozing it over the D7 Cat. I think I heard the sound of taps somewhere in the distance.
******I love to digress. I had the best of families, heritage, traditions that anyone should ever want. I came home from school to the smell of either bread hot out of the oven, or cookies or pies and my momma folding the laundry she had just brought in from the clothes line. They smelled like heaven. And freshly laundered sheets...oooh. Couldn't wait to crawl in between. Momma always had an apron on while she flitted around doing her chores and baking. She never went outside without a strawhat, long sleeved cotton shirt and garden gloves so as to keep her skin from getting old too fast. (I failed to acquire that trait and desire--sun and more sun for me.) We had big gardens which meant big harvests, big bottling and canning season. We had cattle which meant meat in the freezer and a cow to milk-always fresh milk and cream. We entertained ourselves with hiking, bicycle riding, playing in the creek, making huts, making paper dolls from old catalogs, going to gramma Adairs or Brinkerhoffs, going to the ranch up on the Paunsagaunt....nuff said. We were taught to work. We were taught responsibilities and consequenses, momma and daddy took us all to church and taught us and instilled in us this wonderful foundation and anchor to help us sail thru the inevitable trials we were sure to face one day. I cherish my growing up in the country with a cowboy daddy and a stay at home June Cleaver type momma. I love my three sisters and my baby brother more than I can ever express. I can never express enough gratitude for the heritage and legacy these and those before who came across with the pioneers to settle the desert and make it bloom. And, boy, we all have. Glendale. The Brinkerhoffs. The Adairs. The United Order. MY family. MY roots. Thank God for all this.

In the beginning.......

Who says you can't teach an ole' dog new tricks?? It may be true because I can't even teach a new dog new tricks. Any tricks. And I am not too sure that I can "blog" anything anyone in their right mind would bother looking up. No pearls of wisdom. No magical wit. No insider scoops on anyone or anything. But maybe I can embarass my daughters and all my grandchildren with tales of 'remember whens....' And they say if you write your own history (so to speak) it will be exactly the way YOU want it remembered. Cool. Shoulda done this long ago. Wonder if you can erase any history you want deleted and it would magically be gone-guess then there would be no color in a story at all.