Looking Forward to Becoming a Teacher

Teaching is in my blood, and I guess I always knew I would grow up to be a school teacher someday, but by the time I got to High School the last thing in the world I wanted to do was spend the rest of my life in school. 

Dad was a teacher and he was good at it.  His mom, my Grandma Russell, was also a teacher until she got married and stayed home to raise a family.  For a little while when I was young I wanted to be a nurse,  but I think every little girl who grew  up in the late 50's and 60's wanted to do that.  I got a nurse doll and costume for Christmas one year, and it really cute, but by the time I was in 2nd grade I knew I wanted to be a school teacher.  Once I hit 4th grade I knew that was the grade I wanted to teach.  To my mind, 4th grade was the perfect year.  The kids had already learned to read and write so the teaching part was easy, but they weren't so old that they thought they knew everything and had attitudes, like the 5th and 6th graders.  Plus,you got to teach Arizona history in fourth grade.

We took an aptitude test during my senior year in high school that was supposed to give us direction and help steer us into careers that we would enjoy.  I wasn't surprised at my results, at least not the half that showed what I would do well in if I was a female , which of course I was.  Those results pointed conclusively towards teaching young children.  The only surprising part of my test were the results for if I was a male. They showed I would do well as an FBI agent. Weird, huh? 

I was thrilled to think I might have an affinity for detective work, but I suspected the results were skewed because I read so many mystery novels.  Alas, I wasn't a boy, so it looked like I was destined be a school teacher, although I toyed with the idea of teaching as my front and being a secret agent behind the scenes, but I knew in my heart that wasn't going to work.  Still, it made fun daydreams.

My senior year in high school I had the opportunity to be a teachers aid at an elementary school during the afternoons.  That sounded like more fun than sitting in class and taking tests all year, and everyone assured me the experience would be beneficial if I was going to be a teacher, so I signed up for the program.

This was during the gasoline crises of the early 70's.  Gas prices had skyrocketed, although compared to today gas was still amazingly cheap.  The worst part about the crisis was getting the gas.  It was actually rationed for awhile, so we could only go to the gas station on certain days of the week, and then the lines were super long and sometimes they would run out before we even got to our turn to fill up.  It was a mess!  Consequently, mom and dad tried to limit the amount of driving we did.

Dad started riding his bike to work, he even got his picture in the newspaper as an example of someone who was doing his part to help our community, and he thought it would be a good idea if I rode a bike as well.  I had always walked to elementary and junior high school, they were both less than a mile away, but the high school was over four miles from our house.  There wasn't time to walk that far in the mornings so mom drove me, then I walked home in the afternoon.  I didn't mind since the hour it took to walk was an hour I could spend reading.  It only took 15 or 20 minutes to ride a bike, though, and then mom didn't have to drive me at all, but I couldn't figure out a way to read while I rode. I tried, but even though I could hold the book on the handle bars, I was going too fast to take my eyes off the road without running into stuff.  Darn.

So, I rode my bike to school in the mornings, went to four classes, then rode my home, ate a quick lunch, then went to the elementary school to spend the afternoon being an aid.  It was a lot of fun.  I helped in second and fourth grade, and determined I had been right about fourth grade being the easiest year to teach.  Second graders, while cute, were a pain, and having to teach reading and spelling to kids who didn't understand was hard.  By fourth grade the kids knew the basics, and we just had fun.

Mostly I graded papers and made copies for the teachers, but sometimes I listened to kids read or answered questions.  I also had a chance to watch how different teachers taught, and to decide what kind of a teacher I wanted to be. 

There were four 2nd grade classes that I helped in, spending one day a week in each class.  Two of the teachers were pretty ordinary, but the other two were so opposite it was interesting.  At the beginning of the year I really liked the first teacher, she was all smiles and giggles and sweet with her kids.  She worked hard to be their best friend and made very few rules in her classroom; she and the kids just had fun.  The other teacher was so strict I felt sorry for her students.  She rarely smiled, the class was always super quiet and the kids were expected to sit at their desks and do their work without any visiting.   

By the middle of the year, though, my perception of these two rooms changed drastically.  The first happy-go-lucky teacher was really struggling with her class.  They were loud and unruly, seldom on task or doing what they were supposed to be doing.  The teacher had very little control of her kids and the only way she could get them to do what she wanted was to yell.  It seemed that her voice was raised almost all of the time, and I really didn't like being in her classroom.  The other strict teacher, though, never raised her voice.  Her classroom was always quiet, the kids were always on task, and although she wasn't always smiling and laughing there was a peaceful, calm feeling in her room that was really nice.  I learned during that year that I wanted to be that kind of a teacher, not necessarily my student’s best friend, but someone they could trust, respect, and rely on.

Not that I was really looking forward to becoming a teacher yet.  I still didn't like the idea of going to four more years of school after I graduated, although I recognized it was a necessary evil I was going to probably have to endure.  Still, I dreamed of becoming a secret agent instead.  I just didn't know how to do it.

Babysitting

I got paid a dime the first time I went babysitting. I wasn't very impressed.  I only watched the little boy across the street for an hour while his mom ran an errand, but still, a dime wasn't very much money. 

It wasn't long, though, before I was babysitting two or three times a week for different people in our ward, and making a lot of money.  I enjoyed babysitting, I enjoyed the money, and I enjoyed feeling important and grown up enough to watch other peoples kids.  Sometimes, though, I would rather have stayed home with nothing to do but read.  But I didn't know how to say no, so unless I had of an excuse, I went.

There were certain families that I preferred sitting for.  I loved those kids and felt comfortable in their homes.  Once in a while I'd be asked to sit for someone new, and that was kind of scary.  It amazed me how different people's homes could be from ours.  Some were dirty, some smelled funny, some had the strangest decorations and furniture, but always the kids were pretty much the same.  Babies cried if they were hungry or needed their diapers changed or wanted to be held.  I could take care of that.  Toddlers cried if they were hungry, needed their diapers changed, or wanted to be loved.  I could take care of that, too.  Older children cried if they were scared, hungry, or missed their mommies.  I could take care of them, as well.  I soon learned that between giving the kids something to eat, making them comfortable, and telling them stories or singing them songs I could pretty much take care of all their needs. 

My favorite time was when I put the kids to bed.  We would go through their routines of brushing their teeth, putting on their pajamas, saying their prayers and tucking them into bed with a favorite blanket or toy, then I would sit down by them and tell them stories and sing them songs.  I developed a whole routine, almost like being in Los Vegas, of songs and stories that kids loved to hear.  There was Whitie, and The Little Puppy Doggy, Heidi and The Littlest Mermaid, to name just a few of the favorite stories.  Then I would sing everything from lullabies to movie songs, until the kids fell asleep and I slipped quietly out of their room.  Then I would go into the front room and read until their parents came home.

Once in awhile I'd watch TV, but most of the young families I sat for only had tiny sets, and some didn't have TV at all.   This was before the days of cable TV or VCRs with all kinds of movies to choose from.  I had to watch whatever was on our four local channels, and often that meant there was nothing good.  Thank goodness I liked reading.

Sometimes it would get kind of scary, sitting in a strange living room, listening to the click of a wall clock or the gurgle of an old refrigerator or water heater, or whatever other appliances made funny noises.  Then I would call mom and talk to her for a few minutes.  She always calmed me down and made me feel better.  If the couple was out late I would occasionally drift off to sleep on their couch.  It was embarrassing to wake up and know that they found me sleeping when they came home but no one seemed to mind.

One day I babysat for a family who lived at the end of our street.  They had a teenage son who was a year older than me, and two little girls.  The son was supposed to be out for the evening, but he came home earlier than expected.  I didn't know quite what to do.  I didn't need to be there if he was home, but I didn't know if I should leave or not.  He was a weird kid, kind of a flipped out hippie type, and when he came into the room where I was reading and sat down on the couch I got nervous.  When he began talking to me I was really uncomfortable.  I had nothing in common with this guy, he wasn't even friends with my big brother, and I didn't know what to say to him.  He tried to talk to me for about 15 minutes, but he must have known I was not enjoying myself.  I suspect he enjoyed seeing me sweat.  Finally he told me to go home, and I never was happier to walk out a front door and hurry to my own house.  I didn't go back babysitting to there.

The older I got the less time I had for babysitting and the fewer jobs I was offered.  Still, I had my special families that called me all the way until I got married.  I often thought back to my babysitting days, and appreciated the experience I gained taking care of those children.  It was like practicing to have my own kids, and it sure made becoming a mom easier.

The Disappointing Christmas

I loved all holidays, except for Labor Day because school started the next day and who could have fun when their stomach was doing flip flops with worry?  Anyway, I loved all the other holidays, but my favorite was Christmas Eve and Christmas Morning.

Grandpa Russell was born on Christmas Eve, so we always had a big birthday party in the middle of the afternoon with all our Russell family. We would have a big dinner and birthday cake and visit and have fun. 


We didn't get together that often with the Russell side of the family, at least not compared to the Johnson side.  Every Sunday we went to Grandma Johnson's house, and often during the week too, so I was as close to those cousins and Aunts and Uncles as I was with mom and dad and my brothers and sisters.  But we didn't do things that often with the Russell's, and I wasn't as comfortable around them.  Still, it was always fun to see them and after awhile my shyness wore off and I enjoyed myself.

As soon as the birthday party got over we would hurry home, pick up the food mom had prepared, and hurry over to Grandma Johnson's for our annual Swedish Christmas Smorgasbord.  It was always the best night of the year.  Grandma and all the Aunts cooked the most delicious dinner for us of Swedish meatballs, potato salad, fruit salad, lympa bread, rye crackers and cheese, rolls, and moss pudding and spritz and pepperkaker cookies for dessert.  Oooooooooohhhhhhh! It was to die for!

Grandma's Swedish meatballs were the most delicious things in the world.  She made them from hamburger and pork sausage, with white pepper for seasoning, and they were just spicy enough to be savory, just juicy enough to make your mouth water, and just just big enough to pop one in your mouth whole without looking like a pig.  I popped lots of them in my mouth over the course of the evening.  After I grew up I discovered that most people put gravy on their Swedish meatballs and serve them over rice, but grandma never covered them up like that.  We just ate them plain, and boy! were they good!

So was the rest of the meal (although I never tried grandma's pickled herring which she served in a white sauce and looked disgusting!  She made it to take the place of lutfisk, which was the traditional fish dish served in Sweden on Christmas Eve that everyone joked about and said smelled as bad as it tasted.  I think we may have had it once or twice, but usually we had to be satisfied with the pickled herring.  Since I wouldn't try either one that didn't bother me.)  Anyway, the rest of our smorgasbord was also absolutely delicious, especially the moss pudding.  I suspect "moss" was actually a Swedish way of saying "moose", because moss pudding was a wonderful pineapple fromage, fluffy and light and full of whipped cream, like a French moose would be.

Since Santa always comes to Swedish homes on Christmas Eve, grandma arranged for him to come to our smorgasbord, too.  He would tell us kids that he just popped over to see us because grandma was such a good friend of his, and then he'd tell us he would come by our house with the rest of our presents after we went to bed.  Boy, did we think we had a special grandma since she was a friend of Santa's.

Our Smorgasbord wouldn't last too late, since all the aunts and uncles and cousins needed to hurry home so Santa could come.  We would pile into our car and sing Christmas songs all the way home, making sure dad drove down Main Street so we could see the pretty lights strung from light pole to light pole, all the way down the center of town.  They were beautiful! 

The closer we got to home the more excited I would get, anticipating the wonderful presents I would find under the tree Christmas morning.  Even when I was a teenager I still couldn't go to sleep on Christmas Eve for excitement, even the year I knew what all my presents were going to be.

I liked to snoop.  I'd known since I was five years old that she was really.  My dumb cousin had whispered the truth to my older brother.  I cried and cried because they wouldn't tell me what the secret was, until mom finally got fed up with them and made Keith tell me what Evan had told him.  What a bummer!  But it didn't dampen my enthusiasm for my presents.

Anyway, I liked to snoop. Trying to find my presents was almost as much fun as opening them on Christmas morning.  When I was fifteen I got lucky and found them all.  I already knew what some of them were since I'd been at the store when mom bought them.  There was a four foot long, pink, fuzzy stuffed snake that I'd fallen in love with in the toy department and pointed out to mom.  There were white go-go boots that I'd begged for the previous spring when they were all the rage but mom couldn't afford them.  I knew she bought them during the summer when they went on sale, and hid them in her closet for Christmas.  I wasn't that excited about them anymore, since the fad had passed and no one was wearing go-go boots to school anymore.  There was also a pretty little glass oil lamp filled with perfume that I discovered way up on the top shelf of mom's closet that I simply adored.  It was the prettiest thing.

That Christmas Eve Santa gave me a puzzle for my gift from grandma Johnson.  I loved puzzles, and since I couldn't fall asleep I set it up on a card table in my bedroom and began putting it together.  Pretty soon mom came and told me to go to bed. I tried, but I just couldn't stay asleep.  I'd lay in bed with my eyes closed, and eventually drift off for a little bit, but I'd jerk away a few minutes later and lay there trying to fall back to sleep for what seemed like hours.  About 2:00 in the morning I gave up, rolled a towel and stuffed it under my door so no one would see my light, and went back to work on my puzzle. 

About 3:00 Linda woke up and joined me.  We were trying to be quiet, but pretty soon Julie and Sharon were also in my room, giggling and playing on my bed.  That woke up dad, and he was sure cross when he opened my door and ordered us all back to bed. 


"Don't you dare get up before 8:00!" he ordered. 


He always said that on Christmas Eve, but we knew he'd let us get up long before then, so we went back to our beds to wait.  I managed to sleep for about half an hour, but at 4:00 I got up again, put the towel back, and worked on my puzzle by myself until 5:30. Julie and Sharon sneaked into mom and dad's room and snuggled up with them, twisting and turning until Dad finally gave up and let us all get up.

How exciting it was to put on our robes and stand in the hall, waiting for dad to set up the movie camera so he could catch Christmas morning on film.  How much fun everyone else had opening their presents and exclaiming in surprise over each of their gifts.  And how let down I felt, knowing what each box and package held for me, and not being surprised one bit.  I sure wished then that I had not snooped and found all of my presents. 

Worse, I opened all of the packages with my name on them but did not find the pretty little glass lamp I'd found on mom's top shelf.  I immediately knew what had happened.  It was so high up she had missed it as she wrapped the gifts, and she had forgotten it was there.  But what could I do?  If I told her she would know I'd snooped, but if I didn't tell her I wouldn't get my lamp.  Darn.  I tried hinting, reminding mom about the year before when she'd forgotten to give someone one of their presents, but she didn't catch on.. 

We ate breakfast while I was still trying to figure out how to get my present, and then everyone kind of went their separate ways.  The little girls went off to play with their toys, Linda and the boys went to their rooms to examine their loot, mom and dad went to take naps, and I sat on the couch and grumped.  This Christmas was no fun at all, and I wanted my lamp!  Mostly, I was grumpy because I hadn't had enough sleep, but I didn't feel like taking a nap.  Christmas was over and I wanted something exciting to happen.  Darn.

Mom woke up about noon and I tried hinting again that maybe she had forgotten a present.  This time she remembered, and she apologized all the way down to her room, laughing at herself for forgetting to give me my gift.  I assured her that it was OK, and I didn't even mind that she hadn't wrapped it, I was just so pleased to get the pretty little lamp. And it was nice, but you know what?  It didn't make me any less grumpy. I was still cross and tired and feeling let down.  Most of all, I was mad at myself for ruining my own Christmas.

About 2:00 I got the bright idea that I should go to the movies.  At least that would be something fun to do.  Camelot was showing at the theater, and I adored that show.  So I begged mom to let me take Julie with me, and finally she gave in.  There wasn't anything else going on that afternoon, and although it felt kind of wrong to go to the movies on Christmas there was really no reason for us not to go.

So I took Julie to see Camelot on Christmas afternoon.  There was one other person in the theater, which was bizarre all by itself, and we ate popcorn and cried and forgot what day it was as we watched that sad show.  Later, when we walked out of the theater into the early evening and remembered it was still Christmas day, I made a vow to myself.   From then on, no matter how curious I got, I would never, never, never snoop for my Christmas gifts again.

And you know what, I never did.

You Love the Ones You Serve

Mom used to always tell us, "You love the ones you serve."  She was trying to get us to stop fighting, but the lesson she taught me reached far beyond my childhood squabbles with my brothers and sisters.

As a teenager one of my favorite books was "To Kill a Mockingbird", by Harper Lee.  I loved it because it touched my heart and made me cry, but it also taught me to see people for who they really were, not just who I thought they were.  Is I grew up I began to understand that other people also felt and hurt and laughed, were happy, angry or afraid, just like me.  Slowly I began to want to put myself in others shoes and understand them. 

Mom continued to teach me empathy when she assured me that no one at school, church, or wherever I was going would even notice if I had a zit, a bad hair day, or what my clothes looked like, because they were all worrying about how they themselves looked.  It helped me not to obsess about my deficiencies, but it also reminded me that other people had feelings, too.

Mom knew it was easier to understand and be nice to friends and acquaintances than it was to be empathetic with our family, so she encouraged us to serve each other.  She lived the principle, "You love the ones you serve," and taught by example.

I wish I could say that I followed her example, but most of the time I was still pretty selfish and concerned with what I wanted or thought I needed.  But at least once in awhile I tried. 

I loved to watch "The Brady Bunch" on TV.  One episode was about Jan, the middle daughter in the family, feeling left out and unloved.  Someone sent her an anonymous present, and it made her feel better.  The show got me to thinking about my own little sister, Linda.  She was a lot like Jan, blond, the same age, and also a middle child.  Suddenly I wanted to do something special for her, so I went to the dime store and found a little heart shaped locket that I could afford, and that I thought Linda would like.  I bought it, put it in an envelope with Linda's name on the outside, and dropped it in our mailbox. 

You know what?  I was more excited about Linda finding that necklace than I was about opening my own presents at Christmas time.  It just felt so good!  Linda found the locket before too long, and her surprise and happiness were perfect.  It was so much fun to see her face light up, then watch her try to figure out where the locket came from.

"Did you do this?" she asked me with a huge smile. 

"I don't know where it came from," I assured her, trying to look surprised and innocent at the same time.  She asked everyone in the family, two or three times, but no one could help her. 

"Maybe it was Janice,"  I suggested, trying to stop her from thinking it was me.  "Or maybe you have a secret admirer at school who gave it to you."

Linda didn't buy that, although she wore a special smile for the next couple of days, like she was imagining who out of all the people she knew would give her a present.  Years later when we talked about the locket Linda assured me that she knew all along that I gave it to her, but even if she did, it didn't dim my joy.  I think that was the first real time that I experienced the thrill of doing something secretly for someone else, and it wet my appetite. 

"You love the ones you serve," mom taught us.  It's true, but you also make yourself happy at the same time, and it feels really good.

Wishing I Was Beautiful

My Aunt Eloise was a character, a good one, and I sure thought she was neat.  Ten years older than mom, Aunt Eloise was Grandma Johnson's oldest daughter.  By the time mom was a teenager Aunt Eloise was already living in California, married, and working as a beautician.  By the time I was born she had her own beauty shop in Beverly Hills, and she was the coolest person I knew.

Aunt Eloise had bright orange hair, always fixed in the latest short haircut.  Everyone was "honey" to her, and she made me feel important when she recognized or talked to me.  By the time I was a teenager Aunt Eloise had started her own cosmetic company, Continental Girl, and she was a fount of knowledge on how to look beautiful.

I needed that.  All of my life I had known I was not beautiful, and I wanted to learn how to improve my looks.  As soon as I was old enough I started using makeup.  I studied movie stars faces so I could imitate their eye shadow and mascara.  I gave up on my hair, it was too thin and the back of my head was flat, a trait I inherited from Grandma Johnson and my hard headed Swedish ancestors, but I sure envied the girls at school with their thick, long hair falling lushly over their shoulders.  I was also too tall, and not thin. I wanted to be a size 3, or 5, but even if I  had been just skin and bones my bones would have never fit into those clothes, so I eventually gave up dreaming about being a Barbie doll and just tried to look as good as I could with the body the Lord had given me.  But it sure would have been nice to be tiny and petite.

When I was a little girl I read a story about the most beautiful girl in the world, who even when she lost her gorgeous clothes and hair and skin, was still beautiful because of her smile.  It made me think, and I after that I tried to remember to smile all the time, hoping it would help me look beautiful, too.

The one feature I did like, and was probably too proud of, were my eyes.  I inherited my dad's blue eyes.  His were the color of the sky on a clear, fresh spring day, startlingly deep blue.  Mine were, too, if there was anything blue around me.  One day an elderly gentleman told me I had bedroom eyes, and that fed my ego for years.  The only problem was that it seemed to be only the older men who thought I was pretty.  Nobody  my age did.  I guessed my kind of looks must have gone out of style back before I was born.

Anyway, when Aunt Eloise started her cosmetics company she wanted to market them in Arizona.  She worked up a deal with Penny's to sell them in their store at the mall, but she needed sales-girls to give away free samples and coupons.   I guess I was the right age, and I didn't have anything better to do, so I became one of her Continental Girl sales-people.  It was fun, scary, intimidating, and a good experience, all at the same time. 

All I had to do was stand around the entrance to Penny's, handing out brochures about Continental Girl cosmetics, and point people into the store where they could buy the merchandise.  At first it was way out of my comfort zone, but after awhile I got so I could smile and hand fliers to just about everyone.  Until the fellow stopped to ask me if I used Continental Girl cosmetics myself?  I smiled and assured him I did.  "Then why do you still have pimples?" he wanted to know. 

Jerk!  First of all, I only had maybe one or two little pimples, which was really good for a teenage girl with dark hair and oily skin.  How many other teenagers did he know that had that few pimples?  Second, I really did use Aunt Eloise's cosmetics, and they really were helping my skin to be healthy, he should have seen the way it looked before I began daily scrubbing my face with her facial scrub,  firming it up with her mask, and finally moisturizing it with Valhalla, her special moisturizer that was so expensive I could never have afforded using it if she didn't give it to me for free.

Anyway, looking back I have a feeling the fellow really was a jerk and he was just trying to get a rise out of me, but it worked.  I blushed scarlet, stammered around, unable to think up any kind of reply, and was very happy when the end of my shift came and I was able to go home.  I didn't go back to sell cosmetics ever again.  (Of course, that may have had something to do with the fact that Aunt Eloise was done promoting her cosmetics and she didn't need anyone to advertise for her anymore, but even if she had wanted me to I don't think I'd have gone back.  Who needs people telling them they aren't pretty, especially when they already know it?)

At any rate, I enjoyed being a sales-girl for awhile, and I was really lucky to get to use Continental Girl Cosmetics for free all during my teenage years.  I think they helped.  Someone asked Grandma Johnson once how she managed to have such lovely skin.  She was in her upper 90's at the time.  She told them it was because she had put lotion on her face twice a day her whole adult life.  Maybe she had wrinkles, but her skin was soft and beautiful.  I'm not 90 yet, but hopefully learning from Aunt Eloise how to take care of my skin will help me to have beautiful skin all of my life too, even if it doesn't make my hair thick or give me a size 3 body.

Vice

Vice is a monster of so frightful mien,

As to be hated needs but to be seen;

Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face,

We first endure, then pity, then embrace.

    Alexander Pope

I heard this quote when I was young, and it stuck with me.  It's true, you know. I've watched myself get used to and slowly embrace too many things that I used to know were unacceptable.  I need to do better.

When I was about fifteen the movie "Butch Cassidy and the Sun-dance Kid" came out.  Keith, my older brother, and his best friend Richard really wanted to see it.  After hearing them talk about it I wanted to go see the movie, too.  I guess mom and dad finally decided it would be better to see it with us than to just let us go alone, because one Friday night they got a babysitter for the rest of the kids and took Keith and Richard and me to the movies.

Back in those days going to the movies meant seeing a double feature.  The movie that was showing along with "Butch Cassidy" was called "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie".  None of us knew anything about it, except it was supposed to be something about a teacher, and it sounded pretty innocuous. 

Keith and Richard didn't want to sit by us, (what if their friends saw them?) so they walked down to the front of the theater to find seats while mom and dad and I sat up towards the back.  I settled down in the dark theater, enjoying the excitement I always felt as I waited for a movie to begin, but the feeling didn't last.  "The Prime of Miss Jean Brody" was pretty dull, and it wasn't long before I was squirming in my seat, anxious for the dumb movie to get over so "Butch Cassidy" could begin. Then suddenly the scene changed, and I found myself staring at a totally naked lady, lounging on a couch!  Woahhhh!

Our family did not go to see R rated movies.  We did not allow pornography of any kind in our home, we did not laugh at lude jokes or tell off color stories, we did not watch suggestive television programs, and we DID NOT look at naked ladies on huge movie screens.  I had no idea what to do.  My mouth dropped open in shock, my mind whirled in unbelief, and I just sat there. 

Dad knew what to do, though.  He jumped up, grabbed mom's arm, she grabbed mine, and we crawled out of our row.  Leaving us, dad then stalked down the isle to where Keith and Richard were sitting, grabbed their arms, and led them back up to us. Together, we all walked out of that movie.  Dad marched over to the box office and proceeded to  give the ticket taker a piece of his mind.  (I felt sorry for the kid.)  Dad let him, and everyone else standing around in the lobby, know that he was very disappointed with the theater for allowing a movie like that to be shown without warning.  He assured the management that he would never have brought his family to see a show like that if he had known what was in it, and he wanted to know why it wasn't rated R?  I suppose it was, actually, but someone had neglected to post that bit of information.

Finally, dad told the kid that he was taking us home, but we would be back in time to watch "Butch Cassidy and the Sun-dance Kid", and he expected them to let us come in without charging us again.  The poor ticket taker humbly agreed, and dad pulled us out of the theater, got us into our car, and drove us home. 

I was still in shock.  Not so much from seeing a naked lady, but from watching my dad.  He was normally  such an easy going, nice fellow, especially around other people.  He never lost his temper or made anyone feel bad, but this time he wasn't being diplomatic or kind.  Actually, he kind of made me think about the Bible Story of Jesus, cleansing the temple. 

Two hours later we went back to the theater, passed the ticket taker without saying a word, walked into the darkened theater, found our seats, and settled down to watch "Butch Cassidy and the Sun-dance Kid".  I've got to tell you, I sat on the edge of my chair for at least half the movie, wondering if dad was going to make us get up and leave again, but it turned out to be fine and we stayed for the whole thing.  I enjoyed the show, I remember crying at the end and thinking it was so poignant, but I'm not sure it was really that good.  Years later I watched it again on TV and it was actually kind of a lame movie.  But, oh well.

The show itself certainly didn't change my life, but the experience did.  I learned how to stand up in the middle of a movie, whether it was embarrassing or not, and just walk out.  I learned that there are some times when making a scene is appropriate.  I learned that the faster you act, the easier it is to do what is right.   And I learned that even though I only saw that pornographic picture for just a minute, it is still emblazoned on my mind, even all these years later.   

Vice is a monster of so frightful mien,
As to be hated needs but to be see;

I hope, and intend, to never see something like that again, and certainly never to become familiar with it.  I don't want to have to endure stuff like that; dad taught me I don't need to endure it.   He showed me that it is OK to be embarrassed and embarrass other people if I have to, so I don't have to endure stuff like that, so I will never come to the point where I pity, understand, rationalize, or embrace garbage that will destroy my soul.

Learning to Drive

Part of growing up is leaning how to drive and getting a drivers license.  It was a part I wasn't exactly thrilled about, but at the same time I couldn't wait for it to happen.  Weird, huh?

Dad let me drive the truck for about 1/2 an hour the day I turned 15.  We were on our way home from back east, and I guess he figured the north eastern corner of Arizona was a good place for me to learn since there's nothing there that anyone can run into.  Seven months later I was old enough to get my learners permit, but I wasn't in a big hurry to go down and take the test.  I was scared I would fail.

My 16th birthday came and went without me getting my license, but over the summer I took drivers ed, and passed, so I finally figured it was time to take the big step.  I was nervous the day we went down to the DMV to get my license.  I imagined an intricate obstacle course set up to weed out bad drivers that I would have to prove myself on, but to my surprise all I had to do was drive around a few city streets with the examiner sitting on the passenger side of my car.  I didn't even have to parallel park!  Before you know it, I was getting my picture taken for my very own drivers license.  Cool!  But the hard part came later.

A few days after getting my license mom let me drive Sharon to school.  I negotiated the parent drop of with no problem, slowed way down as we passed the crosswalk filled with little children, and wound my way along the street filled with harried parents trying to get their kids to school on time without running into a anyone.  At the end of the street I turned onto a short side street that took me to the main street we needed to get onto to go home.  I was doing OK going forward, but I was still a little shaky stopping, and consequently I didn't come to a full stop until the nose of our car was pointing out on the main street.  Thank goodness no traffic was coming, but I could see it backed up behind the red light half a block away.  I knew I didn't have time to make the turn onto the main street before the cars got to me, and I also knew my car was in their way, so frightened, I changed gears to reverse and hurriedly backed up, right into the car waiting patiently behind me.

I was so mortified!  So was mom, actually.  She jumped out of the car and rushed around to see how badly I had hurt the car behind us.  Thank goodness it had a high, strong bumper, and there didn't seem to be any damage.  Our car, on the other hand, had a nice big dent in the rear end which didn't make dad very happy.    Thank goodness it wasn't worse.  One thing I will say, having a minor fender bender sure made me a more cautious driver, so perhaps it was a good thing.    I drove, and backed up, very carefully for months after that, and had no more problems until the day I rear ended the car in front of me.

This time I didn't think it was really my fault.   I was coming home down Main Street, just a block or two from our house, when I came up to a big intersection.  The light was green, but it was about to change.  The car in front of me started to slow down, then sped back up.  I was watching the light, and saw it change to yellow just before I reached the crosswalk.  I figured I was too close to stop without stepping on the brake and skidding to a halt, so I stepped on the gas to get through the intersection before the light turned red.  The car in front of me, though, although she was half way into the intersection, suddenly jerked to a stop, and I ran into her.  What a horrible crunching sound it made, and I was sick!  I was so scared, so embarrassed, so horrified at what I had done.

This time the police had to be called, and I had to stand there on the road as cars streamed past me, wishing I could just disappear into the pavement.  The policeman was very understanding, he had us exchange insurance information and he didn't even give me ticket.  I think he felt like there were some extenuating circumstances. 

Again, dad wasn't very happy about the damage to our car.  He preferred doing the body work himself instead of making an insurance claim that would make our rates go up.  I had been driving our family”s orange VW Station wagon, which was the ugliest car you could imagine, but it was perfect for a big family like ours.  Dad was able to fix the damage to the front of the car and smooth it out so it didn't look bad,  but the paint was a mess.  Rather than taking the car in to be professionally painted, dad bought some auto spray paint and painted the car himself.  He chose a light flat green paint, kind of a cross between mint, lime, and puke.  He did a good job masking off the trim and the windows, and the paint job was great, but it wasn't shiny, and it was so ugly.  If I'd thought an orange VW Station wagon was ugly, it was nothing compared to a light green one.   And it was my fault.

I also worried about the girl I had rear ended.  Dad checked up on her a few weeks after the accident to make sure she was OK.  It turned out that her sister took her to the hospital just to make sure everything was OK.  They ran tests, and discovered that she had MS.  It was no wonder her reflexes had been kind of off just before she jerked to a stop and I ran into her.  Her sister assured us that the accident was actually a blessing, since it caused her to see a doctor and he was able to figure out what was wrong.  Still, I felt awful about the accident and sure wished I had known how to turn back the clock so I could have avoided it all together.

The Boat

"We spend our money on the things that are important to us."

I heard Bishop Brinton say that to a lady in our ward once, when she asked him how he could afford to take his family on so many trips around the world. 

"Some people spend their money on big cars or fancy houses, we spend our money on seeing the world," he’d said.

I've thought about his explanation ever since.  I guess it's about where your priorities are.  Dad's priorities were making memories with his children.  That's why he bought the cabin when I was little, so he would have a place to take his family to have fun.  It worked.  If you asked me where the happiest place on earth was I wouldn't say Disneyland.  I would say "the cabin." 

Later, dad built the camper so we could explore the country together as a family.  We toured the west coast, drove all the way back east and spent three weeks discovering our American heritage, and took the camper on numerous smaller vacations, building memories and bonds that could never be replaced.

As we grew older dad decided he needed to find a way to keep us close that didn't involve so much time.  Going to the cabin or on trips happened a few times a year.  He needed something we could do on the spur of the moment, every weekend if we wanted.  When our neighbors down the street decided to sell their ski boat dad realized it was the answer to his prayer. 

The boat wasn't new, but it sure seemed cool to us.  It cost dad an arm and a leg to buy it, and then to keep it running, but it was money well spent if it gave him an opportunity to spend time with his kids, especially his teenage boys.  It never took any coaxing to talk them into taking the boat up to the lake for an afternoon of fishing or skiing.  They even took it down to Mexico a couple of times.  It was a good investment.

I loved the boat, too.  I was sixteen when dad bought it.  We took a trip to Lake Powell that summer, camping on the beach and spending the days driving around the huge lake, swimming and learning how to ski.  How much fun we had!  I loved the tropical smell of sun tan lotion on warm skin, the feel of the sun on my arms and legs, the gentle rocking motion of the boat as we floated through glassy water, and color of the sun mirrored in the clear water all around us.  Lake Powell was so huge, so clean, so amazing!  Unless we were right next to the marina it seemed like we were the only people in the world, the lake was so big that we hardly ever saw anyone else.  

I spent hours learning how to ski, but since there were six of us kids all trying to get our turn it took me nearly a whole week before I got the hang of it.  Then, wow!  It was like flying, only bumpier, with the wind rushing through my hair and my arms feeling like they were being pulled out of their sockets.  Sometimes I fell, but it didn't hurt since I just fell into the water, but my favorite part was skiing until my turn was over, then just letting go of the rope and gradually sinking down into the cold, soft water.  I loved to swim, and skiing added a new dimension that I couldn't get enough of.

Everyone in our family loved it, except mom.  She didn't like swimming in the lake, it scared her not being able to touch the bottom; she didn't enjoy the sun, she burned too easily; and she worried all the time that the little girls might fall over the side and drown.  But she never complained or stopped us from going.  Sometimes she would let us go to the lake while she stayed home with the little girls, but a most of the time she came with us even though it wasn't her favorite thing to do.  Like dad, mom's priorities were making memories with her family, even if it meant she didn't get a new couch to replace the old ratty ones we'd had in the front room ever since we moved into our house, or new carpet or fancy clothes.  Mom and dad chose to spend their money building memories with their family, and what memories we made.

Connections

I read a book when I was fifteen called "Who's Been Sitting in My Chair?" by Charlotte Armstrong.  It caught my imagination, and has held it ever since.  The story centered around a radio disk jockey who worked the night shift, and while he was at the station doing his job someone would come into his apartment, sit in his chair and listen to him on the radio.  It was a suspense mystery, very well written, and I loved it.  What caught and held my attention, though, was the idea that while most people are in bed asleep during the night, others are awake, going about their business, and we never even know it.

That thought intrigued me so much that I found myself wondering about those other people at night before I went to sleep, and sometimes woke up in the middle of the night with them on my mind.  My bedroom window looked out over our front yard, toward the street.  We had planter boxes along the front of the house, planted with bougainvillea, hibiscus, and flowers.  My window was framed with bushes on either side.  I used to open the window at night, climb out and sit in the window frame, and dream.  The bushes on either side helped to create a sort of leafy picture frame for me to sit in and watch the night go by.  To me, it seemed very exotic and mysterious. It was usually very quiet and dark on our street, but I could hear the sounds of traffic on the main street a block away, and I would wonder why those people where awake, and where they were going.  How I used to wish I was out there in the night, going somewhere exciting, too.

The hero in my book tried to help his night time listeners feel connected, assuring them that they were not alone.  The book opened my eyes, too, and made me think.  I copied paragraphs from the story into my journal, never wanting to forget those new ideas. 

For example"
"Now I want to explain this once more.  I want to explain that you've got connections.  You look around.  Lots of other people around.  You got to know that.  Then you can see the connections.  So what do you know about the person on the other side of the wall?  One thing, he's human.  So turn your volume low or you'll disturb him."

Another favorite part of the story was when the hero tried to help his girl understand that her step-mother was a real human being, too, with feelings and problems just like her.  He suggested that if his girl-friend met her step mother on mars, she'd probably be glad to see her.  

The quote I liked best from the book was this:

"For the loneliest people there are.  Those who don't love anybody else.  How can they?  They honestly don't know anybody else is alive."

Fifteen is a pretty strange age.  It's a time of growing up, learning new ideas, seeing the world from new eyes, and trying to figure out where we fit in the whole scheme of things.  Reading this book, and many others, shaped and formed me, along with my mom and dad and teachers and friends.  Thank goodness for good books.

Growing Old With The Cabin

            Julie and Sharon missed out on all the early years at the cabin.  By the time they were old enough to explore the woods we had already found all the exciting places, and we didn’t go exploring anymore.

            Instead of growing up sleeping together in the same bed and having feet fights, or playing scrabble with grandma and going rock hunting with her, they grew up learning how to squirt sour grapes and other teenage activities, because they were surrounded by teenagers.

            The swimming hole below the cabin filled up with rocks during the big flood, so they never had the experience of having their own back yard swimming hole.  By the time they were teenagers we had to hike or drive up past the crossing to find a hole deep enough for swimming.  We found a great swimming hole with cool rocks that made a cave almost like in a polar bear exhibit at the zoo.  It also had a log bridge that crossed the creek, and huge boulders to dive from. That became our favorite place to spend a hot summer afternoon, but it was quite a ways up the creek, and we usually had to wait for someone to drive us there. 

A few years later we found another swimming hole even farther up the creek, with big rocks we could sunbath on high above a deep hole.  Both sides of the creek had good places for jumping, and clumps of tall green grass grew from crevices in the cliff and made it look like pictures we had seen of Hawaii.

            By the time Julie and Sharon were old enough to play outside by themselves the tree house had deteriorated into a wobbly, uninviting heap of old boards.  Keith liked climbing on top of the water tank, and he taught Julie how to get up there.  That became her lookout spot, and she spent many happy hours high above the rest of us.

            Dad still enjoyed taking us fishing, and he taught Julie and Sharon how to fish where the log across the creek used to be.  It had been swept away in the big flood, too, but the boulders were still there.  The boulder in the middle of the creek had been more exposed, and it made a good place to sit and sun tan.  It became ‘couch rock’ and the girls enjoyed playing on it. 

            Different plants began to grow along the creek after the flood, and we began to find crawdads under the rocks. 

Dad entertained Julie and Sharon by cutting green willow branches, tapping the bark to make it loose and then slipping it off.  With his pocketknife he would make notches in the smooth wood, then slip the green bark back over it.  This made a willow whistle, and the girls loved making music with them.

            At night we would go outside and sit on the hood of the old blue truck, looking at the stars.  Nowhere in the world were the stars as brilliant and close as they were up at the cabin.  It really seemed that if we could just stretch our arms a little bit farther, we would be able to pick them right out of the sky.  Even though the creek and forest had changed, going to the cabin was still our favorite thing to do, and the memories we made were worth more than all the money in the world.

A Visit to the Cabin

       

    The summer I turned 16 Uncle David, Aunt Melba and my cousins Laurie and Howard came down from Oregon for a visit.  Grandma and Grandpa were up at the cabin, so they decided to drive up to see them there.  Laurie and I were the same age, and although we never saw each other we were friends.  So they invited me to come up to the cabin with them.

            Aunt Melba didn’t really enjoy the trip very much.  Once we got on the dirt road she began complaining, and she about had a fit when we drove over Fisherman’s point.  Uncle David had a really nice car, but it was very big.  At Fisherman's Point the road is extremely narrow, and it seemed like the passenger side of the car was scraping the hillside, while the driver’s side was almost hanging over the side of the cliff. 

"You're too close to the mountain," she complained, until Uncle David pointed out that he was driving right on the edge of the cliff as it was.  Then Aunt Melba moaned about him being to close to the edge.  It would have been funny if I hadn't been sitting on the driver’s side of the car, looking down into nothing but space, and wondering if there really was enough road under our left tires to keep us up on the mountain.

That night Laurie and I slept on the old fold-down couch in the main room of grandma and grandpa’s cabin.  It wasn’t very comfortable, and we had a hard time getting to sleep.  All night long we were awakened by the sound of mice running back and forth on the tin roof above our heads. 

            “It sounded like the mice were having motorcycle races up there,” Aunt Melba declared, the next morning.  "There must have been a whole army of them on the roof!"

            Later that afternoon we were pounded by a thunderstorm as we drove back home to Mesa. 

I had never heard such loud thunder, and lightening seemed to be striking all around us.  I was really frightened as we drove through the pouring rain, but this time Aunt Melba wasn’t even worried.

            “A car is the safest place you can be in a lightening storm,” she assured us.  “If lightening hits a car it will travel right through to the tires which are made of rubber, so it won’t hurt anything.  Just make sure you don’t touch any metal if we get struck.”

            I felt a little better after that, but I wasn’t sure how you knew what was metal and what wasn’t in a car.   Could you touch the door?  The door handle?  The steering wheel?

Growing Up

Everyone needs to be needed, even kids. 

When I was fifteen I was called to be the Junior Primary Pianist in our ward.  It was pretty frightening, but it sure made me feel important.  I'd been working in Primary for a couple of years already.  When I was thirteen I was asked to help in the Sunbeam class.  They were the three year olds, and there were about ten of them.  Their teacher, Sister Shupe, was a sweetheart and the best teacher in the world, but even a great teacher has a hard time keeping a bunch of three-year-olds under control.  I don't know if I made a difference, but I remember feeling pretty important being asked to work in Primary.

When I was called to play the piano I was scared silly.  I'd been taking piano lessons for about eight years, so I suppose I was qualified, but I was got really nervous when I played in front of people, and accompanying the singing was hard.  You couldn't just play at your own pace, or stop when you got mixed up and start over.  I had to keep up with the conductor and the kids, and if I got mixed up or made a mistake I had to just keep on going. 

Usually my fingers would get so sweaty they slipped off the keys during the prelude music, but by the time we got around to the opening song my nervousness would be replaced with concentration, and although I often made mistakes I learned to keep on going.  Eventually I figured out that I could fake my way through a song, sometimes just playing the top hand if I had to, and as long as I kept up with the chorister the kids would keep singing and no one would even notice I wasn't playing all the notes.  It was good experience for me.

It also made me feel important, special, and needed.  For someone who was very shy and thought no one cared about me, it was awesome.  Older women whom I looked up to and thought the world of now knew my name.  They included me in their planning and talked to me like I was someone important.  In fact, they liked me.  It was so cool. 

Most of these women had young families, and because they knew me they asked me to baby-sit for them.  That was another good experience.  I enjoyed babysitting, it made me feel grown up and responsible, and it was a great way to earn money.  The little kids were cute, and I learned all kinds of tricks to stop babies from crying, children from fighting, and how to get wide awake kids to settle down and go to sleep.  I especially learned how to tell stories.

It was easy to talk to children who were younger than me, unlike trying to think of things to say to people my own age.  The kids I babysat for seemed to think I was interesting, nice, and cool.  You have no idea how heady that is, especially for someone who felt naive, scared, and unimportant around teenagers.

I guess I was growing up without knowing it, and learning responsibility, dependability, and reliability, the characteristics of maturity, by being given the opportunity to develop them.  Interesting.

My Pets

I loved animals but I wasn't very lucky with them.   I was allergic to cats, I killed all kinds of goldfish with either too much or too little attention, I knocked a bike over on my favorite little kitten, and I couldn't seem to keep a parakeet longer than six months. 

I guess mom thought having a bird in a cage would be less maintenance than cats or dogs, because when I begged her to give me a parakeet for Christmas, she capitulated, and I got the most beautiful blue parakeet when I was 13.  I named her Carol, after my favorite Christmas story, "The Bird's Christmas Carol."  I suppose that wasn't the smartest thing to do.  In the book, Carol dies.  So did my parakeet.  Mom was sweet, and let me get another one, which was also blue, so I named her Carol as well.  She flew out the window one day when I forgot to close her cage.  Mom relented one more time, but after my third Carol died she convinced me that maybe I should give up on parakeets for awhile.  I also decided Carol wasn't a very good name for pets.

Two years later, for Christmas, 1971, Grandma and Grandpa Russell gave me the most adorable little white toy poodle.  My uncle was a veterinarian, and he had acquired Sammy from some patient who couldn't take care of him anymore.  Uncle Ray gave him to Grandma and Grandpa, but after a few days they realized they were in no position to care of an indoor dog.  We weren't either, as far as mom was concerned, but someone needed to take this cute little poodle, and finally mom gave in and let me have him.  Thank goodness he was already potty trained and house broken, and named. 

Sammy was wonderful!  He was a little white ball of fluff, so light there was hardly anything to him.  He was also very intelligent and obedient.  He came when he was called, stayed when he was supposed to, and slept on the foot of my bed without ever making a bit of trouble.  I loved him!

We took Sammy with us up to the cabin when we went for New Year's Eve, and he slept with me on the front seat of the truck since we'd decided to sleep in the camper instead of opening up the cabin.  Sammy kept me warm that night, snuggling up with me on the narrow little seat and helping to keep me from falling off.

It wasn't long before Sammy was so much a part of our lives that we hardly even noticed he was there, except when it was time to feed or water him.  I suppose that was the reason I didn't notice Sammy was missing late one Wednesday evening, just over a month after he was given to me.  Mom and dad had gone out for the evening, and Keith and I were babysitting the other kids.  I had done my homework and was in my bedroom reading when the phone rang.  Keith answered it.

After talking for a few minutes he came down to the bedroom to find me.  "That was the Wintles down at the end of the street," he began cautiously.  "They said a car ran into a little white poodle out on Stapley drive, and they wondered if it was our dog."

"It can't be," I exclaimed in alarm.  "Sammy's right here!"  But he wasn't.  I ran through the house, looking for my little ball of fur, but I couldn't find him.  All of my brothers and sisters joined in the search, but none of them had any more luck.  Eventually I checked the back door, and found it ajar.  It must have been left open when mom left, hours earlier, and Sammy slipped out without any of us noticing.

I was devastated, of course.  How could my little puppy, whom I had barely gotten to know, be gone?  It was so hard!  When dad got home he went down the street and checked.  It was Sammy who had been run into.  Thank goodness he at least hadn't suffered.

My little puppy was buried that evening, but it took a long time to get used to him being gone.  For days afterwards I could have sworn I could feel that little warm weight lying down on the foot of my bed, and every time I came into the house I automatically looked around, expecting to see my sweet little puppy. 

A few months later a neighbor who had heard about the accident called to tell me they had puppies, born on Christmas morning, and they wondered if I would like to have one.  The puppies were Doodles, part dachtson and part poodle, and absolutely adorable.  I named my puppy Dandy (you know, Yankee Doodle Dandy).  He was black and looked an awful lot like an overgrown rat, but I didn't care.   I just hoped I would have better luck with him than my previous pets.  As it turned out, Dandy was with our family for years, even after I grew up, got married, and moved away.  At last my bad luck with animals seemed to be over.  Little did I know it was just transferring over to men. 

Daydreams

I used to love to daydream about living in a mansion on a moor, although I had never seen a moor and had no idea what one really looked like.  Mostly, I was tired of the ugly old desert.  After traveling back east and along the Pacific Coast it was hard to be satisfied with a sandy brown world.  I mean, the desert can be beautiful in the spring when it is covered with orange California poppies, purple lupine, yellow brittlebush, peach globe mallow, pastel cactus flowers, and emerald green spikes of grass growing in the shade, with a background of mountains ranging from amethyst to royal purple, indigo to pale blue, and a deep aquamarine sky arching overhead.  But this was only when the spring was wet and we'd had enough rain, which didn't always happen.  The rest of the year the desert was dusty brown, tan, and dirty white; and very hot.

I liked to imagine what it would be like to stand on a hill above the ocean with a cool breeze blowing my dress and hair, looking down off a Cornish Cliff to the cruel, beautiful sea beating below me against the rocks; or looking behind me forever across a lush green moor covered with broom and lavender and most of all, heather!  I really loved that name!  How pretty I imagined it would be. 

I also wanted to live in a huge house with a fine wonderful husband.  He'd be tall, dark, and very handsome.  Our home would be a cross between a mansion and a castle, with big gardens running down to our very own stream.  We'd have lots of money and servants, and thousands of rooms I didn't have to clean.  The weather would be lovely with lots of rain but not much humidity, and sometimes there would be thick fogs. 

It was so much fun to imagine this world, especially when I was cross and cranky and hot, but I knew it was really just a dream caused by reading too many books.  I still loved it, though.  Sometimes I'd imagine I could build my mansion on the knoll we drove past on the way from our cabin to Young.  Others times I thought I'd be happy just living forever at the cabin, all by myself.  I really didn't think I would ever actually get married, but if I did I thought it would be awesome to marry a forest ranger and live in the woods forever. 

I wonder, do all girls have daydreams like this?  Perhaps whatever life we live in, we dream about living in another.  Forty-five years later I can look back and smile at myself, but I wonder, am I still that little girl inside? 

Tumbleweed Snowmen

Christmas was always so much fun at our house.  Being Swedish added to the excitement, because lots of our traditions were based on Swedish customs mom was brought up with.  Like food.  In Sweden baking for the holidays began early in December, and no one visited a friend without being offered delicious goodies.  In our neighborhood we exchanged plates of cookies, candies, candy popcorn, pies, even gingerbread houses if we had the time to make them.  It was so much fun, and it was cool being different from everyone else.

The day after Thanksgiving mom would take out our Christmas decorations and we would fill our house with advent calendars, candles, stockings hanging over the fireplace, and a big tree in the front room.  There was a banner proclaiming "God jul och gott nytt år" (Merry Christmas and Happy New Year) and another with jul tomptens (Swedish Santas) climbing on top of each other hanging next to it.   Mom had made both of them, and she helped us paint little figurines of singing angels and other ornaments which hung on our tree.

Mom enjoyed arts and crafts and she was very talented, but the year she made the snowman for our front yard she went a little too far.  Back then people didn't put up elaborate yard decorations like they do now.  There were no blow-up snowmen or snow globes towering over front yards or upside down santas diving into chimneys on rooftops.  A few people put hard little plastic nativity scenes in their front yards, and once in awhile you'd see plastic santas with sleds on a roof, but mostly people just decorated with Christmas lights.  Then mom got the idea of how she could make a snowman for our front yard. 

One November Saturday we drove out to the desert and gathered plastic bags full of tumble weeds.  They were perfectly round, compact, stickery balls. When we got home mom put them on a piece of plastic and sprayed them with white spray paint.  It was surprising how much paint it took to make those things completely white.  When they were dry mom chose three of the best balls, stacked them on top of each other, decorated them with eyes, nose, mouth, hat and scarf, and we had the cutest snowman sitting in our front yard. 

Everyone admired our Snowman that year, and we thought mom was so clever.  But come spring, mom was not so pleased with her work of art.  Little tumble weed shoots began poking their heads up all over our front yard, and before we knew it it looked like we were starting a tumbleweed garden.  We spent hours and hours each Saturday out in that front yard pulling up those darn weeds, all spring and summer, and even the next spring as well. 

So much for tumbleweed snowmen in our front yard.  From then on mom stuck with putting up Christmas lights, and left the yard decorations to someone else.

No Longer Invisible

I started high school the day after Labor Day, 1971.  I wasn't very excited about it.  I remember going to register the week before school started.  Mom took me, and after completing all the paper work we walked around the campus.  It was huge!  I couldn't imagine how I would be able to get from class to class in time, we only had five minutes between classes, and I was sure I'd forget where I was supposed to go. 

Keith started high school the year before, so he was an old hand at it by now.  He loved the excitement and energy of being with thousands of other teenagers.  I felt invisible.  There were over 800 kids in just my sophomore class, and no way could I be noticed among all of them.

I was sick to my stomach that first day, when mom dropped us off across the street and I walked through traffic, crossed the busy parking lot, and entered the building where my first class was scheduled.  The first day of school smell assaulted my nose, as strongly as the unforgettable smell of a dentist’s office hits you when you walk through their doors.  I suppose I got used to the smell of school after a few days so I didn't notice it, but this morning the smell of chalk, pencil shavings, newly opened packages of paper, mimeograph ink, toner, butcher paper, teacher's early morning cups of coffee, bathroom disinfectant, the soap janitors had used the night before to mop the floors, along with teenage boys aftershave, teenage girls perfume, deodorant, shampoo, mouthwash, and all the other smells associated with hundreds of kids trying to impress each other, assailed my nose and added to the sick feeling in my stomach.  I really wanted to turn around and run back to the safety of our car, but I knew mom had already driven away.

Apprehensively, I walked down the hall and into the room mom had pointed out on our tour the week before: math, my least favorite subject in all the world.  The room was filled with insubstantial looking desks, really just plastic chairs with a small wood-veneered table-tops attached in front.  They looked very modern and uncomfortable compared with the old heavy desks we'd had at Junior High.  Most of the seats were still empty when I walked into the room, not many teenagers were as paranoid about being late as I was.  They were still out in the halls, catching up with friends they hadn't seen over the summer.  I chose a desk in the middle of the room, not too close to the front, back, sides, or next to anyone else, and slid in to my chair.  The desks were uncomfortable!  I was already taller than most kids, and there wasn't much room for me to stretch out.

The warning bell sounded, and gradually the rest of my classmates filtered in through the doors, taking seats all around me.  I recognized a few of them, but most of the faces were new to me.  I studied the few posters and notices pinned to the bulletin board as I waited for the tardy bell to ring, my stomach still doing flip flops with nervousness, then watched as my new geometry teacher walked to the front of the room, closing the door on his way.  Anyone still in the halls from this point on would be marked tardy, and I was immeasurably happy I wasn't out there, lost, still trying to find where I was supposed to go.

Mr. Slade, my geometry teacher, looked out over his new students and smiled.  "Well," he said, "you made it to high school!"  

"Big news," I thought, as the rest of the class rolled their eyes.

"I've got some advice for making this year better," Mr. Slade continued, beaming.  He was short, balding, and kind of funny looking, but he seemed to know what he was talking about, so we listened.

"If you want to get A's in school, you’ve got to brown nose your teachers," he told us.  

"What?" I thought.  "Brown nose the teacher?  You want us to butter-up and become the teacher's pets?"  But I listened.

"Here's how you do it," he explained.  "Keep your eyes on the teacher at all times.  When he says something funny, smile.  When he says something he thinks is right, nod your head in agreement.  When he's telling you something he thinks is bad, shake your head to show you think it's wrong.  No matter what, keep looking at the teacher and show you are listening.  If you'll do that, you will get straight A's in all of your classes." 

I looked at Mr. Slade with astonishment.  That was it?  That was all it would take to get good grades in High School?  He had to be kidding.  But he went on.

"First of all, when you come into a room, sit in the front row.  Then act like you're paying attention when your teacher is up in front, talking.   If you'll act like you agree with him, you're teacher will think you must be smart.  When you hand in an assignment, even if it's not the best paper he's ever seen, he will assume you were just having a bad day and he'll give you the benefit of the doubt.  You'll atomically do better on assignments because you've listened to what he's said, but if you turn in a paper that should deserve a B, he'll give you a B+ because he likes you.  If it really deserves a B+ he'll bump it up to an A because he'll think you deserve it.  You'll be surprised, but if you're teacher thinks you like him he'll give you better grades."

This was something to think about.  All of my life I had been an average student.  I got B's and C's, and I assumed it was the best I could do.  I envied the kids who always got A's, but I thought it was because they were extra smart and had more brains than me.  I wondered if Mr. Slade's formula would really work?

"One more thing," he was continuing.  "If you look at your teacher while he is talking, making eye contact whenever he looks your way, you will find an interesting thing happens.  Within a few minutes your teacher will be talking directly to you.  Try it and see if it doesn't happen.  Everyone likes to be listened to, and your teachers are just the same.  If you pay attention and look at them, in just a few minutes they will be focusing on just you, since you are listening to them."

"Well," I thought, "I wonder if that's really true?  Maybe I should try it."

I enjoyed Mr. Slade's class so much that I didn't even notice how quickly the hour went, and soon it was time to move on to my next class.  I decided to try Mr. Slade's experiment.  I chose a seat at the front of room each hour, and I tried to look directly at the teachers, smiling when they said something funny, nodding or shaking my head in response to their comments, making eye contact whenever they looked my way.  And you know what?  It worked.  Within minutes each teacher was talking to me, making me feel like I was an important person, like they knew who I was.  I wasn't invisible anymore.  It was amazing, and sometimes a little uncomfortable.  There wasn't a chance for me to doze off or daydream, not with the teacher talking directly to me.  Once in awhile it was a little embarrassing, because it almost felt like I was the only person in the room and I wondered what the other kids thought since the teacher was only focusing on me, but it didn't really matter.  Suddenly I was one of the kids who belonged, and it felt awesome. 

Not that I didn't have boring teachers sometimes, I did, and occasionally it was really hard to keep focusing and not let my eyelids close.  But when someone is looking directly at you there is an added incentive to not fall asleep.  I didn't automatically start getting straight A's, either, but my grades did improve dramatically.  I never got another C in any class, and by the end of high school I was earning straight A's.  How much fun!  I don't think I worked any harder, but I automatically learned more because I was listening and actually focusing on what the teachers said.  It's easier to remember something if you have paid attention when it was taught.

I am so glad I was in Mr. Slade’s geometry class, although math is still my least favorite subject.  His first day of school advice changed my life, not just in school, but everywhere.  At church, at civic meetings, wherever I am, it is now a habit to listen intently when someone is speaking, to make eye contact, to smile and nod my head and give moral support without even knowing I am doing it.  And because of that change in me, I am no longer invisible and I really like it.

Coming Home From Back East

I visited all kinds of interesting historical sights with my family on our 1971 trip back east.  It was an amazing adventure, and it helped to prepare me for my American History studies in high school and college, and later when I taught 7th grade American History in Junior High.

We also visited some of the major church historical sights for our church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day-saints.  Being a teenager, I don't suppose I paid as much attention to these places as I would have if I had been older, but still, they made a difference.

One summer evening we went to the Hill Cummorra Pageant outside the town of Palmyra, New York.  The pageant is performed during the summer and depicts the beginnings of the church.  The pageant is very popular, members of the church come from all around the world to see it, so dad dropped Keith and me off in the middle of the afternoon to save seats for our family.   There were lots of people doing the same thing, and missionaries roamed through the crowd, visiting with people and explaining about the church to nonmembers.  A couple of missionaries came over to talk to Keith and I, and we visited with the elders for awhile, telling them where we were from and asking questions about their mission.  The missionaries were beginning to get excited as they talked with us, thinking that they had found some interested investigators, I suppose, until they asked if we wanted to find out more about the church.  Then Keith burst their bubble by telling them dad was a bishop in the church and we already knew all about the church.

We visited other important places on our way home, slowly making our way back across the country towards Arizona.  We drove through Colorado on mom's birthday, enjoying the beautiful scenery and cool weather, although mom wasn't too thrilled with the steep cliffs and winding road as we crossed the Rocky Mountains. 

Early the next morning, on my 15th birthday, we crossed into Arizona at Four Corners.  Here it was possible to stand in one spot and touch Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico all at the same time, hence the name, Four Corners.  This was in the middle of no where, on a high, flat plateau.  Dad surprised me by asking if I would like to drive the truck for a while.  I was thrilled, a scared!  I suppose dad figured there wasn't anything I could run into so it was safe, and he was right, but it was still pretty exciting to get to drive for the first time in my life.

We got home late that evening, ending three and a half weeks of traveling all the way across the country with eight people in the back of a pick of truck (inside a camper, of course.)  It had been a glorious vacation, but it was sure good to get back to our own house, our own beds, our own bathrooms, and lots and lots of room!

Visiting Gettysburg

Mom's sister, Aunt Ejvor, and her family stayed in Pennsylvania the summer of 1971.  They were there for Uncle Leo's work.  We got to stay with them for a weekend while we were back east. 

The ward they were going to had a cafe booth at the State Fair, and the youth were asked to be help.  Since we were there on Saturday Keith and I went with our cousins to the fair and worked in the cafe.  I was a waitress.  It was lots of fun, and not too difficult since I was used to serving people after all the dinners I had helped our ward serve.  It was a little awkward serving coffee, but I could handle that.  The only hard part was having to explain to costumers about some of the food.  This was back before Taco Bell's were popular, and one of the items on the menu was tacos.  People read that, looked at us with surprise, and wanted us to describe what a tay-co was.  Weird.

On another day we visited Reptile Land and went swimming in the Susquehanna River with the Merkleys.  But the most memorable part of our stay was visiting Gettysburg.  I would like to say I really studied the diorama and other exhibits in Gettysburg, or that I understood the battle better after visiting.  Sorry.  I didn't, and I can't.  

My appreciation for this tragic part of the Civil War came later, as I learned and studied and then taught about this battle, and the beautiful address Abraham Lincoln gave to dedicate the battle field.  In 1971, though, I'm afraid I didn't appreciate it at all.  As we walked through the museum and looked at the diorama I barely listened.  Then, when we drove through the beautiful countryside, stopping to read the descriptions of the battle, I sat in the back of the camper with my cousins and brothers and sisters and played card games.  We hardly even looked out the windows.  Dumb, I know, but that's what teenagers do. 

Even though I didn't learn much when I was there, visiting Gettysburg changed my life anyway.   Ever after that trip Gettysburg belonged to me, and because of that I paid more attention and tried harder to understand what happened there when I studied the Civil War.  I'm glad dad took us, even if I didn't appreciate it at the time.

New York City

We camped mostly in KOA's on our 1971 trip back east.  There were plenty of them, scattered all along our way, and they were usually very nice campgrounds. 

Early one morning we drove into New York City to see what we could see.  I wasn't very impressed.  In fact, I was pretty scared and intimidated by all the noise, people, cars, and garbage piled along the sidewalks (there was a strike going on) and I decided this was one place I would not want to live.  But it was interesting. 

We drove past Central Park and up and down Broadway, looking for a gas station.  It was hard enough finding our way from Arizona all the way to the Atlantic Coast, but that was nothing compared with trying to navigate through New York City; our map was pretty useless.  At one point we found ourselves on a one way street entrance, cars in front and behind so there was no way to turn around, facing a sign that prohibited trucks and campers from entering that road.  What were we supposed to do?  Later in the day we were stuck in a traffic jam for two hours on a road that ran next to the river.  Cars in front and behind us were overheating, and we watched as people found ways to get water out of the river to pour in their boiling radiators.  What a mess.

Anyway, we finally found a gas station, and then we drove to the water front where we got a frankfurter before getting on the ferry that took us out to see the Statue of Liberty.  I think the frankfurter was the best part of visiting New York City.  It sure tasted better than any hot dog I ever ate back in Arizona. 

The Statue of Liberty was awesome.  As the ferry rounded a corner and we came in sight of the statue I was amazed.  The sky was black with clouds in front of us.  Behind the sun shown brightly.  The statue was silhouetted against the dark clouds, and it looked so beautiful, standing out light and green against the dark background.  It was almost lime green!  I had expected it to be brown.  It was an amazing sight.

We all started to climb her, but pretty soon mom and Julie and I turned around and went back down to the lobby.  Dad, Linda, Phillip, Keith and Sharon climbed all the way up to the crown.  While we waited for them to come back I looked through the gift shop inside the base of the statue.  They sold things from all over the world, and I found a little orange Dalla Horse from Sweden that caught my fancy.  When I showed it to mom she was excited.  She hadn't seen a Dalla Horse since she was little; they were very popular in Sweden.  It cost more than anything else I'd found on the trip, but I was so excited about it I decided to buy it for mom for her birthday, which was coming up soon.  Mom kept that horse her whole life, and it is sitting on top of my book shelves, next to me, right now as I type.

Anyway, New York City was an interesting place to visit and I'm glad I got there once in my life, but I'm happy with the memories and my Dalla Horse, and don't think I'll ever need to go back again.  Although that frankfurter really was good.

Washington DC

We spent two days visiting Washington DC on our family vacation back east in 1971, but it wasn't long enough to see everything.  What a fascinating place that was. 

On the first day we went to Mount Vernon, the home of George Washington Finally I got to go inside an actual mansion, and boy, was it neat!  I loved the gardens and grounds, they were cool and green and beautiful, stretching all the way down to the Potomac River.  I loved walking through the well laid out gardens and out buildings.  I could almost imagine I had stepped back in time to 1776, and that George or Martha Washington would come walking through a gate at any minute. 

I was a little surprised when we went into the house to discover how small everything was.  The furniture, and especially the beds, were pretty dinky compared to what we have now-a-days.  The tour guide explained that in general people were smaller two hundred years ago, so it made sense that their homes and furnishings were built to suit them, but it still surprised me.

All of the furniture in Mount Vernon was authentic, and most of it was the actual furniture used by the Washington’s.  It was amazing to look at the desk where President Washington sat and see his personal belongings lying there.  Again, it felt as if he could walk into the room at any moment.  Everything was gorgeous, but what made my heart stop was the real harpsichord standing in the music room.  Ever since reading "The Middle Window" I had dreamt of owning a harpsichord, but I'd never even seen a picture of one.  I've got to admit it looked a bit different than what I'd imagined, it certainly wasn't as pretty as a piano, it was more of a glorified rectangular box on legs, but still, it was a real harpsichord!

We spent the next day touring down-town Washington.  It was lovely and cool compared to the weather we'd experienced earlier on the trip, although it was a bit windy, but I didn't mind.  We began our day at the White House because we'd heard it was hard to get inside.  We had to wait in line for a couple of hours, longer than waiting for rides at Disneyland, but the tour took longer than a ride, so it was OK.  I'd brought my copy of "Gone with the Wind" to read while I waited, and that helped keep me occupied.  I don't know how mom and dad managed to keep their cool while they tried to help six year old Julie and four year old Sharon remain calm.  Eventually we made our way down Pennsylvania Avenue, then up to the front gates of the White House.  They had a security check point set up there to search purses and back-packs before they were allowed on the grounds.  We weren't used to being searched back in those days, so it was exciting to watch mom turn out the bag she was carrying snacks and water in to keep the little girls happy.  I was really surprised, though, when the guard asked me to hand over my book.  What on earth did he think I was going to do with it?  Hit the President over the head or something?  But he didn't keep it.  He just opened it up to see if I'd hollowed the inside out to hide a gun.  Cool!  Of course, "Gone with the Wind" is such a big book it probably would have been a good place to hide a weapon.  The White House was awesome!  It was huge, and rich, and much more modern than Mount Vernon.

Later we road up to the top of the Washington Monument in an elevator, mom got kind of sick, and Linda and Phillip took the stairs down.  They thought they could beat the rest of us on the elevator, but not quite, although they did make the descent in about eight minutes.

We drove by the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials, but didn't stop to go in to them.  We did go into Arlington National Cemetery, and visited the tomb of the Unknown Soldier and President Kennedy's grave.  We stayed long enough to watch the changing of the guard, and as we left Keith commented, "This was a nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live here."  He was 16, and kind of full of himself.

We went through guite a few of the Smithsonian Institute buildings, but there wasn't time to see them all.  The exhibits were really cool, though.  I was fascinated with the display of inauguration gowns worn by all the first ladies, and the antique jewelry on display. 

Last of all we went to see the Capitol, but discovered it had already closed for the day.  We sat on the front steps, though, and waited for dad to go get the camper and pick us up.  While we sat there we looked up and admired the statue on top of the capital, guessing what it could be.  It looked a lot like an Indian, but we couldn't figure out why that would be on top of the capitol.  Later we found out it was called "Freedom."

On the way back to the KOA to camp that night we passed the Pentagon, so we figured we had seen pretty much all that was noteworthy in Washington DC.