Nov 30, 2011

Crossing Palisade lake on a raft

I have written about my cooking experiences at Palisade Lake in the Granddaddy basin of the Uintah National Forest and this story is of another exiting adventure of that week.  Scouts are prone to get into trouble given a chance and well we were given a chance. We spent a lot of time that week running around the lake and fishing and playing. Someone at one point decided that we, and there were four of us, needed to return across the lake to camp and I thought we would be going back around on the shore but his idea was to go across on a raft. Now of course we had nothing to use to build a raft so we went back around the lake on the shore and over to where we were camped on a flat area above the cliffs which were on the one side of the lake. However a seed was planted and we just had to make a raft after that.

So we gathered up rope and went down by the water and gathered up logs that would float and then tied them all together with very sloppy pioneering lashings but it worked and we set off around the lake. Now I wasn’t a swimmer by any stretch of the imagination and still had visions of almost drowning in Moats pool so how they ever got me on that raft I don’t know. But I must admit that despite my fears I had a great time sitting on that raft and paddling the little thing, which barely held all four of us, around the lake. It was fun that is until it started to come apart and at that point I made sure I had a good strong big one that I could hang onto as I cautiously made our way back to shore so we could repair it. I think Brother Hansen found us at about that time and stopped us from going out on the lake again with it.  It was fun but I know the bottom of that lake was a lot further than one could reach on his tiptoes while holding the raft and for part of the time that was exactly how we did it on the shallow side of the lake. Yes, left to their own devices, boys are their own worst enemy.

Nov 29, 2011

Coyote Hunting

I had never seen a coyote in the wild especially around Duchesne until I was in High School. I knew they existed but didn’t know they were anywhere near the farm. Then one day as I went up onto the hill to go rabbit hunting as I quite often did since the black tail jackrabbit were a major problem in the fields and we had to keep them under control. As I got over to the oil well road, which ran down from the bench onto the east side of the farm, and I saw my first coyote near the farm. I had my .22 rifle with me and was actually a pretty good shot or so I thought until I shot at the coyote. He went down as soon as I shot and so I figured I had him but when I got close to where I had thought he should be and couldn’t see him then I began looking around and sure enough about 100 yards away I could barely see him sneaking through the brush. I fired again but the bushes were in the way and thus I couldn’t hit him. I only saw him one more time up there and had the same results.

Later that year as Harold and I were deer hunting up in Four mile canyon in the right hand fork of Indian canyon we spotted one that looked very sick. We kept hiking and also kept watching it. It became quite apparent a little later that he was stalking us and had no intentions of leaving us alone. Harold and I both shot at him and yes you guessed it had the same results I had when hunting them near the house. We continued hunting that evening never seeing him again but always wondering if he was just watching us from a little safer vantage point.

So even though the coyote pelts would have brought money from the government those critters wasn’t going to let me make it by selling their hides. They truly are a very elusive creature.

Nov 28, 2011

County Fairs

Utah has several counties and many of them still hold their annual county fairs toward the end of the summer months. I remember those fairs as being a special treat that we got to participate in only if the haying was done and there was time enough to go to town to the fair. It was a good thing that Duchesne was the county seat and thus the county fair grounds were located there or we probably wouldn’t have gone. The events that I always liked were the Ferris Wheel, rodeo, pig roasting that would happen every few years, and the displays for 4-H and local talent. There was always canned fruit, photographs and art work, breads and plenty of other goodies to view and even at times sample. I even had things entered in the fairs for several years due to 4-H Forestry and other 4-H classes ands still have the ribbons that I received for winning in some of the judging. There was always the parade to at the start of the event that we were in sometimes riding the float as a Duchesne High School Band (we didn’t have a marching band). The fair typically lasted for three days with the rodeo being held each night. I really quite liked watching the clowns at the rodeo but was always glad I wasn’t one of the Bull or Bareback bronc riders. I was plenty content staying in the crowd.

Nov 27, 2011

Coach Josie "Big Hands and Feet"

When I was in High school I had hopes of being a very tall person which consequently didn’t ever happen. I had these hopes because I had a coach by the name of Coach Josie who told me on more than one occasion that I would grow tall because I had big feet and big hands. Well apparently the rest of my body never got the message and I even later blamed it to be possibly caused by my thyroid, which controls the growth hormones. I was diagnosed with thyroid disease several years after I had been married when a goiter began growing on my neck in the thyroids. I thought that it was only on the right side until many years later when I had a scan and was told that the left side was actually bigger but was just growing inward. It has never really been a problem and in fact people never notice it until I point it out during discussions about the thyroids and their function. Doctors have told me they can be removed but that it would only be for cosmetic reasons since they don’t cause other problems such as swallowing difficulties.  It was interesting to that when Marie first noticed it that we had been to visit Lynn the weekend before because he was diagnosed with the thyroid disease and they killed his causing him to have to take medication each day to replace the thyroxin that they normally produce. Since then I have been put on the same medication even though my thyroids still produce thyroxin only my medication is to prevent the thyroids from over producing where his were under producing and causing extreme tiredness and lack of energy. Apparently the fact that I always had so much energy must have been because mine worked overtime as it seemed.

Nov 26, 2011

Church Songbooks/Mission B o M's

One of the common practices for children to keep awake in Sacrament meeting was to take a pencil and piece of paper and rub the pencil on the paper with the church hymn book under the paper. The organ piped for the Tabernacle in Salt Lake City were embossed on the front cover of the hymn book so it made for a neat looking picture on the paper. However it wasn’t that entertaining considering the length of the meeting. So older kids would start writing on a page and telling the reader to go to another page where the same thing would happen again and thus keep one flipping through the pages of the book for long stretches of time.

It often made me wonder when I got to the mission field if someone whom had marked up one such hymn book was the one who started missionaries marking the Books Of Mormon with the same style only this time it would lead investigators of the church to specific faith promoting scriptures instead. There was never any rhyme or reason to the markings in the hymn books but the ones in the Books of Mormon were designed specifically to guide the reader through different scriptures, it was just one of those things that just seemed to make sense even though marking the hymn books didn’t. 

Nov 25, 2011

Church Schedules

I was recently thinking about the changes of the church that I have witnessed in my lifetime. One of the interesting ones is in the number of meetings and the schedule of those meetings. As a youth I remember going to church in the morning around 10 am to attend Priesthood meeting and Jr Sunday School and when older attending Sr. Sunday School.  Those meetings would last until around 12 noon and then we would go home until 7 pm when we would return to Sacrament Meeting. Mother would attend Relief Society during the week and we would go to Primary on Wednesday night after school.  Later after turning 12 years old we would go to mutual on Wednesday nights starting at 7 pm.

The Sunday meetings were much like they are today except that we passed the sacrament in Sunday School and Jr Sunday School. When I became a deacon we would meet in our Priesthood Quorum meetings and receive assignments for passing the sacrament. It was always quite fun because we would get to pass in either Sunday School or Jr Sunday School. I liked going to Sunday School to pass but going back to Jr Sunday School was a little harder since I had just “graduated” from going to that room. When I became a teacher we all became pretty efficient at putting cups in the trays because we were doing it twice a day and in the morning for two areas. We  even ha d competition to see who was the quickest. Returning that night for Sacrament meeting meant we had to convince the entire family to go early so that we could fill our assignments to prepare the sacrament for that meeting. That wasn’t really hard to do for my family however because mother liked to be early anyway. Dad was a High Council member for many of the years when I was young and I quite often got to ride with  him to other wards in Fruitland, Utahn, Tabiona, Hannah, Altamont and Bridgeland where the other wards of the stake were located. It was fun and consequently I had close friends from many of those places from attending Jr Sunday School with them.

During the week we would leave school and walk the three blocks to thee church for primary. That walk took us right past Kohls, our grocery store, and made for a perfect stopping place to buy candy before we went to primary. I still remember buying candy cigarettes which we quickly learned was a bad things when our teachers taught us how the devil was trying to teach us to break the word of wisdom even in a very small way because that would teach us cigarettes were OK. As I look back on it now they were very right even though I didn’t feel that way at the time. We started buying penny candies instead (yes for 1 cent each) to replace the candy cigarettes. When I was 17 I returned again to primary only this time as a teacher of the Guide Patrol class, or the equivalent now of the New Scout patrol, 11 year old scouts. The name for that has changed several times over the years as well and I still find myself calling it Blazers, Guide Patrol and New Scouts.  I had a fun time teaching those boys and at an early age learned how to teach. We also went on several camps and did a lot of scouting things.

When I had turned 12 I also started attending MIA or Mutual as we called it and participated in scouting, dancing, basketball and speech events. We had talents show for Mutual and Road Shows and did a lot of cultural type things which for a small community away from the Wasatch front something that we couldn’t do any other way. I began liking Marie at that time and really enjoyed going to Mutual just so I could see her.  For scouts, which we held during mutual we got to go a few times to the mouth of Indian canyon and on the low rolling ridges play capture the flag in the dark. That was really cool because we could use extreme strategy hiking sometimes for a half mile around the area just to sneak up from the back on the other camp to get their flag while others were keeping them distracted from the front. Once or twice that worked but usually by the tie we were there our flag had already been captured and the game was over and they were just waiting for us to get their to start it over again. I can’t remember for sure when we would hold firesides but I do remember wanting to attend those so that I could be with Marie. Several times in those firesides they spoke about dating and not single dating but I remember well one couple that came to speak and telling how they had been sweethearts in their youth and she had waited for him to go on a mission before they were married in the temple. I thought then how neat it would be for Marie and I to have the same ending to our story.

After high school I attended Snow College and similar schedules were in place there only Priesthood and Relief Society both met Sunday Morning before Sunday School. Then we would return that night for Sacrament meeting. I was not yet an Elder but attended the Elder’s Quorum meetings as a perspective elder and was often called on to pass the sacrament since I was still a n Aaronic Priesthood member. After the one full year at Snow I was called to serve in the Texas North Mission and found similar Sunday schedules practiced there until I was assigned to Stephenville, TX where there was only a small branch at the time. We would get in car pools and travel to Cleburne 60 miles away for Sunday Meetings so while there we would have Priesthood, Relief Society, Sunday School, Mutual, and Sacrament meetings all in one four hour block then we would return to Stephenville usually stopping about half way for lunch which was pot luck prepared by the sisters that morning before leaving for church.

It wasn’t but a coupe of years later I had returned from my mission that there were rumors in the church that we would be changing our meeting schedules to a consolidated schedule where primary and Relief Society would be moved to Sunday and there would be no more Jr Sunday School and all meetings would be held during a three hour block. I remember thinking how great that would be because I had experienced a similar schedule in the mission and had loved it then. Well it soon happened and we have been on that schedule ever since and none of my children can remember going to Sacrament meeting at 7 pm. That was good because bedtimes were then no longer curling up on a parents lap during Sacrament meeting after the Sacrament had been passed and sometimes even before. I look at mu grandchildren’s bedtime schedules now and wonder how parents ever did it because sacrament meeting was not only started at 7 pm but went until nearly 9pm. MIA is still held during the week and scouting activities are still held during the week but that is the only one that has not been moved to Sunday.