A Special Cousin

While I was partying the night away at my 30 year reunion, Troy was at home receiving our weekend guests, Peter and Sheri and kids. They came up because Sheri felt like a visit to her grandparents in Heber was long overdue. They drove north on Saturday, straight to Heber, spent the afternoon with her family, then came to our house late that night.

Here's what I want to say. Peter and Sheri have darling darling kids. All four of them are so fun and delightful and we adore them. I just have to give a special shout out to their 2nd daughter though, who is just a couple of months younger than Emma. Cara has been Emma's most loyal friend in her whole life and I'm really grateful for her. Those two girls are facetiming constantly and text and just show up for each other. She's a darling friend to Emma, who really needs her in her life. 

Emma finished learning all the pieces in Book 3 of her Suzuki violin program and she needed to have a little recital to make it official. Boy was I glad when I realized that Peter and Sheri were going to be here on the weekend of her recital. We just got to enjoy Emma's playing just with ourselves and Troy's mom. Emma played beautifully. She got very nervous right before it started but really pulled herself together and did a great job!

Grateful to cousins for showing up for us. We love them so much. And also so grateful to The Becky and all she does for Emma.

30 Years Later

East High School, Class of 1991. That's me. Thinking back on those four years really makes my brain get twisty, to use the gymnasts' phrase. What on earth? Which way is up? How come 4 years can take a lifetime and the 30 years since then can seem to talk half as long? It's so weird.

I had a great high school experience. I know there were times that were hard, that I felt all the feelings all the time so fiercely that I thought I was going to explode or just drive my parents and friends all crazy. But I also had so much fun. I'm so grateful I had a place at EHS. I loved the theater department so much and the friends I had there. I also connected with so many other people of all kinds, even though I often felt intimidated by them or looked down on by them. That may have been true - there may have been times that people really thought I was odd. After all, I loved big hats and no shoes. But also a lot of that was probably just in my head. 

I went to my 20 year reunion and it felt like a much bigger deal than this one. I wore fancy clothes and heels, spent a lot time fussing over my hair, and got really nervous to go. For some reason, our 30th didn't feel that way. I don't know if it's because we all got so shaken by the state of the world over the past 18 months, or if we just grew up even more, but this reunion was so fun. It felt more relaxed, more joyful, more full of people just wanting to be together. I had several long and deep conversations with people I swear I never spoke to in high school at all. 

I loved the causal gathering - and what was funny was that the Highland High 1991 reunion just so happened to be scheduled at the other pavilion at Sugarhouse park at the very same time. I kind of wanted to go over and say hello, but since I really only know two people from that class and both of them are boys I dated with kind of awkward breakups, I decided to not do that. Instead, I just stayed forever at this party, even to the point where the sprinklers at the park got turned on and I got totally blasted in the face and was totally soaking wet. Luckily I had not picked a white shirt so it was benign and also hilarious. 

A highlight of this reunion for me was getting the assignment to create the playlist for the party. What fun that was! I tried to fill it with a mix of the classic old things that our class loved like Cat Stevens and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young as well as things that came out that year like The Samples and The Sundays, plus the leftover 80s hits that we love as much now as we did then like Howard Jones and General Public. I confess that I can not stop listening to this playlist.

The only sad part of the evening was that it didn't last longer. I didn't get quite enough time with some of the people I had hoped to, and I know there were many people who didn't come at all. I know our class was way bigger than I even know, that there are dozens of people who would never consider coming to a reunion or feel like part of a group at all. I'm sad about that. But for someone who sometimes felt a little bit like an outcast myself, I was grateful to be there and feel a human connection with so many fellow classmates. 

Also, I really should have taken more pictures. 

More Aspen Grove

One little Sunday afternoon at Aspen Grove camp was definitely not enough, especially on a day when none of the activities were rolling. Chase was very cute actually and mentioned a couple of times that we should come up again, and that he had Thursday off. So just a day after the girls and I got home from St. George, Troy took the day off of work and we went back to camp. We went nice and early - apparently Thursday mornings are biscuit and gravy mornings, and Chase told us that was the best breakfast they had up there. Worth the early drive! 

We made it in time to enjoy breakfast together but that really wasn't the fun part of the morning. The best part of going to Aspen Grove is seeing Chase in his element. He's put in weeks of work up there - I can hardly believe the summer is almost over. He for sure has a whole society of friends and a summer's worth of stories to tell. It was so fun to go and eat breakfast with some of the friends he has made. They all are very gregarious and willing to chat with us. 

After breakfast we headed across the bridge to make our first stop of the day - a visit to the ropes course. Gulp. I don't have a great history with ropes courses, especially high ones. However, this has a great set up. The whole system is made so that when you attach your harness to the course, you can go anywhere on the obstacles and you are connected to the ropes. You don't need people belaying you or tying and untying knots. You have this metal thingy on a rope on your harness and you just slide it around and sort of work it over these metal plates to get to the next obstacle of your choice. It means that you can really just play around on the course and not have a specific destination or objective. Just go have fun. And it really was fun. I was of course sweating like crazy within about five minutes - it's a ton of work and really taxes your muscles. But also just fun. I kind of wondered if it would be too much for Emma. She generally has not loved physical activities like that. But she had a great time and stayed on longer than any of us. Troy and Chase took on the high ropes course and we gals stuck to the low one. I don't think I could have handled the high course but Chase just jumped from step to step like a champ.

 

Chase with good friends Sav, Alexis and Sam

After the ropes course we headed to the arts and crafts area. There is a cool yurt that houses the pen-turning stations, and you have to be 18 to do that, so Troy and Chase signed up to make one. Romney was a little bummed but she and Emma and I had fun in the craft shack glazing ceramics. 

Emma made the cute little gnome, I made a polka-dot bowl and Romney made a terrifying cereal bowl. We decided that it was a bowl that asked you in a slightly crazed way..."DID YOU FINISH YOUR CEREAL??" to which you can quickly reply with panic in your voice yes sir!!!

We had to take a break in the middle of crafts for a lunch break which was tacos. It was so funny - Chase and his dining hall buddies who also had the day off were ecstatic that they didn't have to work the taco shift. Apparently it's a real mess and with all of the different elements for tacos it's just a total pain. They really cheered when they figured out what was for lunch. Of course before we returned to the riverside craft house, we made a stop in the store for ice cream. Must have ice cream. I went for the graham cracker flavor which was good but so sweet it made me sleepy.

After we wrapped up our crafts, we all agreed it was time to head home. We were tired and Chase was hoping for a nap and time with friends before dinner. That was actually so happy - he wanted us there, spent the day with us, brought friends along to meet us and hang out with us, and then wanted to get back to hanging out with them by himself. All good things, I'd say.

The drive home was a bit longer - we took the Alpine Loop way which was beautiful but slightly treacherous considering how everyone going the opposite way from us seemed to be totally speeding. I'm turning into a total granny driver. Why does everyone have to be in such a hurry? And trust me, I drive over the speed limit already. Just not a LOT over. Kids these days.

 

Pirates Forever and Some Olympics Too

It was Sheri's idea to get discount tickets to see The Pirates of Penzance at the Shakespeare Festival this year. That was one of the shows my mom introduced to us way way back when. After our harrowing drive to St. George we had a mellow trip and relaxed as much as we could. For me this included watching as much Olympic coverage as I could squeeze in, which is what I do every time the games are on. Another weird result of a weird year - watching 'The 2020 Olympics" when it is clearly 2021. 

This was a delightful trip. Despite being a little freaked out while driving, I loved all that time with my brother Peter to just talk to our heart's content about nerdy movies and books we are reading and thoughts we are thinking. And then of course letting our 12-year-olds spend every minute together which is just how they like it. Romney and Siena sometimes really click and have fun and other times retreat to their own spaces but the retreating always seems amicable. On this trip they mostly were in hang-out mode. On Monday we got delicious burgers for lunch from a divey kind of place in Cedar before going over to the festival. The play was nothing short of absolutely charming. It was clever and funny but not totally overdone like Pirates sometimes is. The Pirate King of course stole the show, though Mabel and The General gave him a run for his money. Sheri and I sat by each other just enjoying the laughs together, doing much giggling. What a treat.

 

We really kept a low profile for the rest of our time - staying out of the heat, watching more Olympics, going for walks as early as possible while listening to a seriously great audiobook called Project Hail Mary which has been one of the most entertaining listens I've had for a while. I'd say the most entertaining reads....but I haven't read a hard-copy book in ages. They make me fall asleep in seconds because I'm very old. 

You Asked For It

Remember how I mentioned a few posts ago that our state was in such a state of drought that the Governor asked everyone to pray for rain? And remember how we got one delightful rainstorm and I asked for more please? Well, consider my prayer answered and my wish granted. In full. 

On Sunday the 1st of August we had free afternoon and decided it would be a great day to go visit Chase up at camp. It was super cute, actually - we had been talking to him about finding a day to see him and he was more encouraging about it than I expected him to be. We even rearranged the day after he let us know that he had Sunday off and would enjoy a visit from us. That made me happy. 

We drove our way up to camp and enjoyed eating Sunday dinner with our cute boy. We got to meet so many of his sweet camp friends and walk around the mountainside. It wasn't a long visit, but it was a fun one. I loved chatting with everyone we had been hearing so much about.

We came in separate cars because once our visit was over, the girls and I would be heading on south to St. George for a cousins visit while Troy went back home. And in a funny stroke of weird arrangements, Peter was going to be with friends in the area and would need to catch a ride with me back to is home. So he had his friends drop him off at camp and we got to enjoy dinner with him as well. Great night!

Well, we hugged and kissed Troy goodbye, got in our separate cars and drove away from one another. Troy of course could have come with us but since we were A) Going to see a musical at the Shakespeare Festival and B) Were going to southern Utah during the hottest time of year, he said thanks but no thanks. 

And then we all almost drowned. A storm came up from the south - in fact, only a few hours before we drove through Cedar City that part of the freeway had to be shut down because it was really more of a waterway than a freeway. We even saw a video of an SUV and trailer basically floating away into a field. Both our south-bound minivan and Troy's north-bound civic ran into some troubles. Okay, Troy got home just fine, but as he was pulling into the driveway, the storm hit hard and he found himself getting soaked to the absolute bone while getting our sad soggy chickens out of the rain and into their coop. It was so funny - we had literally THAT morning been chatting about how it had never rained hard enough at our house to actually flood our back porch. And that very night he sent me video of water absolutely sluicing onto our porch. He did just what we talked about him doing in that case - he used our garden hoses to start syphoning water away from the back yard and to the street. He said it was pretty alarming. Some rainstorms are exciting and fun and some kind of scare the crap out of you. Lucky for us we had no flooding and all was well. We didn't have to even water the lawn for like three weeks. 

As for Peter and me, we had a very soggy drive to St. George. There was a moment just around Payson that might be one of the scariest driving moments of my life, right up there with losing my breaks while going down Big Cottonwood Canyon while being towed by my neighbor. (Story for another day.) We were driving along at good old highway speeds when the storm hit and an absolute wall of water came down on us. As it hit, the other cars around us also started spraying water up from their tires and the combination of directions was equivalent to getting paint poured on my windshield. I could see literally nothing out the windshield. I knew I couldn't stop or even really slow down - everyone else was driving fast too and would have no idea that someone ahead of them stopped. I basically just prayed, slowed down a little, and headed for the shoulder of the road. It was so scary! The rest of the drive was pretty wet with a few other nail-biting moments, though none as bad as that first one. 

Basically, we got our prayed-for water, all in about 45 minutes. I heard that the avenues got about 4" of water in that evening storm. The roads were totally cluttered with rocks and debris and lots of places were just a real mess. I was super grateful that all was safe for us on the roads. Utah seems to have had so many more tragic accidents and deaths recently and getting to my destinations safely is now feeling like more of an accomplishment than ever. 

"Insert Acronym" Camp - or - I'm Proud of My Daughter

There have been what feel like a large variety of camp opportunities for the youth of our church. There was something called EFY - which stood for Especially For Youth. Then that expanded to things like OFSY (Outdoors) and AFSY (Adventure) another one I can't remember where kids could go to needy places in the world and do service like build schools and stuff like that. It had another acronym. Then the church decided to change that system and rebrand the camp to be FSY Camp - which is an acronym for For the Strength of the Youth - and naturally I get them all confused all the time. The FSY camps were supposed to start last summer and were going to be more widespread and accessible for more kids in the church, but then of course Covid hit and it all got cancelled. (PS I feel like if i have to type the word covid one more time in this blog I'm going to totally flip out. I'm SO SICK OF IT.) 

Anyway,  our area got word that they would be starting up slowly this summer and would run a pilot program to test a few things out and our ward would be invited to participate. I was so excited about that! I talked to Romney about it and she was maybe more game than excited but that's better than grouchy and unwilling so we went for it! Of course, part of her willingness was based on the assumption that she would have fun with her friends in the 'hood who would also of course be going. 

Um...none of her friends went. It was about two weeks before camp that I finally figured out that she would have to room with a stranger. I was not very excited to share this news with Romney, expecting her to flatly refuse to go but instead she shrugged her shoulders and said Oh Well! She really took it pretty well and decided to just go for it. I was so proud of her!

Of course as the first day of camp grew closer, she grew a little more concerned and nervous, but she stuck to her decision. On a Monday morning we carpooled to Provo with some friends who had kids in the same week of camp (none old enough or of the proper gender to room with Romney). She and I climbed into the back of a minivan and enjoyed some time together before pulling up to the massive Marriott Center, hopping into a huge line of people, checking in, picking up a name tag, a room key, and a planner. We got her moved into her room and then had a little time for some lunch so we found ourselves at Panda Express with just enough time to gobble a bowl of chow mein and head back to the school. Romney then bid me goodbye before I even got to meet her roommate.

I confess to being pretty nervous - I had no idea how it was going to go for her. Who knows who her roommate would be or who would be in her group. I was pretty anxious to hear from her. Later in the day she texted me to let me know that all was well - at least, she sent me a text that said her roommate 'was cool." That was the only bone she threw me. A relief nonetheless.

Throughout the week we chatted a time or two and it sounded like she was having a really fun week. It felt like she was gone forever and when Saturday morning finally rolled around I was pretty excited to go pick her up. I had a little trouble finding her and when I finally located the picnic area where her group was gathered I found a very cute group of kids who, when I told Romney it was time to say goodbye, gathered around her and did this:

What a very lovely group of young people. They really bonded. In fact, Romney told me that they still text each other goodnight and goodmorning pretty much every day. I'm so proud of Romney for just going for an adventure without a safety net like a close friend. She just jumped in with both feet and had a great week.

Romney happily chatted with me the whole way home about the fun she had - even the part where they sat in classes and learned churchy things. She didn't like the first dance but really loved the second one. How her company had all sorts of inside jokes and times of great hilarity.  The snail drawings and snail races. (Don't worry she lost me on that one too.)

Anyway, yay for my girl who was a total trooper and enjoyed the benefits of her courage.