LIZA'S BAPTISM AND SOME RAMBLING

This is a picture of my granddaughter, who was baptized today. She is barefoot because by the time we got to her house, after the baptism, she had already changed out of her church clothes and I made her change back so I could take a picture. She looks like she's trying to be patient with me, doesn't she? She really wants to go play with her cousins.

Her Dad had changed too and I made him change back. I'm bossy that way.

He baptized and confirmed her a member of the church and gave her the gift of the Holy Ghost. I gave a talk on the Holy Ghost before the baptism. I tried to make it simple for her and another darling little boy who was being baptized too. It was a beautiful day for us and for Liza. I am so happy for her.

She will do well in this life. She is a sensitive little soul, very caring, very loving and a hard worker. And loved by her Daddy.

Here is my son, mugging for the camera with Phil. He's such a joker, my boy. As you can see, Phil loves it.

I'd show you the picture of me but, sadly, I look my age and it makes me ill so there will be no illness here today.

This is the backyard. I am so happy to learn how to download pictures that I take pictures of everything, except for my old self. This is the arbor that one of my other sons, Bentley and his new wife, Trisha, stood in front of at their wedding reception a year ago last August. It was so hot we thought we'd die and now look at it.

That's the way things are. You can hardly stand whatever you are going through, sometimes--not the wedding , it was a wonderful thing--but I'm speaking metaphorically here--I got off on this tangent remembering the heat at the reception.

So, you are going through a bad time, a hard trial, maybe, you are despondent and sad or anxious or however you experience tough times. I get a horrible anxious feeling in the pit of my stomach and I imagine the worst. Then, six months later, you have gotten through that time and you look back and can think of it differently. I often am able to write about times of stress with humor, later--not that I'm successful at the humor but you know what I mean, at least I can see it differently. Some people can't. They never let go. They remember and are angry or sad or hurt or whatever it is that they feel justified about.

I am sad to have to admit that I am that way too with some things and wish I weren't. My birth dad got on a private plane in a blizzard when I wasn't quite two years old, with my mom pleading for him not to go. The plane crashed and she never saw him alive again. I have been living with that abandonment all my life. Angry at times, hurt at others, feeling like I was not important. I have got to learn to let it go. To realize that he, my birth father, has other responsibilities. One of them may be to watch over me, to whisper in my ear when I need help or comfort. Do I realize that? Now, as I'm writing this, I do, but not as I live my life, realizing I didn't know him, wasn't taught by him, didn't learn the things that he held dear.

Well, I had no idea this post was going this direction. Maybe I needed to think this through a bit. I really do need to let it go and not feel cheated. Mom did remarry and Daddy loved me with all his heart. He was a good father, he even taught me to drive my sister's Army jeep which is more than any father should have to do. That is another story for another time. What a dear, patient, Daddy he was.

Okay, enough of that. This is the arbor up close.

And Chloe, who lives outside and loves it. I wanted to take a picture of of Pinky--the cat--with Kate, the four-year-old, but Pinky was asleep on the arm of the couch and Kate somersaulted onto the couch and flipped Pinky, head over tail, right on the floor. Poor now-awake Pinky was frozen, wondering how he got to the floor. Walter, the pup was banned to Chloe's doghouse until all the company was gone so no pictures of him either.

This last one I loved for no reason.

Have a great Sunday one and all. Thanks for stopping by and wading through my pictures and odd thoughts.

BIG SNOW--LITTLE SNOW. LITTLE SNOW--BIG SNOW.

Derrel--one of the world's most delightful people--grew up hearing this saying: "Big snow, little snow. Little snow, big snow. " This wisdom came from the Indians. Perhaps the Piutes, who lived in and around Kanab, Utah where Derrel grew up. There were Navajos Indians living there too. Derrel doesn't know exactly which tribe had the saying. Perhaps both. Perhaps all the Indian tribes who live in parts of the country where snow is prevalent have this saying.

I just visited with Derrel on the phone and he says he can hear the Indians say it still. Slowly, with dignity. "Big snow." (Pause) "Little snow." (Pause, pause.) Little snow." (Pause.) "Big snow."

When the snowflakes are big the accumulated snowfall will be small. When the snowflakes are little the accumulated snowfall will be big. Derrel says that through the years he has seen this proven to be true almost 100% of the time. Since Derrel told Phil this about ten years ago I have observed the same.

Today was a little snow, big snow day. The snow sifted down, as if the angels, dusting Christmas cookies with powdered sugar were making a mess in the Heavenly kitchen. I was driving with my daughter, Elizabeth, in the powdered sugar snow. At first it was fine, the windshield wipers took the sifting off with no problems.

We went to Borders. We browsed for a l-o-n-g time. When we came out the car was covered. The side mirrors, which I didn't notice, looked like oblong snowballs. We got back on the road, the v-e-r-y slippery road, and when I needed to change lanes I looked in the side-oblong-snowballs and realized I had a problem. We rolled the windows down, scrapped the snow off but it was frozen in diamonds underneath. With our fingernails we scraped. It didn't make much difference.

I drove to a store--that shall be un-named--to see if they had any good toys I might need to buy for the grandkids. I am not mentioning the name because this store gives my daughter the shivers--she might be somewhat of a store-snob--and she spent most of my in-store-shopping-time in the car, freezing to death and fogging the windows.

The savvy store had printed a $5.00 off coupon and it was like a free five-dollar bill, pulling me in. I did find what I was hoping to, which I won't mention here because there is a slight, very slight chance the parents of those grandkids might read this blog and say to the grandkids, "I know what Grandma and Grandpa are getting you for Christmas." There is nothing more annoying than someone who knows a secret, a secret about you, and taunts you with it. My children take every opportunity to taunt. They have the annoying gene. It comes from my husband's side, I'm pretty sure. Okay, there is a slight chance it comes from mine. Slight.

I stashed my wonderful purchases in the back of the car and got in the driver's seat. I looked at my blue-tinged daughter and said, "Where to now?"

"Barnes and Noble," she said. (She has a hard time getting her fill of bookstores. She writes like a dream, and absolute dream--I am so jealous--and one day her books will be on the shelves. Bookstore air is an elixir to her.)

Backing up was an act of faith, due to Elizabeth's breath coating the windows, and both of us hung out the windows to make sure we weren't running over Rudolph, .

Then I proceeded to slide all over the road. I tried to put 4-wheel drive on but since I have the technological-non-functioning-gene it wouldn't work. Cars, with all their technological innards, enjoy taunting me. There's a lot of taunting going on in this world.

"Are you sure you want to go to Barnes and Noble?" I asked.

No answer. I looked over at her white face and clinched knuckles. "You better just take me home," she said in a weak voice.

"I was going to buy you lunch at Cafe Rio and you were going to come home and download my pictures and show me how to put pictures on my blog."

"Not today," she said, color starting to come back into her face. "Just take me home." Obviously starvation was preferable to what she perceived my driving might lead to.

I drove the car, slipping and sliding but because I grew up driving in snow I knew what to do to come out of a slide. If I didn't we would have done 360's. Lots of 360's. As the car slipped and slid and as I pulled it out of the slides the color left her face permanently. She may have to use tanning cream until she's ninety.

We drove down University Avenue and I pointed out a stand of trees, frosted with snow and a wire fence, wrapped in whiteness.

"Isn't that beautiful?" I asked, trying to ignore the fear we both felt because of the road conditions.

No comment. She had no interest in beauty. She wanted to go to her apartment, where it was safe. Were things didn't slide into each other.

So I took her home and sure enough, the car slipped into the gutter. Because it could and because of the taunting it so enjoys. I couldn't drive out of this one. I could back up but could not go forward. I didn't want to back home in the sifting, powdered sugar snow so I had her enlist the help of her friends and they pushed me out. I drove in first gear for two blocks and then, miraculously, the 4-wheel drive kicked in. It waited until my bloodless-faced child was gone. It so loved to give her a good scare, my taunting car.

I drove twenty miles an hour--or less--the five miles home. I passed every policeman in the city, helping people out of smashed cars. One three car pileup had the middle car tipped in the air like a stink bug. I wonder how the end car felt as it watched the rear end of the middle car plow into it's windshield.

So, today was a little snow, big snow day. I don't know if the Indians have any wisdom about the slipperiness of the snow but if they do, I'd like to know what it is. The next time those conditions are right I'm staying home. Bookstore or no bookstore--bargains or no bargains. I'm staying home.