Grand Canyon

At the last minute Thursday of last week I decided to go with my friend to her family reunion in Kanab. I scrambled to get the sacrament program done and sent to someone to print and hand out since I would be gone. I rearranged my plans for the weekend and made sure work was taken care of so I could skip out on Friday. I've been to St. George but never to Kanab or Arizona, Lake Powell or the Grand Canyon. I'm not sure why I had the expectation of red, hot, dry, and more dusty american desert (vs sandy african deserts), but when we went from Utah to Arizona, the land changed from dry and sparse to forest wilderness, more reminisce of Washington and Oregon than Utah. Forest stretched into the distance on either side of the road, bark a beautiful red, meadows lining parts of the road, glimpses of deer amidst the trees. The noise and clutter of my mind stilled while I gazed as far as I could into the forest, music and talk settled into a background murmur. We drove by at 60 MPH, but it felt like the world had slowed to that moment, the peace of nature welcoming me home. Before I knew it the grand canyon had come up on my right and I didn't even notice. I turned to look and through the trees I could see a tremendous gap in the earth of red rock and dirt, more what I had expected than a wilderness paradise.

At the grand canyon, the line of trees ended and 10 feet later the cliff sides dropped into the earth's crevice. Despite my fear of heights, I went out onto long, thin walkways, sheer drops on either side of the path.

The view was beautiful and if I didn't think about falling down the chasm I was fine. Early afternoon the weather really started to turn, raining first and lowering to mid-forties. I'd brought my wool sweater, but not any rain gear, thinking it would be hot and dry in June. We saw lightning streak across the sky above the canyon, which was awe-some and I wished I'd gotten a picture of it.



Then the rain cleared up a bit and we decided to go for a walk along one of the trails. Just as we started back to the car and had only a mile or less to go it started to snow. In June!? The temp dropped to thirty-two degrees and quickly we were all soaked. On the way back to Kanab the snow fell so hard it was a world of white around us, no wilderness, no meadows, no trees, merely snow. Not what I had expected at all. Still beautiful and peaceful though.

That was on Saturday. Friday was Lake Powell and Sunday was Horseshoe Bend overlook and the Cathedral Wash hike in Arizona. At Horseshoe Bend I got as close as I could bear to the edge, which wasn't that close and looked down on a beautiful river. The dogs found a lizard about that and chased it until it dropped off its tail to save its life. It worked too. We were all too fascinated with the severed yet still wiggling tail. We watched until it stopped moving.

This area was the Arizona I had pictured. We hiked through Cathedral Wash, going deeper and deeper into the dry river bed, watching as the rock looked more and more like strange red skeletons of what once was there, pocks and openings everywhere.

On the way home, Utah was the most green and beautiful I'd seen it, especially for the lower half.

My Mother, the Saint

My mom is amazing. While raising her own five kids, ages 3-11, she did daycare in her home, adding 5-10 kids to the mix. She did this for 8 years, along with doing such things as teaching early morning seminary; gleaners-a welfare program where food was brought into our home (a pile of food so high in our living that I could swim in it)-so people in need could pick up food from us; she cooked and cleaned; she dealt with my brother who had ADHD, my other brother who has dyslexia, both of which ended up being homeschooled, and me and my copious amounts of energy. There were relatives that would stop by without notice, stay for dinner, ask for the last piece, my mother's piece, and when given it would just eat the whipping cream or top off of it. She dealt with a nearby mother-in-law who was controlling and not always the nicest person and who owned the home we lived in so she felt she had a say in what we did and after 8 years of us living there asked us to leave. There is so much more, it would take me ages to go through it all.

Now my mother, at age 62 1/2, should be able to relax and enjoy life with an empty nest, working in her garden (yes, she still does a garden every year). Instead, two of my older brothers still live at home and now that mother-in-law, at 82, is going to move in and be cared for by my mom. When we heard Granny had a stroke, my mother without hesitation said it would be fine for granny to live with them since they had the best layout where everything was on the same level and granny wouldn't have to worry about stairs.

There is a special place in heaven for my mother. And she said if there isn't, she'll just say "oh, hell" and swear on her way back past the pearly gates. See, she is amazing.