Blue darts –-

There’s a program on my I-pod called Cool Facts. Some of the information is really cool, other bits of information were just a waist of time. How a slinky was invested, you can lead a cow upstairs but not down. That makes me wonder if a country kid snuck a cow into his two-story schoolhouse how do you get it out – or do you just plan a barbeque? I guess that doesn’t matter because a school now days have to be handicap accessible and not being able to walk downstairs is a handicap. So most likely they would have an elevator.

One fact I saw the other day was that in Japan they had a national contest involving who could fart the loudest and longest. Now this information is cool to a little boy and some immature adults. I know, your hoping I’m not writing a story about this! Sorry – so here we go. Now this would be important to me because this is one area I could have been a national champion. When I was a kid I didn’t know what it was called or why it happened, but I’m lactose intolerant. This is a fancy way of saying dairy products give me gas.

Now its just uncomfortable – well I’m sure it was back then too, but as a kid you hardly ever thought about holding it in. In the right situations it was even a desired ability to produce at a moments notice. At my age now you would say I’m a little more couth – or maybe I just can’t trust the results of such an event. In my case it’s not just dairy products that I have a problem with – I mean there are certain foods that everyone has problems with. One of these is sauerkraut. I love sauerkraut, and the best thing with a krautdog is a glass of milk. Mom made the best homemade sauerkraut I’ve ever had, then added with dairy – I guess my stomach would call it the perfect storm.

I mentioned at certain ages this ability is very desirable, one of these ages is twelve - especially as a boy scout sitting around a campfire. I’m sure most older people have seen the movie “Blazing Saddles” and their famous campfire scene. Now this may be how cowboys do it, but scouts take it to the next level. Having gas is a natural event and in a way could be considered natural gas. In our furnace natural gas gives off a pleasant light blue flame, well the same is true for the other kind of gas as well – thus blue darts got their name.

Now scoutmasters try to tell the scouts about the time a kid received internal burns – I don’t know if that ever happened but I speak from experience and as a witness that the other parts are true. If you sit just right and hold a lit match a short distance from the explosion the natural gas is indeed flammable and blue. Of course it’s something you only want to do at night – otherwise it would be like lighting fireworks in the daytime. As a scoutmaster I tried to stop the kids from participating, which was hard when the assistant scoutmaster grabbed the matches and joined in. The longer and more powerful the excretion - the larger and longer the flame. I’ll admit as a kid the first time I was a little scared and only participated after seeing the other boys do it. I’ve seem this phenomenon a few times as a kid and just about as many times as a scoutmaster. For some reason things like this seem to be passed down for generations.

This isn’t the only time being able to perform at will was a benefit. As teenagers hanging out with the guys it seems to be a opportunity to show you are still a little kid in a big body. One time we were driving around in my friends VW Bug and I got stuck in the back. I asked them to open the windows because it was a little stuffy. One of the guys didn’t want to because he was cold; well I knew how to solve that problem. Of course every time he tried to roll them back up the perfect storm from dinner came to the rescue.

Co-worker -

I’m too old to say someone I work with is like a father to me, but to say he’s more like an older brother would insinuate that he beat the crap out of me on a number of occasions. If I were to say he was an equal it would show my cockiness and self-glorification. Over the years I can honestly say that I have never met anyone with more integrity, honesty and who is genuinely a great guy. Now before he’s translated I need to point out that he is human and occasionally shows up to work ornery and discouraged. How couldn’t you, working in the banking industry the last couple of years? Like myself he has seen his retirement funds down the drain enough to cause permanent depression – at least it has to me. But he always remains positive and upbeat in my misery. As an employee I have never seen anyone be such a jack-of-all-trades. When he leaves we will all freeze or sweat to death, the lawns will die and who will help me shovel the walks? As a banker his job has been to make loans, in doing so he has also educated and changed the lives of thousands of people. Through his tutelage they have learned to budget, save and develop the skills necessary to improve their situations and find peace of mind. The company we work for has a slogan – “we haven’t forgotten who keeps us in business.” His slogan could easily be “he hasn’t forgotten the worth of each individual.” He treats everyone with kindness and respect – even if they don’t deserve it. Enough of the mushy stuff, he does have a couple of things wrong with him – he’s color bind, but still is more color coordinated than I am. He has more hair than I do – but does a little comb over. Despite the fact we’re getting older there are a few of his personality traits that are contagiously youthful. He has a love for cars and has models of some of his favorite in his office, but the one I’m the most jealous of is his relationship with his beautiful wife. They are like teenagers falling in love again for the very first time. Now I’m sure they have their difficulties, but I don’t see how they could be mad at each other long enough to make it worthwhile. He is one of the valued people that I bounce my life off of. He has never, out load, called me an idiot or made me feel like I’m a waste of time. He laughs at my stupid jokes and stories that I make him read. He always sees the silver lining in what ever is going on in my life – when I think it’s all tarnished. At work I feel he’s kind of got a raw deal. Over the past number of years a bunch of yuppie types has gotten into upper management and created a number of fancy titles or positions. These are now the people that need to take care of the most profitable clients, because of his age he has evolved into the position that basically has taken care of everything else, and he does it very well. Because of the economic downturn the bank has asked him if he would like to take an early retirement package. Now if I recall he’s already sixty-two, so I’m sure retirement is something he has thought about before. His package wouldn’t be considered a golden parachute – it’s probably not a parachute at all. But a few months ago his wife retired from her job and now they get to spend all day together, which would be suicide for some people but not for them. Entering a new stage or frontier of life is exciting, but also a little scary. There is no doubt in my mind that he will continue to succeed in what ever he decides to do. He’s not the sit in a rocking chair and watch TV all day type. Indeed he has been a great friend over the years that at times have filled all of the categories I mentioned at the first. I do look up to him as a fatherly influence – a brother, I would do anything for him if he needed it, and he would say an equal because he would never put himself above anyone else in importance. Good luck and God bless you and your family for many years to come.

Lunch man--

We’ve all made mistakes that have been embarrassing to ourselves and to those with whom we love. Sometimes that embarrassment isn’t because we did something wrong, it’s just that we have different opinions of what’s acceptable or brings shame to the family name. I have a trouble fashion sense, I guess you don’t wear a denim shirt with denim pants or wear a denim shirt at all, and socks with sandals – forget it. On more than one occasion I have come home from work and someone will give me that look, “you didn’t really wear that in public did you.”

What’s cool or OK with kids isn’t always cool with parents. Years ago my older brother was working at a local grocery store and called my father to see if he could get a ride home. My Dad said that he was on the way to the dump and would swing by to see if he was ready – if not he would then go to the dump first and come back. Now the family station wagon wasn’t the coolest car in the first place, but when dad pulled in the parking lot with some old pee stained mattresses on the top can you blame my brother for hiding between two cars until dad decided to come back later.

Once another brother got in trouble at the local high school and had to have Mom come in for a conference. Of course he didn’t want anyone to know his mom had to come in, so he convinced her to enter the building through a fire escape instead of the main entrance, and of course if you came in that way that’s the way to go out. The amazing part of the story is that she went for it.

Not only did our parents embarrass us but also now it has passed on to the next generation. Once my wife had to go to the school because of one of our daughters, because she knew she was coming she decided to pick out my wife’s clothes for her so she didn’t look too bad. Luckily there’s a time that the tables turn back and your kids actually think your fun to be with again.

The other night all the younger kids were hanging out with their friends so we called one of our married daughters to see if they wanted to go to dinner with us. They were really excited and we had a great time. Now maybe the reason they were excited was because they knew we would pick up the bill and it had nothing to do with being with us. But since I’m writing the story I will assume the best.

I guess that turning point depends on the kid’s maturity and what you’re doing together, if there’s a free meal you can put up with the old guy in the corner. Ten isn’t that age, the last couple of years my wife has taken a part time job at the elementary school because they needed help during lunch. She really enjoys most of it, especially the kids. Last year there were a couple of days that one of the lunch ladies had to take some time off. Now this wasn’t one of the cooks, this was the one that walked around the room wiping down the tables so the next group of kids would have a clean place to sit. Well they we’re having a hard time finding a substitute so I volunteered.

This was only for an hour or so per day, so I didn’t have to take any time from work it just became my lunch break. I know a lot of the kids at the school and when the new lunch lady was a man and had a tie on - it took a few of them by surprise – especially my ten-year-old daughter. “Oh my gosh are you kidding.” It wasn’t bad enough that I was having the time of my life - but all kinds of kids started to ask her if this was my new job. Of course I didn’t know all the rules as well. At one table of boys – which many of them I knew quite well, I had them laughing and making a bit of noise. As I walked away one of the lunch ladies in the kitchen came out and gave them the business for being so loud.

After she was gone I looked over and told them I was sorry since it was my fault. None of them seemed to have lasting physiological problems from the situation – well except my daughter. Her dad was walking around the room with a dishrag making a total fool out of himself. A couple of weeks later they needed someone again – I was too busy at work to help out – at least that’s what I told them.

Teachers -

All of us have had teachers that have made an impact in our lives. Now that impact isn’t always good. I’ve had teachers that have failed at what they tried to teach me – but in the process taught me valuable lessons. One Sunday school teacher jumped up on his chair and yelled at us, something about going to hell. Now that might be true, but it wasn’t for what we were doing in class. One of the students stood on his chair and told him he was teaching false doctrine. Another Sunday school teacher, after a stirring music practice as a congregation, was failing miserably in class as we were singing the answers to his questions. Instead of getting mad he started to sing the questions. I don’t remember the topic we were discussing but I remember we thought he was pretty cool. Sometimes what you have planned just isn’t going to work, that doesn’t mean you’ve stopped teaching. One teacher that taught me something I wasn’t planning on learning also happened to be my football and baseball coach. He wasn’t that great of a coach, thus the reason he was fired. Now firing the football coach after the end of the season doesn’t eliminate him as a teacher for the rest of the year. He wasn’t to happy about being fired as the coach and it affected the way he taught history. As I mentioned he also was the baseball coach, which he was better at than football. I was in his history class and at the end of the third quarter I asked him what my grade would be. He said I deserved a “D” – that wasn’t true I had done a lot better than that; I had never received a “D” in my life. After a couple of minutes of arguing we came to an agreement. Later that day was the first baseball game of the season and if I hit a homerun I would get an “A” – triple a “B” – double a “C” and if I only got a single I would get the “D.” He never said what would happen if I went hitless, I guess it never really crossed my mind. Our game was against Morgan High School, when we got to the school I instantly noticed a couple of things that were to my advantage: first – there were no fences, this meant a good line drive could go for ever, second – left field was slightly downhill, third – as I watched the pitcher warming up he couldn’t throw a decent curveball. I was a pretty good fastball hitter, but a good curveball got me every time. It didn’t take long for me to fret or feel pressure, as in the first inning I hit a doozey. As it went over the left fielders head I turned on the steam – I was rounding third before he got to the ball. As I headed for home I raised me hands and started to yell, “I get an A, I get an A. There was only one other person that knew what I was talking about. To his credit or fault he gave me the “A.” In hindsight it’s a good story, but not a grade that I deserved or an action that was appropriate for a teacher. Another teacher that did something that would look inappropriate actually had a positive effect. The same year as my baseball experience I had a class that was released time and had no effect on my high school requirements. Because it didn’t really matter what grade I got, I didn’t send time studying, which was quite obvious. During one of our test the teacher walked by and said maybe this will help and put the answer sheet on my desk. It took me by surprise and made me feel a little guilty. After that I actually study for the next few tests. At the end of the year he went around the class and said something about each person, the comments were sincere and positive. He predicted that I would be the one that would change the most in the next few years and talked about some of my qualities that weren’t so obvious. He made an impact on my life. Some of the great teachers see past the present and try to help their student reach their full potential. I had another released time experience where the instructor would always ask me what was going on in my life and joke about what I was doing. He knew I loved sports and would tell me I would only score as many points in basketball as I scored on his quizzes. Because I liked him and his class I started studying to do better on the quizzes. Some classes don’t give the teacher a lot of leeway on how the subject can be taught – but all teachers can show concern and appreciation for those they teach. And it can change their life.

Discipline –-

The world has changed its view of appropriate discipline or punishment so many times that who knows what will be acceptable when my kids are parents. Some states have done away with the death penalty because it is inhumane, despite the fact that most of the time it’s more humane than what the person did in order to qualify.

I’ve been through a couple of these changes that fall in this category. We had a principle in elementary school that had a paddle that looked like the end of ore – and he wasn’t afraid to use it. Occassionally when someone would run in the halls he would make them lean against the wall as if they were sitting on a chair, but the chair wasn’t there. The worse part of that is you were running for a reason, hopefully it wasn’t to the bathroom.

If you had to do it very long it started to hurt. I had a seventh grade social studies teacher that uses to swat our knuckles with a yardstick. Now I’m sure I was doing something wrong – but did I deserve that? More than once I have been grabbed but the nap of the neck or ear to quickly be escorted out of a room or a situation.

These were just in school – at home we had a couple of other rules. My mom would threaten us with a wooden spoon, but she was more bark than bite. Now my father followed through a couple of times on his threats. Disciplining our children isn’t always a positive experience, depending on which child; different things seemed to be effective. But I will admit that for the first two children spanking was an option – until I crossed the line.

This is told in my daughter’s own words – “It sounded like thunder beating on the carpeted floor as I shoved my little body into the smallest crack behind the closet door of the closest room I could run to. I was frantic, not enough time, not enough room, the door is opening, and he sees me - crap. I was a goner.

Well it was bad but not too bad now that it is over, I guess, I thought as I pulled down my pants to look at the red handprint though the leftover tears. It was bad enough that I would get to show mom at least she would make him sorry. I knew how to play the game. Look at what dad did mom! I re-teared for effect. My tiny bum had goose bumps from being exposed and sure enough the handprint wasn’t going anywhere in a hurry. This was not the first time I had been on the losing end of my father’s disciple but it may have been the last. Truth be told, I probably deserved a good spanking every now and again.”

In reality she did – but that is the last time I remember doing it. The later kids are thankful. Each kid is different, my son all I had to do is look at him sternly and he not only would get the message but also start to tear up. One of the younger ones made me want to go back to spanking – the only thing that seems to be effective is taking away her cell phone.

The fact is that no one does what you want them to do all of the time – and sometimes that’s good because we’re wrong ourselves. The older we get and have a little more experience, the more we realize that some of these things don’t matter as much as we think they do. The older kids always complain that the younger one get away with murder compared to what they had to do. It seems that each year our curfews are later, the allowances are larger, and our discipline isn’t as violent.

Maybe its just because I’m just older and slower than I use to be, or maybe I’ve started to pick my battles and not get as mad on the things that really don’t matter. I don’t remember what my daughter did that night, but everything else is crystal clear – especially my wife’s reaction – yeah that little girl knew how to play the game.

Sacred Places -

Many religions have their Mecca, Holy Grail or sacred edifices. Many are physical locations, others areas, places of peace and in other cases it’s a feeling – a state of being. In my case these places or locations are many. My personal belief is the most valuable thing that I have. It is the basis of my life, my relationship with my wife, kids and everyone that I come in contact with. These sacred locations can be because of personal or individual events. I remember going on a walk one evening, confused and discouraged that not only couldn’t I find my eternal companion – but I was having a hard time finding a young lady I wanted to go on a date with twice. In a park not very far from my house I sat on a picnic table to contemplate and pray for direction. I remember saying in my mind – Heavenly Father you know whom I’m compatible with, could you please help me to find her and give me direction. I had one of the strongest manifestations of the spirit, not to worry and it would happen shortly. It was just a few weeks later that I met my wife for the first time. We hadn’t lived close to each other during the previous years – she came to Logan to rent an apartment and that’s when we met. This is an event that is more spiritual than the location in which it took place – but it became a special place to me. Being a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is something that’s very important in my life. There are a few locations that are associated with the history of this great religion. One of these is the Sacred Grove – the location the boy Prophet Joseph Smith went to ask God which church he should join and where the first vision took place. Mormons believe that this is where God the Father and His son Jesus Christ appeared to that fourteen-year-old boy and started the restoration of Christ Church on earth. As a twelve-year-old boy I was given the opportunity to go to that same location. It was an event that I knew for many months before hand would be given to me. I viewed this as an occasion that would allow me the opportunity to ask God if it had in reality taken place. I spent those months reading the scriptures and praying that I would receive that answer upon my visit. The whole trip was more than ten days. When we finally went to the sacred grove we were allow to go off by ourselves – this is when I took the opportunity to ask the question that I had prepared for these many months. Unlike the Prophet Joseph Smith I didn’t see a light or see with my physical eyes heavenly beings like has happened all through the Bible, but I had a spiritual manifestation that was stronger than any I had ever had in my young life. Up to that point I believe I had felt the spirit a number of times – it was something I was familiar with, but not to this extent. There was no doubt in my heart, mind and being that he had answered my prayer. Since that time I have felt the spirit as strong as that day but never stronger. During my teenage years and beyond when I have faced trials and difficulties and questions of faith and dedication, I have been able to draw on this event to straighten my resolve and faith. It has become a building block of my testimony that God lives and Jesus is the Christ – that he in reality does hear and answer my humble prayers. He knows who I am and is willing to be there in my time of need. Over my life I have talked to hundreds of people that don’t know in there heart if there really is a God and that he knows who they are. This has been one of the greatest blessings and experiences in my life.

Rudger –-

I usually don’t write stories about one individual - unless it’s myself or another member of my family. But this kid has to many good ones to leave alone. We are only two months apart in age and lived within a block of each other for almost twenty years, even today it’s less than a mile between our houses. I still consider him a great friend. He was probably the fastest kid our age but really wasn’t that athletic (sorry).

We played just about every sport together in the early years. Most of these stories don’t relate to each other, except they include the same person. We grew up in an area where there were a lot of boys the same age and we did everything together. One day he announced that there were a bunch of cherries in his garage and we could have some if we wanted them. It was right after church and we had on our Sunday best, but for free cherries we weren’t going to go change first. There was one kid with a bright yellow shirt that was pretty good looking; all I ever wore to church was a white shirt. We all took a couple of hands full except this kid as he decided to un-tucked his shirt so he could take more. Apparently our friend didn’t have the authority to give away the family cherries, as his father came out and gave us the business. He walked up to the kid in the yellow shirt and smashed all his cherries – I think he thought we were stealing them and he was going to teach us a lesson. Besides this time he was really a nice guy and it surprised us all, his son was the one that said it was OK.

Another memorable story about the same time was when we were scouts. Now when your twelve years old you really think you know what’s going on but in reality your kind of stupid. One week we were complaining to our scoutmaster that we didn’t want to bring dues every week. Now as I recall it was only ten cents a week – but we didn’t want to give it away. There were a number of kids that accused the assistant scoutmaster of embezzling the funds. Now we all knew this wasn’t true and there wasn’t enough money to make it worth it even if they were inclined to do so.

Now the problem was the assistant scoutmaster worked at the city and there had been accusations made of this nature in the local paper. This is what made the kids think of it in the first place. Like I said, others had said it before - but he said it load enough for the scoutmaster hear it. You would have thought he said something about his mother wearing army boots. The scoutmaster kicked him out of scouts and told him to never come back. Now this didn’t last very long, as he called the scoutmaster later and asked to be reinstated.

When he came back the scoutmaster did something he shouldn’t have done - he told my friend to apologize to the assistant scoutmaster for what he had said. This may have been fine if he had heard it in the first place, but he wasn’t there that week and had no idea what events had transpired. He approached the assistant and told him what had been said and that he was sorry. The guy went ballistic, can you blame him. He started yelling at us and said a couple of things a scoutmaster shouldn’t say and stormed out the door and never come back.

The greatest story wasn’t his idea and he was only part of it because we made him. We showed up on his doorstep one time in high school and asked him what he was doing – he said nothing so we grabbed him and preceded to tie him up – with ropes. Now I’m an Eagle Scout I know how to tie great knots. We never put a gag in his mouth, we weren't too concerned what he would say, and as a matter of fact it made it funnier to hear his frustration. We then drove to a girls house that he had a crush on, I had told him earlier that he needed to just talk to her. We then put him on her doorstep, rang the doorbell and ran. We knew she was home and we would have come back if she wouldn’t have been – you just can’t leave a kid tied up on someone’s porch for a couple of hours.

They were kind of forced to talk to each other because - what else can you do when you answer the door and find some kid tied up on your front porch. It would have been cool if they ended up getting married and we were the ones that got them together – but oh well it was just a joke that turned out ok for us.

The next story was his idea and it got me in trouble so I guess the last one was kind of my attempt to get him back. For this story I’m going to use his own words, he put them in a story for my birthday.

“One day I overheard a conversation that described a unique scheme to make money. I told Paul how we could go around the neighborhood and pretend we were on a scavenger hunt – not with a long list of sundry items, but one through which we could make some sweet moo-lah. We would knock on a door an tell the homeowner we were on a scavenger hunt and that we were looking for, say, a 1975 quarter or dime or nickel. Sometimes when the people told us they only had a 1974-quarter we would reply, Oh yeah, we need that one also.

After we collected a pocketful of change, we thought we best head to Skanchy’s to spend our loot. We stopped at Paul’s house on the way. As we were walking down the driveway, Paul’s dad came out the front door and toward Paul and me. He addressed us and asked what we had been up to. Apparently one of the ward members had called Bishop Champlin and told him what we had been doing. He instructed Paul that what we had done was not right and that Paul should return the money. I knew it was time for me t go home. Through the years I’ve always looked to Paul as an example and value his friendship.”

There isn’t a great morale to these stories – but I was there for each of them and also value my friendship with Keith.