Anniversary

We got married today. In 1974. In Wyoming. The next day, it snowed three inches. Aw...Springtime in the Rockies! So when I got home this afternoon from a rollicking day with fourth grade ---it was Field Day!!!--we decided to go out on a date. It was pretty low-key because we're going to eat out at a really nice place tomorrow night with our daughter who is coming for a short visit.

But, it was such a fabulous night here in the desert that we just wanted a little motorcycle ride and a quick meal. What a gorgeous evening for a ride, too. It's about 80 degrees, and the air is perfectly clear from the breeze that was going all day. After we ate some yummy Mexican chicken, we drove up over the hill and down into the desert that is on the north shore of Lake Mead. It's a great ride, through a little canyon and down and around past huge rocks and the hardy little plants that somehow survive out there. We stopped at a turnout and just looked up at the stars that were finally starting to pop out into view.

CoolGuy asked me if I remembered my first ride on his motorcycle. Umm...no, actually, neither of us could recall it. We figure it was probably to the beach. That was a favorite place to ride because both of us couldn't get enough of looking at the ocean. We often drove down to the beach and then headed up along the edge of the tall cliffs that overlooked the ocean a little south of that beach. So, it could have been there. Here are some photos of motorcycle rides through the years.

 

1974:  This is the first motorcycle we shared, and this is the year we got married. We were on Mount Palomar in San Diego. SoCal was just the best place ever to ride a motorcycle. (1938 Knucklehead)

 

 

1975:  This was after we were married, before we had kids. I think I was on my way to a night class to learn shorthand or something. I didn't end up pursuing that career. But I really liked riding this motorcycle, too. (1950 Panhead) (my favorite motor)

 

 

1980: We'd been married long enough to create three kids when we had this motorcycle. We shared babysitting with some friends and this time they had our kids overnight while we went to a camping/biker event. We watched their girls while they went to a dental convention in L.A. for a weekend. (1961 Panhead with Shovel top end)

 

1982: Everyone liked to ride the motorcycle. There was a Saturday tradition that each week someone got their turn to ride down to Denny's and have breakfast with Daddy.

(1961 Panhead with Shovel top end)

 

 

 

1983: One year we decided that we needed a Christmas picture. Three rolls of film later, we managed to finally get one that had everyone smiling, looking at the camera, and no dogs were running through the shot. (1961 Panhead with Shovel top end)

 

 

1987:  We moved to Idaho after thirteen years in San Diego, and immediately realized that we actually didn't like winter anymore. We lasted there about two and a half years and then CoolGuy got a transfer back to California. In the meantime, he bought this bike from his late friend's estate. A good memory of a life-long, almost-brother. 

 (1969 Shovelhead)

 

1992:  It's so much nicer to ride when the grass is always green and the sky is usually blue. We lived near the ocean for six years, and I don't think he took the truck to work more than a few days. Contrary to a really old song: It does rain in Southern California, every once in a while. (1969 Shovelhead)

 

 

1997: From the Pacific to the Atlantic...well, the Chesapeake Bay, at least. We got transferred again. It's very, very green on the East Coast. There are an amazing number of bugs,too. So, keep your lips closed when you ride, or you'll be scraping insects off your teeth when  you get home.

(1969 Shovelhead with a new paint job.)

 

 

2010: After ten years in the East, we came home to the West. Although we live in the desert, sometimes we take the bike to SoCal and visit our old haunts. My favorite ride is still Pacific Coast Highway.

(1969 Shovelhead)

 

 

2011:  This is an old tradition, too--the New Year's Day ride. We do it because we can...I hope to keep this tradition going till I'm older and grayer. (1969 Shovelhead) (still...)

 

 

 

2012:  Now we've got grandchildren who join in the fun. Everyone likes a motorcycle ride. You can't beat it! CoolGuy has been wrenching and improving and refining this same bike for over twenty years. It'll be the one we drive for the next 39 years, probably. And if we can't keep riding together on two wheels, then we'll just have to wear our leather jackets in our wheelchairs.

Happy Anniversary to us.

The Last Class

Tonight, I walked down the stairs after class, and with each step I thought, "Last time I have to walk on these stairs!" I walked across the campus and admired the beautiful trees, and realized that I don't need to walk across that quad any more. I decided to stop off at Seafood City and pick up some shrimp to serve at a celebratory "Last Class" dinner.

I've finished the master's degree. YEAH!! It was the last class tonight. I'm walking in the graduation on Sunday afternoon. (after I play for Sacrament meeting...) YEAH!! I started in  2009 and now I get to graduate. I'm getting a master of science degree in Educational Psychology. It's mostly about research and how to do it and how to be an intelligent consumer. So, I don't know exactly what I'll do with this new cool credential, but I'm so relieved to have achieved it. Ta Da.

A Beautiful Song

Hymn 127

 

Does the journey seem long, the path rugged and steep?

Are there briars and thorns on the way?

Do sharp stones cut your feet as you struggle to rise

To the heights thru the heat of the day?

 

Is your heart faint and sad, your soul weary within,

As you toil 'neath your burden of care?

Does the load heavy seem you are forced now to lift?

Is there no one your burden to share?

 

Let your heart be not faint now the journey's begun;

There is One who still beckons to you.

So look upward in joy and take hold of His hand;

He will lead you to heights that are new.

 

A land holy and pure, where all trouble doth end,

And your life shall be free from all sin,

Where no tears shall be shed, for no sorrows remain.

Take His hand and with Him enter in.

 

Written by Joseph Fielding Smith

(1876--1972)

 

I read this song today during the sacrament service, and it felt like a warm, comfortable arm had been placed around my shoulders. It isn't used much in church for singing, so it isn't familiar to many. However there was a really gentle version performed by the Tabernacle Choir in conference last fall that is faithful to the quiet spirit of the poem. It made me think of a few dear ones -- family and friends -- and I wanted to post this so that they might read the words, then listen to the performance, and feel that comfortable hug that I felt today. I recognize that the "joy" in the song may be referencing the Eternal Joy to be experienced when we return to our home in heaven. But, it is my experience that we can feel joy now, too, as we toil 'neath our burdens of care. I'm sharing your burden, too. I know you share you mine, dear friends. So together, let's just send out those good thoughts to one another and look upward in joy. Take His hand, now. 

 

 



Happy Birthday To Her

It's a birthday post again. Our second child, first daughter, is celebrating today. I heard that she's rubbing off on her daughter who got up and made a delicious pancake breakfast for her mother to celebrate! Being a good cook is a family tradition for them. I remember my daughter started to bake cookies when she was about that age, too--fourth grade--because, she told me, "I wanted cookies more often than you had time to make them. So I thought I'd just start making them myself." It was a success.

Now, she is a college graduate (all paid for by scholarships) and has just started a superb new job in a university library in acquisitions. It is probably the most appropriate match-up of interest to vocation I could ever imagine. Her----Library---New Books.  Here are some adorable photos to celebrate her life.

 

One of her first cooking successes: Christmas cookie decorating.

Ballet dancer

 

 Carousel riding in Seaport Village, San Diego

 



 

This is the branch from which she fell that resulted in that broken wrist.

 

So adorable...

This is not a particularly flattering photo...but it is a true rendition: reading all the time, regardless of whatever else needed done. (Such as finishing dressing.) She taught herself to read at three and a half and has never looked back. Her new job as a university librarian is exactly the right career.

 

LOVE YOU FAYE!

In Praise of Modern Medicine

I'm lying here on couch, with a four inch long bandage taped to my shin. My leg is still orange from the betadine wash, and the word "yes" in permanent purple marker on the leg just below my knee.  I'm typing on my iPad. The surgery went very well, it didn't last long, the recovery will just be a couple of days. I have a deep incision in the muscle so he could get to the nerve, so it aches quite a bit. But...I have a really nice little pill that knocks that back effectively.

But...prepare the trumpets...when I stood to walk to the bathroom this morning, my foot did not have an ice pick jabbing into the side!!  So far, so good.  I'll test it again several more times as the weekend progresses. My leg is quite sore, so I don't feel comfortable really putting my foot through the paces.  So I'll let the surgical site heal up.but...looks good so far...I'm cautiously optimistic.

(And thank you so much for all the kind words, thoughts and prayers.)

Franken Foot Update

Haven't heard about the feet for quite a while, huh? Well, tomorrow I'm having a little "procedure" done and I thought I'd tell you about it. It's been two years since I had the first surgery for the torn posterior tibial tendon. I laid on the couch for six weeks, then went back to work in the boot till school ended. I finally got back into shoes about mid-June and it felt rather sore still. But, hey! It'd had been totally rebuilt only a few weeks earlier, so I didn't worry much about the pain. I did head back in the doctor to complain about it a little. He really thought it just needed more time, too. About the first of October, I realized one morning that my other foot was now the messed up one. It was really flopped over, in a lot of pain, etc. etc. I went in, got it diagnosed and we started up the whole stupid process again--months of wearing the cast, then the surgery, then the recovery, etc. etc. Well, the right foot was still in pain.

And I don't just mean a little achy...I mean an icepick stabbing me in the side of my foot with each and every step. That kind of pain. I attributed it to my having to favor my new messed-up foot. And then stomping around in a cast for months. But, finally, I got the new messed-up foot all fixed and well again, and still I was in agony. We tried this and that and another thing. Finally, when nothing made any difference at all after nearly a year of messing with it, my doctor referred me to a neurologist.

Which brings me to tomorrow's "procedure." We're pretty sure that a group of nerves got pinched in that area when the bone was healing around the metal insert that was put into my foot to restore it to a normal position after the tendon graft. Rather than go in there and try to un-pinch them, because there are so many little tendrils of it, the neurologist is going to cut the main branch of that nerve up in my shin, so that the impulses from that area will be shut off for good. Of course, I'll have a numb toe, too. BUT...I would choose that over the excruciating pain-with-every-step I've been dealing with for two years.

So, tomorrow afternoon, I go in for a short visit to my old friends at the hospital, and once again get conked out, and cut open, and sewed up. However, this will be a much shorter, less complex surgery and I should be home fairly soon to sleep off the anesthetic. I'm staying home from school until Monday to let things heal up. Then, back in the saddle on the run-away horse of the Last Month of School. And hopefully, I won't be on the lame horse anymore!!! Wish me luck!

Tell About A Time....

The learning standard was to write a personal narrative and the prompt was "Tell about a time when you were disappointed and things didn't turn out like you wanted."  It was part of long diagnostic test that the students had taken, and many of them wrote very little or wrote a fairly boring introduction along the lines of "I am going to tell about a time when I was disappointed."  Now, I'd spent a great deal of time in the last month grinding away on the concept that when one is answering a small question (called a "constructed response" in test jargon) that it is critical to restate the question and then answer it. Then, in the next sentences explain your reasons for that answer with details from the text. Don't use because in your topic sentence; then it isn't a topic sentence any longer---it's a detail sentence. So, I know why they used that dead form "I am going to tell you about...."

However, we re-read the directions and it explained that they were actually not responding to a text they'd read---they were supposed to write a personal narrative. Sigh. Teachers are always changing stuff on us, just when we kind of get good at something. Sigh. Read directions??? Are you kidding???

So, to stimulate thinking for this, and to help them to understand the idea of explaining a "disappointment" I wrote a paragraph to read to them. We've studied before how to write a narrative and how to start it out with a compelling opening; something that will motivate the reader to continue reading. So, I tried to write a paragraph that would get them thinking about how they could try to motivate their readers. (ahem...me.)

I turned the corner in our high school hallway,  and headed down toward the junior lockers. There was Deb, talking to Chad, and my heart started to beat nervously. Now was my chance! It was two weeks until the Sadie Hawkins Dance and I planned to ask Deb to be my date. I was almost there, when, suddenly, all my plans were ruined!

 So, do you want to know more? Are you interested? Can you tell that I was excited and happy and then found myself "disappointed?"  My students got the message. In fact, when I read each small group that tiny paragraph, they all leaned in toward me, and when I ended the last sentence, nearly simultaneously and breathlessly said, "What happened next?!?!?"  It was an awesome lesson. I asked them, "So...you want to know what happens next, huh?  So, did I write an interesting opener? Do you understand that this is definitely about a time I had a disappointment? Can you tell that, at first, everything was going great, I expected to get what I wanted and I was excited, and then.....blah."

It changed the whole lesson. Suddenly everyone (well, most everyone) figured out how to rewrite their story. 1st: let the reader know that everything was going to be great and why. 2nd: let the reader realize that something went wrong with your plan.  Then, go on and tell about the let-down. Voila: a great personal narrative about a time when you were disappointed. They eagerly rewrote their opening paragraphs, and next week, we'll spend some time completing those stories and sharing them.

And, yes, I did tell them the end of my story. Just then, another girl came around a different corner, and she got there to Deb about three steps ahead of me. I saw her approach him, realized why she was there, heard her ask, heard him reply "Yes" and then suddenly, I needed to figure out how I was going to pretend that I was walking up to him for some other reason, or that I wasn't really walking over to him, or something!!  It was a terrible disappointment. I'd developed a serious crush on him, and now it was not meant to be. In fact, I had to figure out how to get out of there without being embarrassed. The kids were very sympathetic as I told "The Rest of the Story" and some suggested that I should have stepped up and tried to get him to change his mind. However, I asked them if they'd ever seen a cartoon or a movie where two people are walking toward each other, and there are hearts and little birds flying around and beautiful music is playing as their eyes meet?  Well, that's the way it was with Deb and Marie. Then I told the students that a couple of years later, after high school, those two got married and they've been married ever since: nearly 40 years! Oh. Well, they optimistically asked me, "Who did you go to the dance with? Did you go ask Mr. [CoolGuy] then?"  Um....no. He had a girlfriend already. I did find a nice boy to ask, and he had a cool car, so it was okay ultimately.

They love to hear stories of my life, and they love to give me advice about how I should have conducted myself. I assure them that someday their traumatic life events will simply be a good story to tell their children and that they'll get over almost everything. Plus---all these things that happen can be turned into really interesting stories to write the next time some test prompt asks them to write a personal narrative!!

More Spring Fever

As I walked out of the school on Friday night, the air was fabulous! The sun was low in the sky, the wind was still, it was pleasantly warm. I crossed the parking lot and ducked under the foliage of a mesquite tree and was enveloped in a sweet scent almost like honeysuckle. I'd forgotten that mesquite trees have such a lovely aroma when they bloom. It doesn't look much like a flower. They're just a fuzzy, long tube-thing that, upon close inspection, have teeny little blooms all up and down the stem. They hang in clusters on the branches.

 

They're about the size of an adult finger.

 

The mesquite trees in our parking lot are loaded with these blooms.

 

 

These trees provide shade for our cars during the school day as the weather begins to heat up. They're native to southern Nevada, so they tolerate the high temperatures and need very little water.

 

You see how small the leaves are, and they're very resinous too--all important features of a desert dweller. These flowers will turn into seed pods, and--I learned from my nature field trips--that coyotes are a main consumer of these seeds. The early people who lived here ground up the seeds on a metate to make a cake or a porridge. The seeds are full of protein.

 

 

Well, I wasn't the only one enjoying the beautiful evening air filled with the scent of the honey mesquite. Ummm...I guess that's why they call it the "honey" mesquite, huh?

 

Every one of these trees lining the median in our parking lot was vibrating with hundreds of bees, gobbling up the nectar from those tiny, tiny flowers. I'm going to have to look for some mesquite honey in the grocery store. I'm sure that the beautiful scent has to translate into some really tasty toast topping. The bees were working enthusiastically and I'm sure their honey will be terrific.

 

And, yes, I spent about twenty minutes photographing bees and flowers. It was such a great night to be outside. I think we need to plant one of these in our yard so we can enjoy the beautiful aroma and be a host to bees every spring.