The Chicken Incident

Every high school senior has a dream. Some dream of fame. Others dream of great fortunes. Still others dream of finding the perfect soulmate. My buddy Dave had a dream when he was a senior, but it didn’t involve college gridiron glory, making a killing in the stock market, or any of Charlie’s Angels. No, Dave dreamed of stealing a chicken.

It wasn’t just any old hen that Dave wanted to steal; it was an eight-foot-tall fiberglass chicken that stood outside JoAnn’s Restaurant, at the south end of Main Street in Heber City. Dave and I endlessly dragged Main during the late winter and early spring of 1982 – listening to the music of the Go-Go’s, Journey, and Billy Joel, among others – and we passed that big bird a dozen times a night. As we burned our $1.28/gallon gasoline Dave would stare longingly at the hellacious hen and sigh wistfully, “There has to be something we could do with that chicken.”

Early spring turned into late spring. Soon graduation was just around the corner, with still no resolution to Dave’s poultry problem. I really don’t remember if me, Dave, Dale, Randy, or Jud finally decided that the fiberglass fowl would look pretty great sitting on the high school roof the morning after we graduated. It was probably a combination of all of our deviant minds. Anyway, whichever one of us who initially came up with the idea was a freakin‘ genius and – if there were any justice in the world – should be a multimillionaire now.

Finally, a plan was hatched – no pun intended. Dave and I made a sign to hang around the chicken’s neck. The sign read “Class of ‘82,” in honor of our awesome accomplishment of making it through high school. I guess for me graduation was an accomplishment, but that’s a tale for another time.

Graduation night – Wednesday, May 26, 1982 – finally came and, after all the pomp and circumstance, we retreated to a party at the home of Susan, Dave’s then girlfriend and now wife. 3:00 AM – the agreed upon hour – came agonizingly slowly, but it finally arrived. Our group of would-be poultry pilferers made our way stealthily out the door, so as not to arouse the suspicions of any females at the party who might have objected to our objective. We had already lost one good man for that very reason.

We took a couple of vehicles, including a truck, and proceeded to JoAnn’s Restaurant, the scene of the potential poultry plundering. Main Street was quiet, the silence broken only by the lackadaisical meandering of a bored cop, who was probably disappointed by the lack of action on graduation night. After ascertaining that said police officer was nowhere in sight, we made our move.

Lifting that bodacious bird turned out to be surprisingly easy. Not only was it held in place by just a few large chunks of concrete, it was unexpectedly light for an eight-foot-tall piece of molded plastic. While one of our group scanned Main Street for any onlookers who might have interrupted our larceny, the rest of us put the capacious capon into the back of a truck.

We approached the high school cautiously and made our way to the back of the building. There were garbage dumpsters there, which would make our lifting of the rapacious rooster onto the roof much easier. A few of our group, Dave included, climbed the dumpsters and stationed themselves on the roof in preparation for the placement of the plundered poultry. Two more stood on the dumpsters to relay the ripped-off rooster to the guys on the roof. The rest of us passed the pirated pullet to the men on the dumpsters, who in turn lifted it to the guys on the roof, who set the fabulous fowl by the large block W that stood guard over the main entrance of the school. Finally, Dave placed our “Class of ’82” sign around its neck.

At that moment, my best friend Don broke ranks, casually sauntered off, and hid behind one of the other dumpsters. I followed him to find out what the problem was. It turned out our adventure was a little too nerve-wracking for Don and he was worried what his girlfriend (and her family) would think if he were arrested for chicken rustling. I think he figured he could unobtrusively remain behind the dumpster should the cops break up our little poultry pirating party. After making sure Don was okay and that there wasn’t anything seriously wrong with him, I went back to the group in time to help down Dave and the other guys who had been on the roof.

We rejoined Susan’s party a little over an hour after we left. Our buddy, who couldn’t go with us because his girlfriend objected, looked at us dolefully, and we related the events of the previous hour to him. We spent the rest of the night watching videos, quite a comedown from the adrenalin rush we had experienced earlier.

At dawn the party broke up and all of us headed to a restaurant near JoAnn’s for an early morning breakfast. As we passed the high school, Coach Dan Hansen saw us, and Dave pointed to the rooster on the roof. Hansen gave us a thumbs up, which made Dave feel really good. Dan Hansen was the football coach, which at least doubled the value of his opinion.

We paused for a moment to appreciate the fruition of our night’s endeavors. As the first golden rays of the rising sun bathed the object of Dave’s finally appeased passion – no, not Susan; the ripped-off rooster – we all felt a sense of accomplishment. Not only had we graduated from high school, but we had also placed an eight-foot-tall fiberglass chicken on the roof of the school without getting caught. Life didn’t get any better than that.

Epilogue

I went home and collapsed into bed. Around two o’clock in the afternoon my mom woke me to tell me that I had a phone call. It was Dave. Our former high school principal, John Carlile, had called him to request that we return the chicken to its rightful owner. I’m not sure how Mr. Carlile found out we swiped the chicken; apparently, we weren’t as sneaky as we thought we were.

Dave picked me up, and then we drove to the Heber City Cemetery to retrieve Jud, who worked there on the grounds crew. The three of us went to the high school, climbed to the roof, reclaimed the chicken, and put it in the back of Dave’s father’s truck. We drove the short distance to JoAnn’s, where JoAnn herself was waiting for us. Expecting at least a tongue lashing for our misdeeds of the night before, we were pleasantly surprised when all she did was smile, shake her head, and say, “Thanks boys.”

After we left JoAnn’s, we decided to have a little fun with Don, our buddy who hid behind the dumpster the night before. We had passed Don’s girlfriend on the way to the cemetery earlier and stopped and talked to her briefly. We told her about the events of the previous evening and Don's participation in them. She got a big kick out of the story, especially the part about Don hiding behind the dumpster. I think she liked that Don cared about what she thought of him.

We paid Don a visit at the tire store where he worked. As Don broke down a tire, we told him that the police were now involved in our little escapade. We also told Don that because we had been honest, confessed our role in the crime, and returned the chicken to its owner, we were not being charged with anything. He, on the other hand, still had to answer for his part in the chicken theft. Don noticeably paled and became very nervous. We didn’t have the heart to continue the charade, so we finally told him the truth. I think he swore at us.

All the main participants in the Chicken Incident are now mostly respectable members of society. I’ve taught school for the last thirty years. Dave is an attorney and is a partner in his own law firm. Dale builds sheep camps in Idaho. Randy is a high school guidance counselor. Sadly, Don passed away nine years ago.

The moral of the story? Follow that dream, I guess. Even if the dream is just stealing a giant fiberglass chicken.

I’m a little in awe that it all happened forty years ago.

High School and the Meaning of Life

 

The fortieth anniversary of my high school graduation is coming up this month, so I’ve been feeling nostalgic for 1982. The pictures posted above were taken in my parents’ backyard in June 1982, a few weeks after I graduated from high school, and more recently at a store in Draper, UT. I like the juxtaposition of the two photos – same person, same pose, same attitude, forty-year difference. That’s my 1971 Dodge Charger I’m leaning against in the photo from ‘82. Spring 1982 was a good time in my life. Not only was I anticipating graduating from high school, I had the general expectation of great things just over the horizon that only a seventeen-year-old can feel so defiantly and yet be so oblivious of what life might really hold in store.

 

One memory in particular stands out. I had a P.E. class from Coach Mecham, the wrestling coach at Wasatch High School. Mecham was a fairly young guy, mustached, in his late twenties, originally a farm boy from Montana. He had that compact wrestler’s build and was friendly to a point, but you knew you didn’t give Coach Mecham crap. I didn’t think Mecham liked me very much because I had quit the wrestling team the previous year. At the time I quit the team I was recovering from a severe bout of the flu and trying to juggle academics with a job bagging groceries at Days’ Market after school. Something had to give, and wrestling was what gave. I wasn’t very good at it anyway.

 

Coach Mecham let us have a class baseball tournament the last month of school. He divided us into teams, and we agreed that the losers had to buy the winners milkshakes at JoAnn’s, a restaurant near the high school. JoAnn’s was home to an eight-foot-tall fiberglass statue of a chicken that stood in front of the place. That chicken would play a pivotal role on the night of our high school graduation, which is a story for another time.

 

We spent the last few weeks of our senior year playing baseball during PE class. My specialty was hitting the ball as hard as I could and running like hell to first base. If anyone stood in front of the base, I was just as likely to knock him over as try to get around him. What I lacked in finesse I made up for in brutishness. It worked; I usually got a base hit, even if I didn’t score. What can I say? We were a bunch of lower to middle class seventeen and eighteen-year-old boys growing up in a small town in Utah where education wasn’t a high priority, but sports were. I remember in one of the games I was up at bat and the guy playing shortstop on the other team started to talk trash. I believe the words he used were “easy out.” I hit the ball straight at his head, probably not intentionally, and he had to duck in order to not get hit in the face. Coach Mecham, who was umping the game, admiringly said “Nice hit.” I felt pretty good about that.

 

What makes me nostalgic about the whole experience is that not only was it a lot of fun, but it was also emblematic of a whole different era in education, one that is probably long gone. Nobody walked away angry about the results of the tournament. Somebody had to win, and somebody had to lose; that was life. As I recall I was on the losing team and I gladly drove to JoAnn’s to buy one of my friends on the opposing team a milkshake, during school time of course. Coach Mecham probably didn’t expend a lot of energy in planning the tournament – I’d bet he doesn’t even remember it – but here I am forty years later thinking about it. As a teacher I look back on that time and wonder if anyone will feel nostalgic about being in my class.

 

I wrote earlier that education – at least in academic areas – wasn’t our highest priority in May 1982. Like most high school seniors, we had other things on our minds. One of my friends lost his mother that spring, and another good friend was learning to adjust to life in a wheelchair. We didn’t go to the best school (by modern standards), but then some of us weren’t the best students, either. We did have some teachers who gave a damn, and who persevered despite the lack of money and other resources.

 

Looking back, the majority of us who went to school together in that era are successful. There are teachers, doctors, nurses, artists, attorneys, and newscasters among us. We didn’t have laws like No Child Left Behind to force somebody else’s version of success on us, nor did we have a bunch of right-wing politicians dictating what was appropriate for us to learn and what wasn’t; we discovered success for ourselves, and we actually learned American history, warts and all. I kind of miss that, and I hope my daughters are finding success without some fascist politician or educational bureaucrat defining what success – or failure – is for them.

Men Without Women

Randy's Records, November 14, 2020

Nowadays, unless it’s a new album by Bruce Springsteen, most of the vinyl records I buy have some emotional resonance for me, which means I mostly buy old stuff. If I can find an original pressing of a favorite album rather than a reissue, it’s even better.

In 1982, my brother Phil gave me the album Men Without Women by Little Steven and the Disciples of Soul for Christmas. Little Steven is actually Steve Van Zandt, Bruce Springsteen’s best buddy and lead guitarist in the E Street Band. It’s a great album – Steve’s take on 60s soul music. Phil passed away in 2006, and my original copy of the album disappeared years ago. I finally found an original pressing of the album at Randy’s Records around 2017 or 2018, which made me really happy, because it had never – up to that point – been reissued on vinyl. Finding that album was also like having a little bit of Phil back with me, which I think was ultimately the point. Unfortunately, in December 2018, I took my new old copy of Men Without Women with me to a Little Steven concert at The Depot, hoping for an autograph, and due to circumstances beyond my control, I lost the album. I recognize that losing an album is really a #firstworldproblem, but I have missed having it in my collection ever since. Even buying the newly remastered CD version that came out this year did nothing to alleviate the sense of loss I felt over misplacing my vinyl copy.

 

Today, I finally decided that screw it, I was going to see if they had another copy of the album at Randy’s Records. I get nostalgic for deceased family members this time of year, so I didn’t even care if it was an original pressing or the new reissue. Because of social distancing and the exploding Utah COVID numbers, Tristen and I had to stand in line about fifteen minutes to get into Randy’s. Once I finally got in the store, I searched the record bins, but to my dismay, there wasn’t a copy of Men Without Women to be found, new or old. I finally asked a clerk if they had the album, and after debating with him over the title of the album (which I admit is a little weird; Steve Van Zandt named it after an Ernest Hemingway short story collection), he went in the backroom and found a copy from 1982 that even contained the poster that came with the first pressing. Not only that, it was in great shape and reasonably priced. You better believe I snatched up that sucker and paid for it without a second thought.

Right now Little Steven and the Disciples of Soul are singing the song “Forever” on my turntable – one of my all-time favorite love songs, and a song that never fails to bring a tear to my eye – and I’m reminded that life doesn’t always suck. Sometimes it’s pretty good.

 

Thus Sayeth The Lord ...

I rediscovered this picture today. It was taken in Provo, UT, in my former in-laws’ backyard during the summer of 2006. The photo presents a very placid, serene picture of me playing with my kids. In some ways that’s exactly what was going on, but oh boy, the story behind the picture … this was the day I found out how hypocritical and sanctimonious some LDS Church leaders are, and realized how negatively their actions had affected my late brother Phil’s life.

Phil had died four months previously, on March 15, 2006. I was still trying to cope with my grief over his death when the picture was taken. On the day that the picture was taken, July 10, 2006, we were visiting my ex-wife's parents in Provo. My ex-wife's sister was there as well. The adults were visiting in the kitchen that morning, while the kids played outside. My ex-wife's distant cousin came up in the conversation, and someone casually mentioned that, thanks to the intervention of an LDS General Authority, that cousin had been allowed to go on an LDS mission, even though he had fathered a child outside of wedlock.

My curiosity was piqued, because the LDS Church cancelled Phil’s mission call in July 1984 when someone claimed Phil was the father of her (then unborn) child. Local and general LDS Church leaders (including an apostle) told Phil he was obligated to financially support the girl and her baby, even though there was absolutely no proof that Phil was the father. The leaders cancelled Phil’s mission call because of that alleged obligation, and because of an LDS Church policy that said anyone who had fathered a child outside of marriage wasn’t allowed to serve a mission. When I questioned one of those leaders about the situation, he told me “girls just know who the father of their baby is.” The baby still hadn’t been born when I asked that question.

A paternity test later determined that there was no possibility Phil fathered the kid, but because of the “inspiration” of a handful of men (who believed God spoke directly to them), Phil’s life went into a tailspin from which he never recovered. The LDS cultural stigma of having a cancelled mission call was more than Phil’s self-esteem could bear, and he ended up marrying the first woman who was kind to him. Unfortunately that woman had borderline personality disorder, and made Phil’s life a living hell for the next twenty years. Phil was never able to break away from her and it ultimately cost him his life. Whenever Phil tried to get away, she played the “I loved you when …” card, which, along with the stigma of ending an "eternal" marriage, worked on Phil.

So I asked who the General Authority was who allowed the cousin to serve a mission.

According to my former mother-in-law, LDS General Authority Hugh Pinnock ensured that the cousin was able to go on a mission, even though the cousin – unlike Phil – had actually fathered a child outside of wedlock. Fortunately for the cousin, he lived in the same wealthy neighborhood as Pinnock, so Pinnock pulled a few strings and the cousin went happily on a mission.

Hugh Pinnock was one of the LDS leaders who cancelled Phil’s mission call. At the time of my brother's call, Pinnock had responsibility over the area where my family lived, and he, our stake president, and an apostle, were the leaders who dealt with Phil. According to The Mormon Murders by Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith, Pinnock was a pompous, sanctimonious prick who was better known for inadvertently aiding Mark Hofmann in scamming money from a bank to purchase nonexistent LDS Church historical documents at just about the same time he was dealing with Phil. So much for Pinnock’s divine inspiration and powers of discernment.

When my mother-in-law said that, I thought my head was going to explode. I didn’t know whether to be angry or to cry. Pinnock’s hypocrisy was almost more than I could stand. I managed to say that Pinnock was the guy who cancelled Phil’s call. My former sister-in-law responded sympathetically, “Boy that guy (meaning Phil) couldn’t catch a break.” I didn’t know what else to do, so I walked outside and played with the kids. I couldn’t be in the kitchen any longer. I felt like someone had hit me in the head with a baseball bat.

And that’s when someone snapped that picture.

In the years since, I haven’t ever really gotten over the anger I felt about that bit of information from that seemingly innocuous kitchen conversation. My mother-in-law didn’t know the significance of what she had told me, and I don’t have any bad feelings for her that she said anything. It just was what it was: another nail in the coffin of a “testimony” of the “truthfulness” of the LDS Church.

To someone outside of the Mormon bubble, the belief that LDS leaders are always inspired by God sounds very cult-y, and it probably is, especially when he or she looks at the LDS Church’s policies on gays, women, and – until 1978 – African Americans. Also in the years since, I’ve learned a lot about LDS Church history, and how truly despicable most of the early leadership was, especially Joseph Smith. They basically believed that as long as they said, “thus sayeth the Lord,” they could get away with whatever they wanted, including murder and misogyny. Not much has changed since.

My brother’s life and death are a sad part of that legacy.

Bernie

I have a friend named Bernie McGuire. Bernie is an amazing man; an attorney by profession, he specializes in Social Security disability cases. There are literally hundreds of people who know Bernie and admire him for a variety of reasons; Bernie has a great sense of humor, and he’s a babe magnet, among other things. Bernie is also an inspirational guy; he has a great attitude about life, and his resiliency knows no bounds.

Did I mention Bernie is quadriplegic? He is, and what happened to Bernie could happen to anyone.

Let me take you back to the last Sunday in October 1981, the twenty-fifth to be exact. It was the first Sunday after the time change back to standard time, which is a factor in this story. Other than the time change, it was just a typical Sunday. Bernie and I were in the same LDS ward. I’d known Bernie for the previous ten years, and he was a fun guy to hang out with. That particular Sunday he and I decided to skip Sunday School. We were loitering in the foyer outside the chapel and noticed that my mom, who was the Relief Society President, had posted sign-up sheets for enrichment night mini-classes. 

Let me stop right here to say that this story doesn’t have anything to do with what happened to Bernie, but it is a good example of Bernie’s sense of humor. I’ll get to Bernie’s accident later

Anyway, there was a man in our ward whom I’ll call “Roy Jones”  (not his real name, of course), who was the ward character. It seems that every LDS ward had to have one back then; it was required. Roy was in his late fifties, divorced, very obese, seldom bathed, and wore the same ill fitting ten-year-old dark blue polyester leisure suit to church every week.

What Roy was best known for was his OPD - obnoxious personality disorder - which isn’t a real mental illness, but ought to be. Roy was on disability, so he had lots of free time to bother people. The conductor of the Heber Creeper once kicked Roy off the train at Bridal Veil Falls because he was making such a nuisance of himself, and Roy had to find a way back to Heber on his own. Roy used to accost people in the supermarket where I worked after school, and follow them around the store talking to them as they vainly tried to escape from him. Roy was also infamous in our LDS ward for holding forth during testimony meetings for anywhere from twenty minutes at a time to most of the meeting.

Bernie and I saw those sign-up sheets on a table outside the Relief Society room door and had the same devilish thought at the same time: wouldn't it be hilarious if we signed Roy Jones up for every single one of those classes? We gleefully did, and then I forgot about it because of the events that happened later that evening. A few days later I heard my mom frantically talking to one of her counselors on the phone about how the bishop was going to just have to tell Roy that he couldn’t attend the classes because they were only for Relief Society sisters. Listening to my mom gave me the one good laugh I had during a rotten week, and I confessed that Bernie and I had signed Roy’s name to her lists. She was so relieved she forgot to be mad at me.

So, that was Bernie (and me too, I guess).

Later that evening, Bernie and some other guys from our ward were driving down a dark country road to toilet paper the house of a girl who Bernie liked. The time had changed the night before from Daylight Savings to Standard Time, so it had gotten dark early. October 25 was the girl’s birthday, and toilet papering her house was Bernie’s way of letting her know he cared. Bernie was driving, and they didn’t notice that there were horses standing in the road at the bottom of a hill until it was too late. The car hit the horses at the knees, bringing them down on top of the car and breaking Bernie’s neck. I remember hearing ambulance sirens - we lived right next to the hospital - but not knowing what was going on.

The next morning Mom woke me with the news about Bernie. I felt sick inside, and felt even sicker when I got to school and saw he really wasn’t there. I remember trying to talk about the accident with our choir teacher - a really good lady, and one of my all-time favorite teachers - but she was too upset to speak about it. Later that day, my brother Phil and I, along with one of the other kids who was actually in the accident with Bernie, went to the salvage yard where the remains of Bernie’s car were stored. While looking at the shattered windshield and caved-in roof of the car, which was splattered with gore where the horses landed, I came to the realization that it could just as easily have been me in that car.

Confronting my own mortality as a seventeen-year-old wasn’t an easy experience. I’ve had a few of my own brushes with death since, but that was when it really hit me I wouldn’t be on this earth forever. However, if I wrote here that on that spot in that auto salvage yard on that autumn afternoon I swore to live each day of my life as if it were the last, I would be lying. I was seventeen, for crying out loud. Seventeen-year-old brains don’t think that way.

What Bernie’s accident did for me was give me enough perspective on life to realize that the cliquish, kind of mean-spirited way that most high school kids live their lives was not the way to go. Since then, I’ve tried to be kinder to and more accepting of everyone who crosses my path, because you never know what life holds in store for you or anyone else.

Bernie never physically recovered from that crash, but he has done some incredible things with his life, such as graduating from law school and having a successful law practice while sitting in an electric wheelchair. I heard he even once bungee jumped. However, the greatest thing Bernie has accomplished - in my eyes at least - is teach by his example that no problem is insurmountable as long as you’re breathing and have a functioning brain. When life gets overwhelming, I stop and think about Bernie and what he has accomplished with his life. It puts my troubles into perspective. Bernie will be the first to tell you he didn’t do it all on his own. He had the help of an awesome family and good friends who didn’t let him down. Like I said, Bernie is an amazing guy, and I’m glad he’s my friend.

Here’s a ten minute mini-documentary of the man himself that someone posted on YouTube. It’s definitely worth checking out.

Thinking About Mom

Kind of a bittersweet anniversary today, one that I usually don’t think about much anymore. Today, however, it’s on my mind. Thirteen years ago today - February 16, 1998, Presidents' Day that year - we lost Mom. She’d been an invalid - wheelchair bound because of a stroke - for nearly two years previously, so it was a relief for her to go. I guess I'm thinking about her today because I would love to have a chat with her. I could use a dose of her common sense and wisdom. I’m mildly irritated that I can’t pick up the phone and call her. I thought T-Mobile had coverage everywhere.

My mom was well known for many things. She was the happy, friendly lady behind the counter at the Dairy Keen. She was the enthusiastic referee or line judge at LDS Young Women’s volleyball and basketball games. To the people who knew her, she was always Vera, never Mrs. Rasband or Sister Rasband. Her most famous creation - other than her children - were her chocolate chip cookies, otherwise known as “Veracookies” to friends, neighbors, and my college roommates. She always made sure there was a bag of cookies in the freezer for me to take back to Logan when I came home for the weekend. When I started teaching school in Heber, Mom’s sour cream sugar cookies were my students’ preferred treat for Halloween and Valentine’s Day school parties. I had students from miles around show up at our house on Halloween night just for a second (or third) cookie.

My mom was the yang to my dad’s yin; they brought out the best in each other. Mom was outgoing, friendly, and optimistic. My dad was quieter (until you got to know him), reserved, and more of a pessimist. I could take a road trip with Mom and have an interesting, entertaining conversation all the way to our final destination, even if the destination was seven hundred miles away. I could take a road trip with my dad and ride in comfortable silence with neither of us saying a word for hundreds of miles. It’s interesting to look at my brothers and sister and see who inherited which trait from my parents. I think I’m a weird mutation of some of their best and worst qualities; sometimes I can talk your ear off, other times you’re better off not bothering me.

My mom’s greatest attribute was her faith that things would always turn out all right. I remember after her stroke, when she was completely paralyzed on her left side, she tried to persuade me to take her out to the car and let her go for a drive, never mind that she couldn’t use her left arm or leg, and her peripheral vision was gone. Mom just knew that if she just had the chance, she could relearn to drive a car.

In many ways, Mom isn’t really gone. I see reminders of her everyday in my daughters; Susan’s athleticism, Caroline’s smile, and Grace’s small stature, funny personality, and penchant for waking us all up in the morning with her singing, all came from their grandma.

So that was my mom. I’m sorry my daughters never got to meet her in this life, but there are enough reminders of her in themselves - and me - that they know her anyway. I’m grateful for the legacy of kindness, happiness, and optimism that she left. If I can leave a legacy half as good when I depart this veil of tears - sorry for the cheesy language, but that phrase always makes me smile; it would have made Mom gag - I will have accomplished something.

Drawing the Olsens

Christmas Day 1982. Kind of a punk.

I’m sitting here in my classroom after school, watching my daughters – Caroline and Grace – entertain themselves by drawing until it is time to go home. It’s been a long week and I’m not feeling especially motivated to correct papers or record scores, hence the blogging. I’m also feeling kind of blue, and thinking about the past. I have my iPod blasting a playlist of my favorite songs from 1982, and Bruce Springsteen, John Mellencamp, Bob Seger, and The Who are entertaining me …

I’ve mentioned it here before, but this year has the same calendar as 1982. I look at my daughters as they lay on my classroom floor coloring their pictures, and realize that they’ve never seen a year that begins with the number 19, let alone understand that 1982 was a real year, where both of their grandparents – my parents – were alive, healthy, and not that much older than I am now. My brother Phil was a senior in high school, and my one complete semester at BYU – I went there briefly again in ’85, just long enough to get my Spanish credits - was dragging to an exhausting and inauspicious end. My buddy Don and the rest of my friends were still single and ready to cat around every night. I was living at home with my parents and younger brothers, and driving to BYU every morning with my cousin.

There are several memories from November and December of 1982 that I still hold near and dear, twenty-eight years later. I remember lying in bed every morning that winter and listening to my parents quietly visiting with one another while they ate breakfast together, before my dad went to work. Joe and Vera genuinely enjoyed one another’s company. They usually had the radio tuned to KSL so that they could listen to the news while they ate and talked.

Joe and Vera, Christmas 1982. Best parents ever.

As I watch my daughters draw, and I look out my classroom window at the dark storm clouds gathering, one memory from the second week of December 1982 especially stands out. We’d had a large snow storm during the night, which had dumped nearly a foot of snow - I know, big surprise that it snowed in Heber in December. Anyway, the snow made Highway 189 through Provo Canyon treacherous. This was back in the day - boy I sound like an old fart - when the road through the canyon wound along the bottom by the river, instead of following the contour of the mountainside like it does now. It was a winding, two lane road, and was especially dangerous during a snowstorm. My cousin and I opted not to go to school that morning.

Since I was already up and dressed, I decided to make myself useful. After shoveling my parents’ sidewalk and driveway, I took my shovel and walked down Center Street a block to Clarence and Hope Olsen’s place. Clarence and Hope were an elderly couple - they had to be in their eighties - who lived with their adult son Joe, who was mentally retarded. Joe Olsen was a neighborhood fixture, standing beside the road for hours and watching the cars go by. When I first read the book To Kill A Mockingbird as a teenager, before I saw the movie, the Radleys reminded me of the Olsens (not that Clarence was comparable to the mean and cruel Mr. Radley), and Joe Olsen was who I pictured as Boo Radley.

As a teenager, I spent many hours in boring church meetings entertaining myself (and friends and family) by sketching various members of our LDS ward, especially Clarence, Hope, and Joe. It sounds cruel and disrespectful now, but at the time I didn’t mean it that way; they were just really interesting people to look at, which meant they were a lot of fun to draw. I never cartooned or caricatured them, I just sketched them as they appeared. Which was probably bad enough. Clarence and Hope were both quite feeble - I think Hope was a little senile at that point - although Clarence still worked in the insurance sales office that stood next to his house.

When I got to the Olsens it was still before eight o’clock in the morning, and the house looked quiet. Even then, I think I figured I owed them some compassion; I don’t think they ever knew that I drew pictures of them, but even so, I wanted to do something kind for them. I had their sidewalk and driveway shoveled before anyone was awake in the house. My goal was to escape without the Olsens knowing who had shoveled them out.

I wasn’t fast enough. As I was putting the finishing touches on the sidewalk, Clarence’s stooped figure emerged from the house. I remember Clarence, despite his advanced age and the proximity of his office to his house, was dressed in a suit and tie. At that point in his life, Clarence was slack-jawed and a little difficult to understand when he spoke. However, he seemed grateful and muttered his thanks, which kind of embarrassed me. I didn’t want the Olsens to know I’d shoveled their sidewalk; it was a lot more fun doing it anonymously. It wasn’t a big emotional moment anyway; Clarence didn’t throw his arms around me and tell me how grateful he was. He just mumbled thanks and I told him he was welcome.

I returned from an LDS mission in late 1984 and was a little surprised to go to church and see both Olsens still living. Joe was no longer with them; he had been institutionalized after Clarence and Hope were no longer able to care for him. Not too long after my return both Clarence and Hope died. A few years later Joe met a tragic end when he got separated from his group while on an outing in the mountains near Kamas. Joe spent the night in the mountains and died of exposure. It’s a sad story, but sometimes that’s how life is.

1982 was a long time ago, now. The music from that era brings back a lot of memories, both good and bad. My parents and brother Phil passed away a few years ago. My buddy Don hasn’t been in touch for quite a while, and I’m a little worried about him. I still see other friends that I grew up with, and I’m grateful for their continued friendship, although we don't always see eye-to-eye on some things.

Anyway, I like watching my daughters draw. I’m glad I passed that on to them. I just hope that they’ll shovel the snow once in a while as well.

A Different Country

I watched The Last Detail last night. The Last Detail is a movie made in 1973, and stars Jack Nicholson, Otis Young, and Randy Quaid. It tells the story of two career navy guys, Nicholson and Young, who are assigned to escort a young enlisted man, played by Quaid, to the brig. Quaid’s character made the mistake of attempting to rob forty dollars from a charity box. Quaid’s character is also incredibly young and naive, and Nicholson and Young are appalled at the unfairness of his sentence. Quaid received his harsh sentence because the charity he robbed was his commanding officer’s wife’s favorite. Nicholson and Young decide to show him a good time on their way to the brig, where Quaid is to serve eight years in the old Portsmouth Naval Prison.

And that’s basically the plot of the movie.

I hadn’t seen The Last Detail in a very long time, but I had it on my computer hard drive so I decided to watch it, which is why and how I end up watching most movies anymore. The Last Detail isn’t a classic, but it holds up well as a portrait of America in the early 1970s, mainly because it was filmed on location all along the northeastern seaboard, from Norfolk, Virginia to Portsmouth, New Hampshire. The people and places in the background of The Last Detail are real, not CGI. Also, The Last Detail stars Jack Nicholson, and everything Nicholson did between Easy Rider in 1969 and One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest in 1975, is worth a look.

The Last Detail isn’t a movie for everybody. The language is raw - it is about Navy guys, and the incessant use of the F-word caused quite a stir back in ’73 - and there is also some violence and sex depicted in the film.

What appeals most to me about The Last Detail is its realistic depiction of America circa 1973. 1973 America was almost a different country than America 2010. If you hadn’t lived during that era, it would be hard to explain to you how different Watergate-era America was from today, but being blessed (or cursed) with a good memory, I remember a lot about that time, and The Last Detail is very accurate:

• The cars in the movie are all pre-fuel crisis, American-made, steel constructed, behemoth gas guzzlers. They remind me of the cars my dad, grandpa, and uncles drove when I was growing up. I miss those big cars. They made the demolition derby at the Wasatch County Fair back then a lot more interesting than it is now. It’s hard to get excited about watching a 1987 Ford Taurus fall apart.

• The characters in The Last Detail are all throwbacks to a completely different time, from the redneck bartender who inspires one of Nicholson’s greatest lines (“Call the shore patrol? I am the m*th*rf*ck*ng shore patrol!”) when the bartender hesitates to serve a beer to Young (because he’s black) and Quaid (because he’s underage), to Nicholson’s old-school hedonistic character (booze and broads are his vice) Billy "Badass" Buddusky.

• I smell cigarette smoke when I watch The Last Detail. Seriously. The movie takes me back to an era when quite a few people smoked, even in small town, Mormon Utah. I remember being a nine-year-old sitting in a barbershop in Heber and every adult male there, except for my dad and the barber, was smoking. The movie also evokes memories of a snow sledding outing with my best friend and his older brother, who smoked and swore as he drove us up to Lindsay’s Hill in his old truck. It was sort of like going sledding with Billy Buddusky. That’s actually a pleasant memory, and one of the reasons that smoking doesn’t bother me as much as it seems to bother other people.

• Watching The Last Detail makes me cold. The movie takes place during winter, and it reminds me of all the old, drafty buildings we used to shop in (and live in) when I was a kid. It doesn’t seem like there were many new homes in Heber when I was growing up, certainly not like there are today. Most of the stores - except for the new Safeway, which replaced an old building that had burned down, and the brand new Day's Market that opened in '73 - were in old buildings, as were the library, movie theaters, and schools.

• Finally, although politics never come up in The Last Detail (Buddusky seems happily apolitical; he’s too busy chasing women and whiskey to worry about Watergate, and I can’t even imagine what his reaction to Don’t Ask Don’t Tell would be), it’s gotta be hard for politically aware people in their twenties and thirties today to imagine  how universally despised the President of the United States - Richard M. Nixon - was. Ol’ Tricky Dick Nixon - despite any good things he accomplished, like establishing the EPA or saving Israel during the 1973 Yom Kippur War - didn’t stand a chance because of the innate corruptness of his administration.

I could go on and on about the differences between 1973 and 2010, but I’ve made my point: things change, not always for the better, but not always for the worse either. Movies like The Last Detail don’t get made very often anymore. Only Clint Eastwood seems to make the same type of movie now. There isn’t anyone to really cheer for in The Last Detail. There aren’t special effects or big explosions. The underlying message is the unfairness of life and the dehumanizing effect people wielding too much unchecked power have.

The Last Detail is a realistic depiction of an era when mores and expectations were a lot different from what they are now. Whether that’s good or bad is up to you to decide.

Here's the original movie trailer for The Last Detail:

Haunting The Cemetery

October 31: All Hallow’s Eve. According to the ancient Celts - and to Susan, who reads a lot and has a flair for the dramatic - this is the day when the veil between the living and the dead is the thinnest; the day when spirits walk amongst us and can only be appeased by gifts of food, or fooled by dressing up to appear like them. In honor of Samhain, I took the girls to Heber today. Actually, that’s not true. I took the girls to Heber because I was feeling nostalgic, and because I wanted to get out of Happy Valley for a while. Too much Happy Valley makes a guy blue, sometimes.

We went to Heber with the intention of visiting some elderly relatives. Unfortunately, no one we wanted to visit was home. Maybe I’ll call first next time. Anyway, we ended up at one of our favorite haunts - ha ha - the Heber Cemetery. The cemetery is a peaceful place, and we enjoy visiting there. The girls enjoy running around the headstones, and I enjoy remembering and contemplating the lives of people who have gone on to - hopefully - greater things. There is also a lot of history to be learned in the graveyard, if a person knows where to look.

Here are some things we saw there today:

 The first stop, as always, is my parents’ grave. My mom really dug Halloween; she used to dress up as a witch and tell spooky stories to any group that would have her, especially cub scouts. One year she did such a good job she made one little guy scream and cry.

Of course, we had to pay our respects to my brother Phil. Phil was always good for a laugh on Halloween. I remember one Halloween thirty years ago he and I and a couple of other guys took a can of shaving cream and some firecrackers and ... actually I probably shouldn’t tell that one, if only to protect the guilty.

Here’s a view of Mt. Timpanogos from the Heber Cemetery. As I’ve said before, you can never take too many pictures of Timp.

One year Mom and her best friend told Phil and me that if we went to the cemetery, ran around this grave three times, and asked it what it was doing it, it would say nothing at all. Of course Phil and I did exactly that, and the headstone literally said nothing at all. Ever since I told the girls about that trick, they like to hang around this headstone. I got my girls to do the same thing last Memorial Day.

There are some interesting old headstones in the Heber Cemetery, carved out of various material.  In the good ol’ days, people used whatever was available. One of the most common materials was sandstone. It doesn’t hold up very well; there are a couple of old sandstone headstones that are virtually unreadable. This isn’t one of them; even after over a hundred years, the care that went into making this one is still evident.

Here’s a headstone the girls found today with the famous Utah pioneer clasped hands. There is some deep religious significance* to the hands that escapes me right now. It does look pretty cool. And why don't parents name their children Lowerina anymore?

 Here’s a headstone I’d never noticed until today. I really like the cross and the crown. I’m not sure what the exact significance of it is, although I can probably guess.

This is a detail, in black and white, of that cross and crown. Again, very nice work, especially when you consider that the whole thing was carved by hand.

 An autumnal view of Heber Valley, taken from a hill in the north east corner of town. I was raised here, and I love this valley, but every time I visit I always think of the old Charley Pride song, “Wonder Could I Live There Anymore.” Things have changed so drastically that it isn’t much like the place I grew up in now.

A few months ago I ranted and raved about the audacity of someone changing the name of Clyde’s Billiards to “The Spicy Lady.” I thought the name sounded more like a brothel than a cafe. Well, the place isn’t named The Spicy Lady anymore; it is now The Angry Bull, which to my ears sounds only marginally better. Nice Halloween decorations, though.

And that was the end of our Heber trip. It was a quick one; only three hours. The Wife needed us at home, and I promised I’d be there by five. It was time to leave anyway; too much nostalgia just makes me sad and grumpy, which is why we went to Heber in the first place.

* I just found this website that explains nineteenth century headstone symbolism. Both the clasped hands and the crown and the cross are explained there.

Remembering Veterans...

Ten years ago I wrote a monthly newspaper column for the late, lamented Wasatch County Courier. I didn’t get paid much for doing it, but I had a lot of fun. The main focus of my newspaper column was history, especially Wasatch County history.

Today I'm posting a column I wrote for the Courier back in 1999. I always liked this column, because it dealt with two things near and dear to my heart: family and patriotism. Bear in mind that it was originally published the week before Christmas in 1999, so add ten years (now eighteen years) to any historical references. I’m posting it here today because it also applies to Veterans Day. This article may not contain the greatest writing in the world, but it came from the heart:

Joe Thacker and friend

"I'll Be Home for Christmas" has always been one of my favorite Christmas songs. Bing Crosby recorded it back in the 1943, at the height of World War II. “White Christmas” was more popular, but for my money, nothing can beat the emotional resonance of “I’ll Be Home for Christmas.” I’ve often wondered what that song meant to the Heber Valley men and women fighting in the second World War, and to the families they left behind. I can’t really know, because I wasn’t there. I can only imagine how poignant Bing Crosby’s song was for those people during that terrible time.

I also recently reread the book Citizen Soldiers by Stephen Ambrose. Citizen Soldiers is a history of World War II from D-Day to VE Day, told by GI’s who were there. I highly recommend this book. Ambrose’s tale of the Battle of the Bulge, which was fought the week before Christmas 1944, inspired me to talk to a relative who participated in World War II. I asked my uncle, Joe Thacker, about his war experiences. Uncle Joe spent three Christmases in the service of his country.

My uncle Joe Thacker is the son of Ray and Mima Thacker. He grew up in Charleston, along with his three brothers, Dale, Vern, and Dan, and his three sisters, ReNee, Vera, and Marva. All four of Ray and Mima’s sons served in World War II. Dale was in the Navy in the North Atlantic. Vern served in the Navy in the Pacific. Dan trained for the invasion of Japan in Oregon.

Uncle Joe served for three years as an army engineer. During Christmas 1943, Uncle Joe was in Louisiana completing basic training. He spent Christmas 1944 on the island of Leyte, in the Philippines. Uncle Joe was part of the Philippine invasion force, and has some amazing and scary stories to tell about that battle. On Christmas Day 1945, after the war ended, Uncle Joe was on a boat headed for home. That was probably the best Christmas of all.

Uncle Joe’s memories of the Christmases he spent during the war are bittersweet. He remembers the camaraderie he felt with his fellow soldiers. Their loyalty to one another and the devotion to duty they felt got them through the homesickness and the rough times. They supported one another. Uncle Joe said that remembering the real meaning of Christmas, the birth of the Savior, also helped ease the pain of being away from loved ones at home.

Uncle Joe commented that, although it was difficult to be away from home at Christmas, it was harder on the folks left behind. My Grandmother Thacker briefly kept a journal during the early months of 1944. Each entry details how lonesome she was and how miserable and cold the weather was. Receiving a letter from one of her sons serving in the military gave Grandma a lot of happiness. She missed her sons and worried about them every minute of the day.

Grandma Thacker wasn’t the only one who missed loved ones during World War II. Millions of Americans sacrificed time away from their families to secure the freedoms we enjoy today. Some even gave their lives so that we Americans could continue to live the way we choose. The next time we sing a Christmas carol, especially “I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” let's remember the sacrifices the men and women who serve our country have made to protect our freedoms.