I Used To Read So Much More - What Happened...?

 I picked up a new book recently and started to read it. I've heard good things...Stephen King's son. I've read the first few chapters...so far, I like it. Back in the day, I used to go through books on a regular basis. I was averaging two or three books a month.

They were mostly audiobooks, but still--I count them.

Then, something changed. I stopped reading, and I miss it.

The last book I read was Jared Nathan Garrett's The Seer. I'm embarrassed to say it took me much longer than it should have for me to read a 50k-ish word count book. I soldiered on, I did not stop and after months, the story became a part of me.

The Joe Hill book sits next to me as I write this. I can see it sitting there, no charging cables attached. Funny, physical books never run out of battery power. The question is, when will I pick it up and finish a few more chapters? When will I answer the call?

Maybe Sunday.

This isn't the first time I've asked myself this question. I've thought about it many times. And I think I know the main reason why I've stopped reading book. No, I know the main reason I stopped reading books.

Podcasts.

If Only The Mantis Had Stayed Away...

 There's something you can't see in this photo. Just behind that rise on the garbage can handle is a praying mantis...a big old white one. You know the ones. They're so big they're like ancient monoliths that watch life from a distance having already lived a long life.

And, they kind of freak me out. 

I moved the garbage can and saw it stir. Nope...not going to move the garbage can with that thing hanging out on it. So, I picked up a broom and shooed him away. He landed on the driveway and scampered under my son's car.

Great, I thought. Now I can move the garbage can away from the car and to add more trash and that's what I did. I turned, picked up the trash, opened the lid and dropped it in. When I closed the lid that's when I saw it...the carcass of the praying mantis smushed on the driveway. It wasn't there before. I apparently rolled the garbage can over its insect body. 

At first I wondered if it was another mantis that I didn't see that met a grizzly end, and that's still possible, but the size and color matched the one I tried to save. I don't understand it. I can't see why it would be that attached to the garbage can, but it looks like as soon as it went under the car, it came back and was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Poor fella (or, lady fella...). If only it had stayed away.

Two Mondays...Two Funerals

 On the eve of a funeral for my cousin's wife, the family was hit again...my mom's brother passed away. One just turned sixty-years old, the other just turned ninety-six. Each left large families behind, families that loved them dearly.

They were two of the most incredible people I've ever known.

We honored and celebrated the first, then seven days later, many of us gathered again to honor the next.

I've always known I was adopted. I can't remember ever being told...it was just part of being in the Taylor family. Even though in the past year I've discovered and met members of my birth parents's families, my adopted family was my family. Having lost my father at a young age, our mother leaned heavily on her siblings and my father's siblings for support--especially to raise three children ten years of age and younger. I grew up with cousins that at times felt more like siblings.

We had incredible times.

Both funerals were for those on my mother's side. She had two brothers, and since her passing in 2007, both brothers grew older, both into their nineties. 

The two people who passed away within a week of each other each lived in the Knight family home in Teton Valley, Idaho...one raised as a child, the other raised a family. You must be strong to live in that valley, and especially in that house. I look up to each of them, for different reasons. They were examples on how to live a blessed life, a Christian life. They were both parents, grandparents, spouses, and friends, and they will be missed.

I've thought many times over the years how incredibly fortunate I have been to be placed in this family. I can hardly put it into words. I'm a better person for knowing these two people, as are countless others. We'll miss you, Sheila and Dean...two of my heroes.

If You're Like Me...You Can Feel This Photo

 I turned the corner in an abandoned hallway as loved ones gathered in another room. I loved the scene before me so I snapped a photo. Today, I reviewed the pictures I took yesterday and the hallway returned to me.

I can feel this photo.

I can almost smell it, too.

I grew up in the Intermountain West, a peculiar place, both in geography and culture...especially culture. If you're like me, you've stood where I did, even if it were in a completely different building. You've seen this shot, you've walked on the carpet, passed the coat rack complete with wooden hangers, glanced at the bulletin board at the calendar of events. You also know what's inside in the empty rooms and what you'll find at the end of the hall.

It's as if you're home, even if you don't particularly like the home.

I can't tell you how many times I've seen this view, at different times, in hundreds of buildings. And if you've experienced a childhood like me, or spend much time in these buildings, you have, too.

Even looking at the shot now, I'm back in the smallish hall surrounded by memories. 

Love Me A Car Show...Even A Small One

 Last weekend we celebrated Hay Days, it's our local community's summer celebration, We've only been here a few years, but we already know that Hay Days means several things:

A free breakfast

Local vendors

Activities for the kids

Baby Beauty Contest

And a car show.

We love the car show.

It's not the biggest car show around. In Cache County next door they have a car show around Independence Day. It's great...big and great. The car show at Hay Days is smaller, but there are some beautiful vehicles. Antique trucks, cars, even some motorcycles. This year a family brought two dragsters and a funny car.

The 2015 Corvette isn't an antique, but it's a beautiful car. We know the owners--that's always fun. They've shown their car several times over the past couple of years.

Seeing these cars causes a stir in me. I'd love to have a car at the show. Back in the day, after my cousin painted my '72 VW beetle, that might have qualified. It had issues, of course, but it was a good looking car. A few years ago a kid brought a couple of VWs to the Hay Days show. He hasn't been back since.

Yes, car shows are fun, and you have to put in a lot of time, effort, and money to have a car show-worthy car. I'm not sure if I'm ready for that...

Maybe one day.

Give Thanks...Community

 The fireworks began as we loaded up the cars. And because of that, we ended up pulling off the side of 1000 North to watch instead of going to the hospital parking lot where we usually go. Not a big deal...we were only a few hundred feet farther away from the evening explosions in the summer air.

Though, not the state's largest firework display, it did what it was intended to do...entertain, and hopefully fill those watching with a sense of wonder, of awe...

Of community.

Across the street from where we parked there's an open field. Last night it was full of cars and trucks (lots of trucks...). There's a good chance I didn't know a single soul in those vehicles, and they didn't know us. Didn't matter. Just like all of us found ourselves in this little down a few miles from the Idaho border, we all came--or have stayed--for different reasons, we all gathered around the fairgrounds, watching bombs bursting in air.

Thankfully, if we needed help last night, to borrow a phone or to jump-start a dead battery, I feel I could have approached any of those cars and/or trucks and asked for help and they would have obliged. Just as we would have helped anyone coming to us. At least, that's how I felt last night. That's how I feel living in this community.

Because negativity sells, it's easy to believe everyone is evil, everyone is just out for themselves, and at times each of us feels that way. But, I'm thankful that people are more often than not, better, good, giving, caring, loving.

I'm glad we don't have fireworks every night...it would become commonplace, ordinary. The infrequency makes it special, memorable, an event. I'm thankful for our community and for millions of other communities around the world. I'm thankful we got to see the show.

And the brilliant full moon only made it that much better.

Turns Out...We Just Needed A Taller Flag Pole

 Last month we were given a gift...a US flag to fly in front of our house. Now, we already had a flag. I made it a few years ago from a steel pole and an inexpensive flag that came in a kit, the kind of kit you mount on your wall.

I tossed the pole that came with the kit and just used the flag.

The flag my mom-in-law gave us had a taller pole, taller than ours. We received it because the wind blew her flag over and we have a somewhat sheltered location for our flag...away from direct winds.

I'm glad for the gift. For one reason, we couldn't see the flag out of our front window because it was too short and the lower flag used to hit people in the face when they visited. Maybe that's why we have so few visitors, but on the plus side--door-to-door salespeople. 

I set up the flag and even though it's not in a windy location, the PVC pipe swayed a lot in the wind. Solution--put the metal pole I used inside the pipe. Problem solved.

Today was the first time I flew my Franken-flag. It worked well. Turns out we just needed a taller flag pole.