Melissa and Dallin had Nyah laughing pretty good the other night when I had been taking video with the camera so I captured a little bit of her laughing. Unfortunately the other kids were being pretty loud so they kind of drowned Nyah out.
Here is a photo of the tomatoes that were planted in our garden behind station 161 in Hyrum. You may ask yourself why and when would we have enough time to plant a garden. Two reasons, that station is not really busy and its not a real fire station, just an ambulance house. If you ever feel that you are bored and can't find something entertaining, come spend a few hours here and you will be happy with what you have.
A good friend of mine and a former mission companion wrote an interesting piece for his blog / work the really struck home for me. I thought I would share it with you.
"As Memorial Day draws to a close, it occurs to me that it would be a good time to repost something here that I wrote nearly a year ago for Show-Me Daily, the blog I maintain as part of my day job with the Show-Me Institute. The entry stems from a trip that Justin and I took to Kansas City, during which we visited several historical sites marking and commemorating Missouri’s Mormon War:
Every Memorial Day that I can recall while I grew up in Portland, Ore., we went to visit my mom’s parents’ resting place. After moving away, first for college and later for work, I got out of the habit of visiting family members’ graves on Memorial Day. There just weren’t any within driving distance.
Now that I’m living in Missouri, it’s a little easier — my great-great-great-great grandpa is buried about an hour and a half northeast of Kansas City, lying at the bottom of an abandoned well with several other people after they were all murdered. Although I visited the site in March, and had considered going there again over the Memorial Day weekend, a nasty bug has laid me out for the past few days … and the rain would have been a dealbreaker anyway — my car didn’t handle so well on the muddy back roads last time.
I did, however, spend some time on Monday thinking about the value of civil society. Because we live in a country largely founded on principles of freedom, tolerance, and the rule of law, people with wildly different cultures, backgrounds, and belief systems can live comfortably together in the same communities. And although from time to time tragic incidents may occur — like the one that killed one of my progenitors, and drove several others out of Missouri — they are by far the exception rather than the rule. There are places in the world where this sort of organized persecution and violent purging happens all the time.
Ultimately, this is one of the most important historical innovations of the United States — despite our differences, for the most part we all manage to live and work together in peace.
Most of my periodic trips to Kansas City are work-related, and timing generally doesn’t permit me to stay for much sightseeing. I almost went back this weekend, to see They Might Be Giants and visit a few of the places I didn’t see last time, but found that I had plenty to keep me occupied here at home. I’ll head back again soon, though."
One thing that I really like about Eric is his ability to critically think through issues, his desire to have fun, his love of all music and he writes and lives exactly as he believes. There is no hiding or secret agendas. So when I read this piece posted on his blog, I know he means it.
It struck particularly well with me because at the time of the writing/reading of his post, I had run across a obituary for my grandmother Afton Roberts, which starting me reading from her diary's. Which then had me searching through genealogy websites for other relatives and the nations they came from.
So, when I have a bad day bashing/debating someone over issues that are relevant to me/them (and use / liberally), I can be greatful that this English-Irish (where my firefighter genes come from!)-Danish-Greek-Roman-Rocky Mountain-Amercian (to stay sheek/PC) lives in a county that gives him the ultimate freedom to speak his mind without fear of reprocution to his ultimate enjoyment and relive fond memories of a grandmother that was second to none!
