Day family newsletter for June 2013

NEWS FROM THE DAYS:

Jessica, Stephanie’s 10 yr. old, asked to visit Grandma and Grandpa for a week after her school ended, and we thoroughly enjoyed having her stay over and help Grandma (Linda) while she recovers from her knee surgery. Linda took her shopping, to her physical therapy sessions, Cheesecake Factory, and she went golfing with Katie and Grandpa one morning and drove the golf cart and got in a few practice shots as well. She rejoined her family after spending an afternoon at Gateway where we saw a star show at the planetarium.

Danny took a nice trip to Colorado Springs to visit the David Boone family and enjoyed the time away and all the things they did with him. When I picked him up from the airport, I discovered that his suitcase wheels and pull handle were both broken, and Shelley donated her spare suitcase to him as a replacement.

While driving to work one morning, a motorcycle in front of me hit a fawn deer square going about 50 miles per hour. The driver had a helmet on, and I watched him tumble over and over down the road. The bike ended up about 50 yards down the road on Wasatch Boulevard totaled, and the guy on the bike got up, but we convinced him to lie down until the ambulance arrived. He ended up with road rash is all (lucky), and the deer was disemboweled.

An interesting event at my work. There is a girl named Jessica about 20 years old who works part time in our DMV and looks just like Elizabeth Smart, and I occasionally call her Elizabeth for fun (she says lots of people tell her she looks like Elizabeth Smart). One day, I was helping a customer, a younger girl (about 20), and I told her she looked just like Jessica who was working a few stations down from me. The customer agreed, and said she could be her sister. I then told this customer about how Jessica looks so much like Elizabeth Smart, and asked my customer if anyone ever says she looks like Elizabeth Smart? She said “Yes, all the time!” I went back to finishing up titling her car and when I saw her name as the new owner on the back of the title, I saw Mary Katherine Smart. I looked up at my customer and asked, “Are you Elizabeth Smart’s sister?” She smiled back and said yes. Mary (I think I got her whole name right) is the little sister about 8 to 10 years old who was in the bedroom with Elizabeth Smart when she was kidnapped, and about 8 months later, remembered that the man was the same one who had worked at their house before. This information led to finding Elizabeth Smart and the arrest of her kidnaper. Anyway, an interesting encounter with her at work one day.

Another interesting thing at my work – I help train new people, and have trained in the last year a man from India who taught me all about the Sikh religion, then later, a girl from Iran who has given me insight into her former country, then a man who had been a mortician for 15 years, and now this past week, a man about 45 yrs of age named Rob. When I asked him where he previously worked, he told me he had attended school for 11 years and had spent the past 20 years being a Catholic priest, last assigned a parish here in the Valley. I haven’t got the whole story yet, but there are at least two employees in our office who were in his parish and a lot of others who are Catholic who are watching their language. An interesting experience so far.

Shelley and Brett Baird (of the Bairds on Redondo) organized and held a Rockin Redondo Reunion one Saturday evening at Sugarhouse Park. About 30 to 40 showed up, including Deon and Alisyn, and it was enjoyable to visit with old neighbors and friends who came including the some Knapus family, Baird family, Perkins, Curtis, Findley, and others I can’t remember names of. Everyone brought their own food, and Brett Baird put together a great slide show of everyone back in the 50’s and 60’s.

We celebrated Father’s Day at Jackie and Wiggin’s home with swimming and a barbeque. Lots of food and fun times. Deon invited us down to dinner at Derrick’s home one evening and we were joined by Danny, Cole and Jessica Rikli with our two great grandchildren Emry and Jax, Sherilyn and Richard. It was good to see everyone including the new Farnes addition – I believe Robert.

Linda continues to recover from her knee operation, is off her cane, and is doing very well. We went to a movie one afternoon with Steph and the kids, Monster University, and Linda and I also saw Man of Steel just the other night. Katie joined me golfing last weekend with a friend and his son – the temp hit 105 that afternoon, but we finished earlier while it was a mere 101.

We had a death in the family, so to speak. Our 40 ft. high cherry tree was diagnosed with slow death by bores, and it chose suicide by chainsaw. It has provided us with shade for 25 years in our backyard, and when the vast majority of its leaves failed to come out this spring, we called the tree doctor. This, of course, after I had tried an old wives tale of pounding it’s trunk with a baseball bat to shock it back to life. Now I lie awake at night wondering if I hastened its demise – I may ask my Priest trainee at work about this quandary.

I was happy to hear of the Supreme Court’s recent rulings moving us closer to equality for all people. Locally in Utah, our Attorney General is looking at possible impeachment by the Legislature in addition to being investigated by the FBI, a special prosecutor, a Federal investigation and being asked by many to step down including the local paper and the governor. I’m hoping the Congress will pass the immigration bill that the Senate just passed. But I’m prejudice – I want the illegal immigrants to have a pathway to citizenship.

Linda had many of our window screens replaced, the carpets cleaned, works a few hours per week helping her old employer, and is filling in for a week while her replacement goes on vacation. She continues to rehab the knee, primarily at home now, and is looking forward to being able to start some of the many projects she has looked forward to in retirement. Our garden is starting to look like a garden, filling in and growing higher all the time. No actual harvest yet other than raspberries. Baby quail (about 9) were spotted in our back yard a few days ago. Life is a continuous cycle.
Love, Tom & Linda