Bringin' Our Boy Home!

Work has been kickin’ my butt lately, so what’s new? But I’m coming up for air long enough to post this blog. Has anyone noticed that I never post about my children? If strangers ever happened upon our blog, which might be plausible if I ever posted anything interesting, it might appear that Kirk and I are a childless, anti-social, older couple who have nothing better to do but ride around on our Harley and incubate larvae for fun…which is mostly true, except for the childless part.

Actually, I have justifiable reasons for omitting our children from the blog:

1) I really haven’t been blogging all that long, and sometimes Vacations, Harley’s and Botflys are more interesting than children.

2) Our married children (Jen & Tony and Jared & Heather) have their OWN blogs. Since our 40-something-year-old friends DON’T blog (pretending we really have friends) the only people who DO visit our blog are family and occasionally friends of our children, who leave comments because they feel sorry for us that we don’t have friends of our OWN to comment. So I don’t blog about the married kids because that would be like watching a re-run, don’t you think?

3) We do have two younger sons who have been away from home serving full-time missions for the LDS church. Josh has been serving in the Jackson, Mississippi mission since October 2006, and Justin has been serving in the Santa Rosa, California Spanish-speaking mission since May 2008. I miss them horribly and can’t bear to think of them, so I haven’t blogged about them. (Okay that’s not true but it sounds better than, “I just didn’t feel like blogging about them”.)

I truly DO miss our sons. When Josh had been away from home for only three months I started asking, “Shouldn’t he be coming home soon?” Then I would count on my fingers and realize he still had another 21 months to go….sigh. Only two states away in California, Justin is so close that I’m often tempted to jump in the car, drive the 800 miles to California and kidnap him for a day! Of course that would be breaking the rules and Justin, as those who know him will confirm, is definitely NOT a rule-breaker.

BUT, we are in serious countdown mode for our Josh to come home!! Kirk and I will be hopping a plane to Mississippi on TUESDAY to bring our boy home! I know, right?! I am so excited I can hardly stand it!! So I started thinking about what it might be like for Josh to see his family AFTER TWO WHOLE YEARS!!

Huh…turns out not a lot has changed after all! BUT, my predictions for what Justin will miss while he’s gone?...2 babies, a wedding (not necessarily in that order) and Kirk will finally build me that swimming pool…

Bragging Rights and Blog Material

I think of Provo Canyon as my home away from home. As a family we've had experiences in the canyon and Wasatch mountains that could fill volumes of blog-space: Visiting Grandma and Grandpa Brown’s trailer across from Vivian Park, picnics at Vivian, South Fork, Bridal Veil, and Canyon Glen parks, afternoon-drives around the Alpine Loop and to Squaw Peak, biking the Provo River Parkway Trail, water-skiing at Deer Creek, tubing the Provo river, hiking Upper Falls, Stewart Falls, Cascade Springs and Timpanogos Cave trails, family reunion activities, backpacking and camping along the Ridge Trail. I have memorized every mile-marker along the Provo River Parkway Trail from Will’s Pit Stop to Vivian Park. Our son Justin lived for a summer at Aspen Grove Lodge where he worked as a camp counselor, and our daughter Jen even held her June wedding reception at the Conrad Ranch in Provo Canyon.

Mount Timpanogos is my landmark for home. We watch the peaks of Timpanogos for the first signs of the incoming season, and my favorite is autumn. Even though it feels like I’ve explored every inch of wilderness in the Wasatch mountain range, I’ve never hiked Mount Timpanogos. But this last Saturday, thanks to the encouragement of my cute little sister-in-law Emily, I experienced the spectacular colors of autumn from a whole new vantage point. Kirk, Emily and I hiked the twelve-and-a-half miles (I’m spelling it out so it sounds as long as it felt) to the summit of Mount Timpanogos.

I’m so glad I can check this off my “things to do before I die” list (and by check-off I mean be done with it!) I can honestly say this was harder than running a marathon, which may actually have more to do with being 15 years older and 50 pounds heavier; nevertheless it was grueling. I believe it was even more arduous for poor Emily, aka Mountain Goat, to hike with us, but as I consistently reminded her, I have children that are Emily’s age. Remember Kirk is the eldest son of 12 boys and 2 girls? Emily is married to Ryan, who is one of the brothers who falls in the younger-half-category of the 14 children. At one point on the downhill-side and toward the end of the hike (about mile 10) when she thought I wasn’t looking, I actually caught Emily jogging. It was almost as though she was desperately looking for a way to turn this into a workout, as if it hadn't been already!

We started at Timpooneke trailhead in American Fork Canyon at 7,370 feet, and hiked to the summit at 11,749 feet, which I will repeat is a twelve-and-a-half mile round trip. Two of our favorite boys (Chris and Jake from our BYU ward) met us at the summit, after having spent the night on the trail so they could watch the sunrise. There had been some mention of Chris and Jake having breakfast ready for us at the top, but since we didn’t arrive until after lunchtime….

For the bragging rights and blog material alone, we are happy we did it! Thanks Em, and thanks Ryan for letting us have your wife for the day!

WARNING! VIEWER DISCRETION ADVISED!

I’m still trying to decide if by posting this blog, I am risking ALIENation from the entire human race, but I decided to go for it anyway, so here goes. Remember the Best-Vacation-Ever blog? We had such an amazing time in Belize that I just couldn’t bear to leave the place. Alas, I had to board the plane but NOT without making sure the country was EMBEDDED in my brain.

After 10 days of snorkeling, canopy tours, river trips and slothfulness, we arrived home tan, happy and mosquito-bitten. As we re-acclimated to our civilian life the memories of Belize faded but the mosquito bites persisted. Two weeks after returning home the itching had become tortuous. There were two bites on my scalp that itched so terribly I was sure I would be diagnosed with insanity-by-scratching syndrome.

Three weeks after returning, the bites on my legs were finally subsiding, but the scalp-bites were out of control. They had developed into full-blown boils. One night, Kirk was staring at me with a strange look on his face, and he said (carefully of course), “You look…different.” So I checked myself out in the mirror and sure enough, the bridge of my nose was swollen and my eyes were migrating in the direction of my temples (unfortunately I don’t have a picture of this phenomenon). It was late so I decided to sleep on it, but when I awoke the next morning the left side of my face was numb and I thought, “Okay this is getting weird”. I got up and went to work (that’s just how I roll, I don’t wanna hear it) but by the end of the day when I was still feeling like “Two-Face”, I decided I better visit the urgent-care.

With authority, the doctor said my bites had developed into a staph infection, but he did a culture just for good measure. “No problem,” said Dr. Urgent-Care. “Here’s a prescription for a really strong antibiotic. You’ll be fine in 10 days.” So I started taking the antibiotic (a horse-pill by the way). Ten days later, the swelling and numbness were gone, but the boils had started to ooze a clear brown liquid. (I warned this could get gross. Exit now if you have a weak stomach ‘cuz it’s gonna get a whole lot worse.)

The oozing brown liquid was actually a bit of a relief, because I assumed the boils were expelling the poison and soon my scalp would be good as new! The ooze only became a problem when it started dribbling down my forehead in the middle of a client meeting. THAT was a little embarrassing. After two weeks of oozing, I had taken to carrying a tissue everywhere I went in order to dab the dribble, but I finally had enough. My scalp had now been seeping for over two weeks , the boils were growing instead of shrinking, and I was absolutely certain I was losing brain-matter through the crater-holes that had now developed on top of the boils.

I returned to the urgent care center. “Not to worry,” said Dr. Urgent-Care. “Some staph infections are highly-resistant to antibiotics. We just need to give you a stronger pill.” He was kind enough to slit the top of the craters and drain more brain matter, but two hours later the boils were now larger-than-life, and I was more distressed than ever. So I turned to the internet where the answers to all of life’s mysteries may be found. I googled, “Flesh-colored nodules” and two hours later I was self-diagnosed with “Keratoacanthoma”, a non-cancerous skin growth related to sun exposure. That was plausible since K-canthoma begins as a pimple and grows into a boil-like tumor, just like the ones on top of my now horned-head. I learned that treatment required surgical excision, so I scheduled an appointment with a dermatologist who could not fit me in until the following week. No big deal; scalp-oozing and dribble-dabbing had become just part of the routine, and surely my scalp (or brain) would not be completely emptied in just one more week.

Finally dermatology-day arrived. One hour before my appointment I considered cancelling because a work-emergency arose (naturally) but I closed my eyes and said “no” to work and “yes” to saving my scalp! This turned out to be a good decision.

I related my bug-bite-in-Belize-turned-skin-cancer story to Dr. Dermatology. I probably should have left out the part about self-diagnosis because as soon as I mentioned “internet” he was tuning me out. I could almost HEAR him thinking, “blah-blah-blah…crazy lady using the internet…blah-blah-blah”, and I could tell from the slightly patronizing tone of his voice that he was making a heroic effort not to roll his eyes. Barely keeping the sarcasm out of his voice, he assured me I did NOT have skin cancer. “I can take another culture if you like,” said Dr. Dermatology, “but it’s likely we’re going to arrive at the saaaame conclusion as Dr. Urgent Care.” I was beyond desperate now! “Can’t you at least drain it?” I pleaded.

His forced patience was unmistakable as he patted the treatment-table and I lay down. With his trusty assistant by his side, Dr. Dermatology went to work draining my scalp. “Huh-that’s interesting” he said as he extracted some egg-like substance that he explained was likely just clotted blood. Then I sensed a shift in energy as his orders for gauze…tweezers…blade….more gauze increased in urgency. I felt a lot of poking and tugging at the top of my scalp, but I didn’t care. I just wanted these tumors (or whatever they were) to be drained once and for all!

One final tug and he was finished (or so I thought). In a curious tone, Dr. Dermatology asked if I would like to see what he had just fished out of the top of my scalp. “Sure”, I shrugged. I looked down at the piece of gauze he was holding out to me. (This is your last chance to exit the blog!)







On Monday, September 15, 2008 at 2:07pm, I gave birth to twins at the dermatologist. Unfortunately, the second twin was delivered in two pieces so I did not get a picture. Needless to say, they were identical twins – meaning they were equally disgusting, freak-nasty, parasitic larvae that had taken up residence in my scalp and in the course of two months had silently and revoltingly overtaken the space….rent-free!!

Here are my final thoughts:

1) There are botflys in Belize (you can google it yourself).
2) I will not be returning to Belize in this life or the next.
3) Whoever invented the phrase, “It made my skin crawl”?....has traveled to Belize.
4) Is there anyone else out there who knows what it feels like to be a human-host?

Don't call...we're on the road!

Last weekend we celebrated over 20 years of wedded bliss! The event was really triggered though, by something that happened about a week after Kirk’s big birthday surprise. We were out for a ride when we pulled up alongside a Harley-brother and traded the compulsory biker greeting. (Does anyone else know about this? Apparently, there is a universal biker wave that is honored by all motorcyclists when they pass one another on the road. No kidding! Next time you see two bikers passing each other, just watch…who knew?!)

Anyway, we pulled up next to our “brother”, and I could actually feel the deep rumbling sound resonating from his Harley. “Why,” I asked Kirk, “is his bike louder than yours?” Well - as it turns out - it is all in the pipes. So...this may not be news to anyone, but I have a teensy-bit of a competitive spirit, and I just couldn’t let the idea of someone else’s superior-pipes, diminish my road experience. So our anniversary was all about beefin’ up the bike. The end result? Now I can FEEL Kirk when he pulls into the driveway and it has nothing to do with our love connection.

To celebrate our anniversary and the new ride, we decided a little outing was appropriate, so we went on a ride through Provo Canyon and stopped in Heber for dinner at the Claim Jumper.

We then worked off the extra calories from our famous-Claim-Jumper-chocolate-cake -dessert by taking the long-way home through Heber, Midway and back down the canyon.

Our anniversary celebration was perfect, but the chill in the air was a reminder of the limited number of days left until our biking days are over for the season. We will be making the most of the time we have left, so don’t call …‘cuz we're on the road!

Are you SURE you prayed about this?

I lost count at 20 years of girls camp, 5 different camps in 3 different states, and I recall all the fond memories of my experiences as a young woman, youth camp leader, ward camp specialist, ward camp director, stake camp director, stake camp-music specialist, stake YW counselor… I think that about covers it. Ah, the memories of flag ceremonies, "singing in the trees", value colors, amphitheater, certification, waterfront, “the lone pine”, A-frame cabins, hot sweaty hikes, air-mattress-beds, wet-wipe-baths, greasy hair, mosquito-bitten flesh, sunburned ears….hmmm.

I lovingly packed away all the 3-inch binders years ago. Chuckling softly to myself as I recalled every grain of dirt and drop of rain, I boxed up the tab-filled binders, each one representing an adventure-filled week of my summer. I placed the boxes on the shelves in my dark basement as I just knew that one day, when my granddaughters grew into young women, my very own daughter would be following in my footsteps as a YW leader and would want to glean from my vast knowledge (a YW value, value-color-green, in case you didn’t know). Five years later, the dust has accumulated and the stacks of clutter have hidden the boxes from view but still they remain in the dark basement, waiting for my daughter to carry them back up to the light.

Meanwhile, I have been enjoying a cushy, flying-under-the-radar life as a BYU Bishop’s wife, imagining my life was perfect. So, consider my surprise when on Tuesday this past week, I was summoned to the Stake President’s office and heard these unimaginable words, “We are re-organizing the stake YW presidency and board; your name has been submitted, and we would like to extend a call for you to serve as our new Stake Camp Director.” An audible groan escaped my throat before I could stop it. I pulled my jaw back into place after it had fallen to the table, and my thoughts turned to the one magnificent lady I knew was perfect to fill the role as new Stake YW President; I quickly dismissed the idea of her though as I thought, "Nah, it wouldn't be Debbie; surely she recalls the more-than-a-few dialogues about our combined girls camp experiences...and we're FRIENDS after all, right?"

So a few days have gone by, and I know the right way to feel is, "I'm so grateful for your confidence in me!'...and I'm getting there, really! But alas, this camp-weary grandma, who just wants to ride on the back of her hubby's Harley to our next BYU activity, can't help but wonder, "I love, LOVE, love you Debbie, but are you SURE you prayed about this? Because I love, LOVE, love NOT camping!"

Remember That Time I Bought You a Harley?

On Sunday, August 3, 2008, I'm pretty sure I pulled off the best birthday surprise ever! So, as long as I've known him, Kirk has wanted a Harley.

I remember a time in the olden days when we were dating. Kirk had pulled up next to a Harley, turned off the radio, and rolled down the window. With a longing gaze (I actually thought he was thinking of me) he turned to me and said, "Just listen to that sound; doesn't it give you chills?"

"Er-no; is it supposed to?" I thought he was going to end the relationship because of my response!

Honestly, I never remotely considered either of us would ever own a motorcycle. Slowly however, our lives began to change: our kids moved out, the house was quiet, we no longer had a reason to be at home, I felt FREEDOM! (sorry kids) Then an acquaintance of ours built this amazing Harley Resort in Lindon, "Timpanogos Harley", and Kirk took me in for a tour. This is one of the coolest buildings I've ever seen, entirely built out of scrap-material from Geneva Steel, the railroad yard, etc. There's a restaurant inside called "Marley's" that our friend Milo manages, and we began visiting Timpanogos Harley more regularly; you know, just to look at the cool building and grab a bite; nothing more!

One day in June while we sat at a table munching on Milo's famous "Sliders", someone started up one of the Harley's, and guess what? I got chills! You know that Cadillac commercial that says, "When you turn your car on, does it return the favor?" Well....

As Kirk's birthday drew near I began to have doubts about my newfound feelings for Harley. Maybe it's a mid-life crisis? What if I'm losing my mind? What about the upstairs-remodel I have been considering? I hadn't told a soul about what I was thinking. Then just before the big day, I casually strolled into Timp Harley, found the General Manager Rick, and told him I wanted to buy a bike. Two hours later I walked out with the pink slip. I KNOW!!!! CAN YOU BELIEVE IT??!!!!!

Rick even arranged for it to be delivered on Sunday even though the store was closed. Yes, it's true - he bribed one of the workers with a "six-pack" to deliver a Harley to a Bishop on the Sabbath! (Ha!) What better way to begin my life as a biker-chick?

The minute I walked out of the store I started hyperventiliating! What have I just done?! I called my son Jared. He was elated, and naturally assured me this was the best decision of my life! I called my daughter Jen, who was so excited she dropped everything, packed up her hubby and kids and made the 3-hour drive to Orem so she could be there for the birthday surprise on the following day. On the afternoon of the "event", I started to panic again so I called my sister-in-law Kate. Her response was enough to calm my nerves for another hour, "AWESOME! You just fulfilled Kirk's life-long dream!"

Kirk came home from his Bishop-duties in the late afteroon, and somehow I forced myself to act natural. We started grilling steaks in the backyard for his birthday-dinner, when lo and behold, word had spread to some of Kirk's 13 siblings (there are 12 boys and 2 girls in Kirk's family). Fifteen minutes before delivery time, Kirk's parents, brothers and sister Amy began to trickle in, which would have been really great if they had all gotten word that it was supposed to be a secret - yikes!!! Fortunately, the part about it being a "secret" was passed around with no harm done, and Amy helped me throw off any suspicion from Kirk.

Finally, after what was for me a nail-bitingly, long and panic-stricken wait, the Harley-Delivery-Boy called to let us know he was around the corner. We opened the back gate for him, and when he arrived, he drove right through the gate into the backyard and onto the lawn. Kirk was looking at me as the sound of the Harley reached his ears. He told me later that it was at this moment that he allowed himself to consider that getting a Harley for his birthday might actually be a possibility, but he quickly dismissed that thought, not wanting to be disappointed.

My only mistake was not having a video camera on-hand for Kirk's reaction. There were actually tears!! So.....Helmet?...$100, Gloves?...$50, Harley?...$affordable, Look on Kirk's face?...PRICELESS!!!

The moment I saw my Hot, Harley-Hubby on his brand-new toy, all doubts receded as this thought gradually occurred to me: "I am going to be able to get a lot of mileage out of this birthday surprise, for a very long time....'Honey, remember that time I bought you a Harley?' "

Best Vacation Ever!

Wow, I'm not gonna lie - this is kind of scary for an old lady! What? Blogging? At my age? Jen and Heather both told me I need to do this, and I'm really good at doing what I'm told (HA!), so here we go!

We've had a great summer, so I guess that's a good place to start. Kirk and I, blissfully enjoying our new status as empty-nesters, are livin' it up! I'm pretty sure our children believe we vicariously live our lives through them....little do they know...

Our trip to Belize: definitely a summer highlight! Our first vacation EVER that we did NO WORK! Before leaving, we both committed to no email and no voicemail. I thought I would be technology-detoxing the first two days but we didn't miss a beat. And although hard to imagine, the company survived without us - quite a blow to my ego by the way. In fact, I suspect half the employees didn't even know we were gone, but I'm a little afraid to consider that possibility. I prefer to hold on to the fantasy that I'm indispensable in the workplace.

Nine amazing days in the Honeymoon Suite (wink, wink) at Chabil Mar Resort. The resort was in a tiny village (pop.500) called Placencia, which is on the peninsula in South Belize (highly recommended to anyone considering a Central American vacation). Belize was the perfect combination of jungle, beach, pool-side, cultural, third-world, luxury, snorkeling, cave-tubing, canopy-tour, sun-bathing and our new obsession sea-kayaking.

Belize already feels like a distant memory, but I will definitely go on record, benchmarking this trip as our best vacation ever!