Visiting Grandma and Grandpa Beatty

Today my cousin Dawn and I drove down to Walsenburg to visit our grandparents. Dawn and I reconnected at the 2010 Beatty reunion in Utah earlier this month - before that we'd only seen each other I think once since high school, even though for a fair chunk of that time we'd lived in the same city. I think we're both pretty excited about making that connection together.

This was one of the nicest visits I've had with grandma and grandpa (Gladys Marie Allison Beatty and Park Forsythe Beatty). We looked at photos and chatted for a good two hours. Dawn showed them pictures from the Utah trip and I brought a few of their photo albums from their Navy days and high school days (I'm holding onto their albums for them because they don't have room in their place) and they looked through the albums and talked about a few things they remembered. One story that comes to mind right now is that Grandma told us about how they got married - they'd met while stationed in San Diego in the Navy, but grandpa got out before grandma and was back in Cedar City, Utah. When grandma got out of the Navy, she stopped in Cedar City on her way home to Fairplay, Colorado. She stayed over at the Escalante for a few days and told grandpa, as she put it, "to either sh** or get off the pot", or rather, told him to marry her or she was going home to find someone else. Well, they just had their 64th anniversary earlier this month. They started out in a basement apartment in Cedar City, but Ernie, grandma's dad, thought no daughter of his should live in a basement, so he set them up at his house in the 500 block (513?) of E.Del Norte, near the Patty Jewett golf course in Colorado Springs. I want to go find that home.

Grandpa claims that he was such a fast runner in his high school days in track that he was actually faster than the current world record but they didn't keep records back then. :) Grandpa also got a kick out of pictures of grandma in her Hawaiian grass skirt and beachwear.

Another story grandma told that was new for me was about how her dad Ernie (Millard Ernest Allison) became a shoe cobbler. He was raised as a farmer/rancher, but his stepdad Ned Lenari trained him to be a shoe cobbler and that's how he made his living in later years. Grandma showed me a picture of her and a Navy girlfriend wearing cowboy boots that Ernie made for them.



I also learned Grandma had a few nicknames in the Navy - she was called "Al" - short for Allison, her last name. Even grandpa called her that. Grandpa said she was also known as Happy Butt because of her first name, Gladys - I'll see if you can figure that one out. :)

They both seemed to be in good spirits. Grandpa has some holes in his memory - he almost completely forgot that he lived in New Mexico for years and had occasional confusion about who we were, but it comes back to him with some time and some prompts to jog the memory now and then. Grandma has a few holes in her memory, too - I've never noticed it before - but she's still very sharp over all. They also seem to be getting more involved in activities available to them where they live. They've been playing Bingo and going to a weekly movie and Sunday church, etc.

Beatty Family Reunion 2010 Trip

I uploaded lots of pictures on Facebook as well as here, please have a look.

Logan, Sam and I left around 5 a.m. Friday morning heading for Hurricane, Utah and the nearby town of Toquerville, where my great-grandfather Walter Beatty lived and a large amount of family that I'd never met still resides. The kids were asleep and missed the antelope and bison in South Park. We made our first stop in Grand Junction for an early lunch. It had to be Subway, that's what we all wanted. And then the rest of the trip we enjoyed a little game of reading the road signs and seeing all other towns that had Subways - almost all of them did! We stopped at the Colorado/Utah border for pictures, and stopped at one rest stop on I-70, but did not need to stop again for gas. We took pictures of beautiful scenery all the way. We got to our hotel around 5 p.m. and ordered pizza for dinner and went swimming in the hotel pool. We watched America's Funniest Home Videos on the hotel TV until we fell asleep.

The next morning, we enjoyed making our own waffles at the hotel continental breakfast, but we had to wait in line for the machine, testing the kids' patience just a bit. Then we drove the few miles to Toquerville's LDS church for the reunion. We all got shirts representing that we are descended from Walter Beatty; people descended from his siblings had different colored shirts. There were introductions at the reunion, then a tour of my great-grandpa's house two doors down from the church, followed by lunch and entertainment put on by various cousins and family at the reunion. Sammy was inspired by one young girl's recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance and decided to recite the Preamble of the Constitution for everyone. Another older girl sang the National Anthem very well - so there was plenty of patriotic sentiment at the reunion. The children were excited by a candy bomb - black powder being used to launch candy across the parking lot for fun. One story that Samantha learned from relatives is about my great-grandmother's wedding ring. Walter was a horse wrangler and guide in Zion National Park and was hired by a famous rich lady to take her to the top of Angel's Landing. When they got there, she was about to throw off her ring, but Walter asked her if he could have it instead to give to his wife Vera, who had a gold wedding band but no diamond. She gave it to him and he of course gave it to Vera. Great-Grandma Vera passed it on to my dad's cousin Vera because she was named after her. Vera has passed it on to her son Ryan's bride, Shay, but the stone is now in a different setting. At the end of the reunion we posed for a group picture, then Logan, Sam and I and some other folks headed over to my dad's cousins Paula and Vera's house to chat. My great-grandpa's saddle was there and Logan and Sam posed for pictures on it. It had hailed during the reunion and the yards looked almost like they were covered in snow. That evening, we went to the movie theater in Hurricane and saw The Karate Kid - which we thoroughly enjoyed. The kids feel asleep to The Toy Story playing on the hotel TV.

Sunday morning we had waffles again and then drove into Springdale to the beautiful place that my Uncle Jack was staying with his daughter Dawn and her family called Cliff Rose Palace, if I recall correctly. Then we followed them in Zion National Park, the entrance being a very short distance away. We explored the Emerald Pools trail, had lunch at Zion Lodge and then walked the Temple of Sinawava trail. Logan and Sam had the opportunity to meet and play with their second cousin Duncan, Dawn's son. We took lots of pictures. I hadn't seen Dawn since her mom's funeral and before that we were probably children, so it was nice to connect with her as well. Jack hospitably took care of us all and planned our route since he was the only one who had been there before and was kind of acting as our patriarch that day. We stopped at the museum to see the large picture of great-grandpa Walter there and then we headed back toward Hurricane. We stopped at a very touristy gift-shop in the town of Virgin where Logan was incredibly excited to find and buy a samurai sword set and Sammy got gifts to take home. We were invited to my second-cousin Richard and his wife Sara's house for dinner, and that was a wonderful highlight and end to the trip. Richard showed everyone how to ride a horse and everyone took a turn. The children showed Logan and Sam the other animals and they played together very well. I think everyone was sad to leave when it was time to go.

Monday morning we were on the road by 4:45 a.m. As on the way out, the kids fell back asleep quickly and it was a beautiful quiet drive through Utah. Finally in Colorado they started keeping me company again. We met a little snow up in the mountains before the Eisenhower tunnel, and some rain we got back to I-25 and home, but we made great time and I dropped the kids off at my brother's house at 3:15 p.m. The car did well and averaged about 43 mpg - yay for that! Thanks to all the family and friends we met, we had a wonderful time. I am so happy to connect with family - what a blessing!

Favorite Poems

These were some of my favorite poems as a kid, and still are, really:

The Jabberwocky and 'The Walrus and the Carpenter' by Lewis Carroll.

The Giving Tree or Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein.

O Captain my Captain and When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer by Walt Whitman.

The Raven and The Bells by Edgar Allan Poe.

maggie and milly and molly and may and 'since feeling is first' by e e cummings.

Because I Could Not Stop for Death by Emily Dickinson.

Let America be America Again and A Dream Deferred by Langston Hughes.

Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night by Dylan Thomas.

Paul Revere's Ride by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

The Three Little Kittens by Eliza Lee Follen.

Dutch Lullaby (Winken, Blinken and Nod) by Eugene Field.

Anything by Ogden Nash ( such as: The trouble with a kitten
is that eventually
it becomes a cat.)

The Purple Cow by Gelett Burgess.

Godfrey Gordon Gustavus Gore by William Brighty Rands.

My Shadow by Robert Louis Stevenson.

The Tyger by William Blake.

Thanksgiving Day (Over the River and Through the Wood) by Lydia Maria Child.

Casey at the Bat by Ernest Lawrence Thayer.

Fog by Carl Sandburg.

The Red Wheelbarrow by William Carlos Williams.

The Unknown Citizen by W. H. Auden.

Robert Frost's Road Not Taken and Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.

Shakespeare's Sonnett 18 (Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day).

For whom the bell tolls by John Donne.

If and Hiawatha by Rudyard Kipling.

How Do I Love Thee by Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

What are your favorites?

Fort Logan

This afternoon I drove up to Fort Logan National Cemetery and found the graves of my great-grandfather (dad's mom's dad) and his wife Blanche. Blanche was his second wife, and the poor lady killed herself about a week after Ernie died, so she joined him shortly - at least that's the story I was told; this all happened before I was born. I don't know anything else about her. However, I've often had the distinct feeling that I've met Ernie somehow, sometime. I have a feeling my dad is a lot like him, but I don't know. I'd never been up there before, but although bad traffic made the trip long, it wasn't too hard to find his grave because they were all numbered right on the stones - very helpful - especially because I went after the office closed. The grass was totally dead in the area where my great-grandfather is buried - it looks like they laid down new sod awhile ago and then didn't water it at all, or something.

Then I went to the center up in Denver for Thursday night prayer, etc. It was hard to find - I got a little lost and had to wander around in the middle of nowhere a bit to eventually find it. So, I saw some people I hadn't seen in probably almost a year, which was nice. Got home around 11:30pm - there's a reason I just can't make it up there very often!

I think two of my brother's kids are up for the Beatty reunion, so insha'allah next weekend I'll be driving to Toquerville, UT. Long drive - I hope we'll be safe and have a good time, and meet plenty of cousins we've never met.

Make a t-shirt bag - world's easiest sewing project

I think I found the world's easiest sewing project online that actually makes something practical. And it recycles - no need to buy fabric. It should take only a few minutes - say 15 minutes or less. A child as young as kindergarten age can do this with supervision and will have fun and avoid frustration that often comes with trying to learn to sew. It requires only one straight stitch and a few cuts, and two more straight stitches are optional. Adult beginning sewers will also enjoy being able to make something with ease. Some youth groups make these and sell them for charity projects.

Materials needed: a t-shirt, scissors or rotary cutter, thread & needle or sewing machine ready to sew a straight stitch.

Step 1. Find an old t-shirt and turn it inside out. It must be jersey material (standard t-shirt material).

Step 2. Set up your sewing machine (or you can hand-stitch if you prefer.)

Step 3. Turn the shirt inside out.

Step 4. Sew the bottom of the shirt closed right above the existing hem using a standard straight stitch or any other stitch you prefer. If you want to be careful, you can pin the two sides together first. If you use a straight stitch, go back and forth at the very beginning of your line and at the end of you line to help lock the stitch in place. Jersey stretches so you may accidentally pull your fabric and end up with a stitch that is not completely straight - sewing slower can help that, but for this project it really doesn't matter - your bag will still look great even with a wandering stitch like mine shown below. You can repeat/go-over this stitch to make it stronger if you like.



Step 5. This step is optional. Reach inside the t-shirt and open it a little, then pull the two sides apart down near the bottom of your inside-out bag, so that you can create a bit of an opening. Lay the fabric that you just sewed together so that you have a triangle on the end as the picture below shows. Sew straight across a few inches in (as in the picture) and this creates some depth to the bag so that it sort of has a bottom instead of just closing to a line. This is called a gusset, I think. The further you sew this in from the end, the greater depth you give the bag, but that triangle above where you sew will be inside your finished bag just kind of hanging out in there, and you probably don't want it to be really really big.

Repeat this stitch making the triangle corner on the other side of the bag bottom about the same distance in. You can measure if you want to, but it really isn't necessary - eyeballing it will work just fine. If the two stitches are very different distances in from the end or are very crooked, it could be a little noticeable in the final product, but your bag will still function just fine.



Step 6. Using scissors or a rotary cutter, cut off the sleeves by following along inside the seam that attaches the sleeve to the shirt, so that the seam is no longer on the shirt body. Cut off the collar the same way. After cutting off the collar, cut the neck a little wider or deeper if you want to, but be careful not to cut into any cool design/pattern that might be on the shirt front, unless you don't care.




Step 7. Turn it right-side out. You now have a flexible and surprisingly sturdy tote bag that can be used for grocery shopping or anything else. An adult t-shirt makes a huge bag. The one pictured was an adult large, I think. Child shirts will make smaller bags.

Irises and Spanish Broom blooming

Sewing Today

First time I've sewed in like a year - made two oversize pillowcases and a bag today.

State of the Yard

Photos posted here.

Abraham Lincoln

I was working on the genealogy of Bessie Maud Hanks, my grandma's grandmother. I had made a mistake in identifying her parents and found a new connection.

Bessie's fourth-great grandfather Robert Shipley born in 1713 is the great-grandfather of Abraham Lincoln, and her other fourth-great grandfather Luke Hanks is another great-grandfather of Abraham Lincoln. My 7th great-grandparents who were married to each other, Joseph Hanks (son of Luke) and Ann Lee Shipley (daughter of Robert), had siblings married to each other named James Hanks and Lucy Shipley. James and Lucy are the parents of Nancy Hanks (Lincoln), mother of Abraham Lincoln. So, technically I think that makes Abraham Lincoln my second cousin, 7 generations removed.

Bessie's husband Milton Ooley was related to Davy Crockett , and Bessie was a witness to the Dalton Gang shootout as a girl. I wish I could talk to her!

Blooming Bush

Two bushes are blooming in my yard right now - here's a picture of one of them.

I got two hilarious books from Paperbackswap.com lately -

1. America - The Book This is a "textbook" associated with The Daily Show.

2. Geek Logik - 50 Foolproof Equations for Everyday Life Made up equations based on some sort of logic to help you evaluate such things as if you should call in sick, should you get a tattoo, or should you join a gym.

Easter

Jesus Saves! About this, Muslims and Christians agree.

This weekend, many Christians and even non-Christians observe Easter, either as a religious or secular/traditional event. To Christians, Easter is a remembrance of the resurrection of Jesus Christ (as) after his execution by crucifixion. The most commonly held date according to some Christian sources for the execution of Jesus is Friday, April 7, 30 CE, which would put the date associated with his resurrection as April 9. But, even the four gospels in the New Testament do not agree entirely on the events of the crucifixion and resurrection and their timings, with the Gospel of John account differing significantly from the other three in many respects. So far, nothing has been found in historic sources or through archaeological research that clearly indicates much about the life or death of Jesus.

The date of Easter observance was set by the Council of Nicaea in 325 CE as the first Sunday after the first Paschal full moon after March 20. March 20 was the date of the Spring Equinox in 325 CE. Orthodox Christians modify this rule slightly compared to other Christians by using the Julian instead of the Gregorian calendar, and using the Nicaea calculation only if the date comes after Passover (14 Nisan on the Jewish calendar). The date of the execution is believed to have occurred after Passover, which Christians consider as a symbol of the blood sacrifice of Jesus. Passover is the observance of an event mentioned in Exodus, when God visited plagues on Egypt, including the killing of firstborn sons. Hebrew followers of Moses (as) who marked their doorsteps with lamb's blood were passed-over for this plague.

There are a few opinions about the origin of the term "Easter", most of which address ancient pagan religious observances. "Easter" is said to come from the name of the goddess of fertility Ishtar/Eostre/Austron. This pagan connection shows up in many modern Easter practices - both secular and religious - such as eating hot cross buns, the symbols of rabbits and eggs, Easter lilies, sunrise services, and Easter candles, traditions that appear to have origins in the worship of Ishtar in the season of the Spring Equinox. Some people do make a connection between the figure of Isthar Ishtar and Biblical figures - she speculated in some sources to be the Queen Semiramis, the wife of Nimrud, great-grandson of Prophet Noah (as).

Nimrud (or Nimrod)  - whose name means "the rebel", according to the Bible and legend gathered from many sources, was a disbelieving powerful tyrant, head of an occult mystery religion, and founder of great but corrupt cities like Babel and Nineveh. When he died, his wife deified him as a Sun-God,  later known by such names as Baal and Molech. She later had an illegitimate son, Tammuz, whom she claimed was the resurrected Nimrud supernaturally conceived.

Since pagans associated this resurrection story with the Ishtar festivals around the Spring Equinox, and Spring is the season in which the execution and resurrection of Jesus (as) are purported to have occurred, it was a natural fit for the two resurrection observances to comingle as pagans became Christians, leading to the Easter we know today.

Easter is largely considered the most important observance on the Christian calendar today, because it is associated with the belief in Jesus's (as) role as savior. Generally speaking, many Christians believe that no human being can live a good enough life to warrant entry into God's presence in heaven. Further, God is Just, so every sin must be paid for or punished. In order that humans have access to Heaven and aren't all doomed to Hell by their sinful natures, through His Mercy, God wills and accepts the death of Jesus, the only sinless person ever to live (a proof of his divine nature), as payment for the sins of all those who believe and acknowledge this "Gospel Truth." Therefore, they celebrate his (as) rising from the dead as the completion and acceptance by God of this sacrifice, and thus as the guarantee of their after-lives in Heaven rather than Hell.

While Christians generally cite the divinity of Jesus (as) as key to the way he saves, Muslims consider deification of Jesus (as) as an obstacle to knowing God and His true salvation Good News. Muslims, like Christians, regard Jesus (as) as savior, but not through a redemptive sacrifice. Islam rejects a few essential notions in the Christian salvation concept:

1. According to some Islamic sources, all prophets (as), and not just Jesus (as), lived sinless lives, and this trait is an indication of a messenger or guide of God, but not of divinity or godhood. The purpose of all these messengers and guides is to demonstrate and teach how to live a good life via example and delivery of God's guidance, and sinlessness is an important trait in being able to serve as a proper guide and example.  Sinlessness does not mean absolute perfection or super-humanness, however.  Most people admit they could commit and succeed at getting through one day without committing anything they understood to be sin.  Many Muslims believe that the best among us can do so day after day.

2. Muslims believe God can forgive sins by simply doing so, and has not chosen to constrict His forgiveness to the method of a blood sacrifice of a sinless or divine person. Salvation is in essence a meeting between a human's approaching God by trying to live a sinless and ideal life according to God's guidance, and the Love and Mercy of God turning to His Creation with forgiveness. No one is guaranteed salvation by claiming a certain set of beliefs, but people's actions, beliefs and intentions will all be weighed with both Justice and Mercy.

3. According to the orthodox interpretations of Qur'an and other Islamic sources, Jesus (as) was not crucified, and did not die for anyone's sins. He has not died yet, and was raised alive and will return. There is some suggestion that a crucifixion or attempt did take place, but it was a case of a scapegoat or mistaken identity - some have said this person was Judas.  However, the matter is not clear, and the Qur'an indicates that people have speculated about what happened and built a house of cards on speculation.

On these latter points of being raised alive and returning, as well as many other awesome aspects of Jesus' (as) nature, such as virgin birth and performance of miracles, Muslims and Christians tend to agree or at least have a lot of similarity/commonality in belief. Thus, the primary differences between Muslims and Christians about the historical Jesus (as) are only his divinity and his death - but these differences contribute to considerably different conclusions about salvation.

Christians claim Jesus (as) as their savior, and Muslims do, too. In that sense, Muslims are Christians. But in the same sense, Muslims could also be called 'Abrahamans', 'Mosans', 'Noahans, and even the politically incorrect 'Mohamedans'. Muslims claim all the sinless prophets and guides as saviors, through their deliverance of God's message to mankind, as well as perhaps through intercession. Therefore, applying the name of any one of them alone is incomplete as a reference to Muslims. The universal message that all the prophets delivered and which instructs mankind about knowing and approaching God, distinguishing truth from falsehood, and distinguishing right from wrong actions, is what Muslims consider as the "Gospel" that Jesus (as) delivered and that saves.

In the Qur'an, Christians are mentioned as the closest in faith to the Muslims because of the shared lineage of guidance both faiths recognize from Adam to Jesus.  The Qur'an makes examples of Jesus (as) and other prophets extensively. We learn and apply the teachings from all of them and not Mohamed (saw) alone. However, we are not limited to the Bible or Qur'an for knowing and following Jesus (as). Shia hadith collections and surviving apocryphal texts are other sources on Jesus (as) worthy of study for Muslims and Christians alike, each to be understood within the context of their individual limitations. Some of the sayings in Shia sources attributed to or about Jesus (as) are also contained in the Gospels of the Christians, while others would be found as relatively unique to a Christian reader, related from Ahlul-bayt (as), but not commonly found in Christian sources, if at all. Al-Hajj Muhammad Legenhausen translated the most comprehensive collection available in English, Jesus (as) Through the Qur'an and Shi'ite Narrations. In the Easter season, Muslims and Christians can expand their understandings of Jesus(as) and better apply his universal message by delving into more than just the Qur'an or the New Testament for his teachings, or by seeking to extend open hands to each other in solidarity, acknowledging that our love and connection to God by way of Jesus (as) is something we share, regardless of some differences in the details.

Another Dream

Another "interesting" dream, for your entertainment, if you find those kind of things enertaining.....

I was trying to figure out how to get somewhere, walking down a street after losing my car somehow, and I see first one, then two, long missiles going down the street. They are dark army green, very low to the ground, and following the curve of the road and going about the speed of a car, but seemingly directed as if by remote control. The two join together, and then take off like a rocket into the sky. At some other time, in a park, the missiles appear again, and lots of young people are crowding around them, kind of running along side them, and I take pictures of the missiles as they go by. At my parents' house, I examine the pictures and discover they are really really good, and I have close-up images on them which shows English writing on them and blue stripes, and really close the outermost paint layer actually seems to be like papier mache with lots of Chinese writing both in Chinese characters and Roman script, and some American corporate logos like Walgreens. I post these pictures on Facebook and my blog and tell people to share them because I worry they might disappear. Later, I'm at a school talking to a student. He is showing me something he is eating which looks like part of a green pomegranate but I think it is a kind of hallucinogen. We both notice this guy who is bald on the top of his head but has long reddish-blond hair and a fat face, and he throws something that looks like a giant grapefruit toward me. I hold my breath but inhale anyway, and I know it is a gas or a poison and I am struggling to breathe like I'm having an asthma attack while the student is trying to drag me away to safety. Then I wake up.:)

Dreams

Every now and then I post about dreams - reading about dreams is always pretty crazy.

I had this dream last night that I was with a large group of people and we were camping in something like tents that were all connected right at the base of a very steep cliff. I woke up and looked out a "window" and saw that the wind was blowing like crazy and caused two natural stone structures, kind of like statues, to collapse on the cliff above me as I watched. No fear or alarm, though. Then, I left my "room" and was talking to this old cowboy who looked a lot like Sam Elliott and he was showing me how he had solved some legend that this secret place on a map was actually Dallas. I went back to my room and looked up at the cliff and now there was a long power cable dangling down it and sparking wildly as it swung back and forth. It ignited some dead leaves in scrub oak and then almost instantly that fire spread everywhere, down the cliff and into and beyond the camp. Sam Elliott in his cowboy hat was on flames and even as the call of Fire! went out, I realized it was already too late, and then woke up.

Then later I dreamed I was a long-haired teenaged boy mad at his dad because I was the only boy/man in the extended family who had not been allowed to race cars.

Fountain Creek Regional Park Today

This is a wetland preserve just about two miles from my house. (Don't forget, you can click on the photos to make them big.)

Spring Break 2010

No complaints - got to start a day early because the district closed due to the forecast. Probably didn't have to, but that's alright by me.

Anarita and the Leaving

Anarita came home from school and saw that the big black box containing Dad's telescope was gone. But she didn't think much of it at first. Later, Alice came home and was making shells and cheese for dinner. She went upstairs to her bedroom and came down obviously upset.

She told Victor and Anarita that Dad's clothes were gone. Everyone cried, but Alice forced the kids to eat dinner. No one had seen this coming. Later that night, maybe around 11, Dad called. He was in Nevada, on the way to California, with a woman from his work and her daughter. He would sell his red Ford pickup and the telescope to start his new life with a new family.

Anarita was angry, bewildered, sad and jealous. She loved that red pickup truck and she loved the telescope; pieces of her dad. And why did that daughter get to be with dad but not Victor, Mom and she? What had they done wrong? The next day, Victor stayed home but Anarita decided to go to school. She sat on the swings and told her friend Julie that her dad had left. Her friend was sad, but Anarita thought, "This happens to almost everyone these days, what right do I have to hurt? It's normal." But she felt so sorry for her mom who would spend days and nights crying and worrying about how not to lose the house while trying to hide her worry from the kids.

Anarita and Victor were sent to a psychiatrist to talk about it, but neither of them wanted to talk. So sometimes they played games there, but Anarita thought that was a waste of time and money they didn't have. No one wanted to go anymore, so after a few visits, they didn't.

Some time later, Joe came back into town, but with the woman and her daughter. Mom took her and Victor to see him at their grandparents' house. Alice refused to go in, and so Anarita and Victor didn't want to go in either. However, they were told they had to go. Dad had 5 o'clock shadow and cried and hugged and kissed them and said things about missing them.

Anarita was dumbfounded. Why did he miss them, wasn't he the one that left? She met the other little girl who was about the same age as her, and tried to make the best of things by being friends with her. She was a nice girl. That turned out to be a mistake because Mom got angry when Anarita wanted to play with the other girl. She learned she wasn't supposed to be friendly with the woman or the daughter because they were the enemies, she should only just be polite. But as she saw it, they were in a worse situation than she. That woman had thrown the lots of she and her daughter in with Dad, and now Dad was back in town and second-guessing. They were being thrown around in the wind.

One day, Dad came back home. From that day on, everyone had to play a game that nothing had ever happened. No one was allowed to talk about the leaving, the betrayal. But it was always there, and it ate the hearts of all of them. It would drive Joe to depression,and being a mean drunk. It would make Victor hate his father for leaving and his mother for taking him back. It would make Alice have no self confidence or self love. And Anarita would spend the rest of her youth trying to be perfect so that she could earn her father's love that he had been so hasty to give away to strangers once upon a time. But being perfect isn't possible, and neither is pleasing a mean drunk.

Anarita and the Salat

She knew them as ordinary people, but when they bowed down before God, their foreheads prostrated in humbleness, they seemed to transform into something wonderful. Rather, the wonderfulness of their ordinariness became apparent when they worshiped the Creator.

It was a new kind of prayer to her. She knew the Prayer of Give Me, the Prayer of Want, the Prayer of More.

"Oh God, Please Give Me More Money,"
or "Oh God, I Want a Snow Day at School,"
or "Oh God, I Need More Time."

Sometimes, "Oh God, I Want My Mommy,",
or "Oh God, Save Me,",
or "Oh God, Not Again."

Maybe even, "Oh God, I'm Sorry,"
"Oh God I Hate That Guy,"
or "Oh God, Why???"

All the prayers of asking, complaining, pleading, conversing one-way. But now HERE was something she was missing and didn't even know she was missing until she saw it. A prayer of worship. A prayer of praise. A prayer of humility. And the motions mattered. The forehead in dust didn't just talk of worship and humility, it showed it, it felt it.

Anarita's heart leaped in her chest in joy and reverence as she bowed and praised, prostrated and humbled.

If there was a God, then this was right.

Anarita and the Feely Meely Box

Anarita loved kindergarten. One reason she loved it was because her mom had taught her well. Anarita already knew how to read. Her mom used to sit and read to her almost every afternoon, and then one day, her mom told her to read instead. It took forever and was very hard and exhausting (and she had plenty of help from mom), but that day she read her first book: Hop on Pop. "Up Pup Pup is Up....." She felt sorry for students who didn't know how to read yet and only had school to learn. If she ever became a parent, she wanted to teach her kids to read before they started school.

For her, school was fun. One of her favorite parts of kindergarten, and there were many, was The Feely Meely Box. At the end of morning, the kindergarten kids sat in The Pit. The Pit was an octagon with three steps down all around, where classes gathered to be read to, to sign up for morning attendance and lunch, and so on. The Teacher would grab a Kleenex box that had been covered in long, pink faux fur and googly eyes - The Feely Meely Box. If she thought you were good, you might be invited to stick your hand in the box, feel around, and pull out a prize. Maybe it would be a plastic ring. Anarita's doctor's office had her favorite plastic rings - they were Disney rings, white plastic with metallic red, green or blue paint on the faces of Pluto, Daffy, Goofy, Mickey or Minnie. But one day she got to stick her hand in the box and she pulled out the best thing of all - a pink butterfly magnet! She was too young to realize that what she really loved was praise and approval from adult authority figures, but at the moment she loved that magnet!

She went home and her mom placed it on the fridge. It was so beautiful. And it stayed beautiful until one day it somehow got knocked off the fridge and the dog chewed it up.

Anarita and the Little Jesus in Your Heart

Anarita had a little black and white TV that got fuzzy UHF channels with preachers on them. It even got channels between spaces on the dial that picked up half of cordless phone calls. She had never seen a cordless phone yet, but she eventually deduced that was what she was hearing. She spent hours playing spy, listening to one side of calls between people she didn't know, trying to determine what the other, inaudible caller was saying in the silences.

Many of the preachers kept talking about inviting Jesus "into your heart". If you did that sincerely, it was supposed to save you. People came on the shows and talked about how their lives changed forever when they were Born Again by this invitation. Then the preachers would put their hands up, palms out, as if reaching out to the people watching, and tell them to come put their hands on the screen and pray for Jesus to come in their hearts so they could be saved. The preachers would close their eyes tightly, and you were supposed to do the same, with your hand on the screen.

Anarita didn't want to go to hell, but this all seemed a bit silly. Still, she wanted to be saved and wanted to know and love God. She wanted that "relationship" those preachers always talked about it. So, she put her hand on the screen and prayed along, keeping her eyes closed except for those peeks to see if the preacher was keeping his eyes closed, too.

She had this mental image of a tiny Jesus, wearing a white or blue robe and having a long brown beard just like in all those Jesus wall pictures. The tiny Jesus came and knocked on her sternum, and it had a tiny door knob. He twisted the door knob and opened her chest cavity up, revealing an empty, red fleshy altar where the heart was expected to be. She had no heart, just a hole. A hole perfectly sized for the tiny Jesus, halo and sandals and all, to climb in and sit.

So now that Jesus was in her, she expected to be changed like those people on the TV. But she felt exactly the same as before. She must've done it wrong. So, she tried again and again with different preachers on different shows and different channels. The preachers were weird, a little creepy, maybe. And what was that tiny Jesus doing sitting in her heart hole all day anyway? He must've got out to go do stuff, and that's why she was the same old Anarita. Or maybe he was never really there at all.

Anarita and the BLM Land

Anarita walked down the side of a sandy gully and up the other side. In the span of less than 50 steps, 50 breaths, she had passed from "her" land to no man's land, or rather, BLM land. No fence, no post with pink flag, nothing that she could see marked the boundary. The boundary was a figment of imagination, just as was the idea that one side of the gully belonged to her family. It was only a delusion that people with sheets of paper and exchanges of money all agreed to together. Enough people or powerful enough people agreed there was a boundary where clearly none existed. What would the world be like if no one agreed to such things? Who was the first guy who came up with the ridiculous notion of owning something that had been there before him and would be there after him?

Her parents would own the land by the BLM land for a few years, via payments. For a few years, the family would camp there, gaze at stars, and watch the dogs run around. It was magical; it had petrified wood, free-range cattle would wander onto it, and a few times the Christmas Tree would come from it. But for Joe, the magic ended when he left a small trailer there with a few board games, camping gear, etc., and it was broken into and robbed. He sold the land that people agreed to imagine somehow belonged to him, and so they stopped imagining it.

The BLM land felt hotter and wilder than the other side of the gully. It had a faster, noisier wind. It had lots of holes in its loose dirt next to more Yucca than on "her" side. She heard a buzzing sound in the wind. She looked for the insects, but saw none. She examined the holes, and decided some animals had made them, but maybe not - they could've been dug, as if someone were looking for something, prospecting.

But the buzzing sounded more like whispering or chanting. Who had walked here before? Where they speaking to her now, threatening her for being on the wrong side of the gully? Or inviting her to stay and listen to some important message? A dust-devil jumped up a short ways ahead of her and then evaporated. She could see the dancer in the dust, encircling her. The haunting mesa was spooky but she didn't want to leave - she wanted to stay and listen, to solve the mystery, or become part of it.