When I was a little girl, aged eight to eleven, my family lived in Flagstaff, Arizona, where my dad had his first professor job at Northern Arizona University. My parents were fresh out of years of graduate school and had five, then six, kids, so money was pretty tight at our house. Not that I noticed. I just happily wore the clothes my aunt sent in black garbage bags, slept under the cute quilted bedspread my mom made from sheets, read every Nancy Drew book the library owned, and swooned over the exotic new treat my parents found at the grocery store, something called Smack Ramen.
Flagstaff was about a ten hour drive away from northern Utah, which is where all our grandmas and grandpas and aunts, uncles, and cousins lived. Every summer, Dad would pack up our four-door Pontiac Tempest--affectionately known as Blue Car--and we'd all squeeze onto the two bench seats to make the drive. There were no seat belt laws in those days, which was good since Blue Car didn't have any anyway. We kids just knocked around in the back seat, fighting over who was touching whom and sticking to the vinyl upholstery while hot desert air blew through the open windows. (One year, my dad rigged bunk beds back there so we'd have more room, but that's a whole story in itself.)
Dad typically drove, and Mom sat in the front with a baby or two between them. I don't know where she put her feet, since the floor in front of her was full of a day's worth of food--sandwiches sweating in an old bread sack, apple slices, homemade cookies, and Pringles, the ultimate road trip delicacy. She spent a good part of the drive handing out food and refereeing the back seat, but usually around mid-afternoon, when the bread sack was empty and most of us were lulled by the heat and full tummies, things would quiet down. That's when she pulled out the
Reader's Digest.
I don't know if they still have this, but back in the late 1970's,
Reader's Digest had a feature called "Laughter: The Best Medicine." It was a collection of one-paragraph stories or jokes, sent in by readers and intended to be funny. I remember Mom turning to this first, holding the magazine high so she wouldn't disturb the baby asleep on her lap, and in a voice just loud enough to be heard over the open windows, she'd read it aloud to my dad.
I hung on the seat between them, listening to every word. Most of the snippets elicited a wry smile from my dad, but occasionally something would strike them both as funny and they'd laugh out loud. I don't remember "getting" the joke, but I'd laugh along with them, or at least grin like a fool. There was just something delightful about watching my parents laugh together.
Eventually the jokes ran out, and Mom would turn to "Drama in Real Life" or one of the other boring, grown-up articles. I'd sit back, brushing the Pringles crumbs from my sliver of back seat, and stare out the window, watching for the road signs telling me how many miles we had until Grandma's house. As the numbers got lower, I grew more excited, knowing it wouldn't be long until I walked into her living room that always smelled like sloppy joes and got tucked into a cozy, red sofa bed. Then summer would begin, complete with cousins, Bear Lake, and the pièce de résistance, a day at Lagoon.
So I grew up thinking Utah was the Ultimate Mecca of All Good Things. We moved there when I was eleven, and the magical "mecca" turned into "home." When Brad and I left Utah for Michigan, we always thought we'd go back, but that hasn't happened yet, and I really can't complain. But it still feels like home to me, and I still get excited at the prospect of a visit.
Last week, I was especially excited because I was traveling to Utah to help Jessica plan her wedding. With everything that happened with my treatments and liver, I'd spent the last two months too sick to do much besides groan and sleep, and I was starting to panic. Plus I was ready to think about something besides cancer, and I couldn't wait to see my kids who live in Utah. It was a very happy day when I got the okay from my doctors to go.
And it was a very, very happy week. I stayed at my parents' house, and they fussed and hovered and made me feel loved like only parents can do. I got to hang out with Jess and McKay, and was finally able to meet McKay's mother, who is utterly lovely (I told Brad we're going to lose the Favorite Grandparents award--we'll have to keep our boat to even compete). I barbequed with the Bitners, Quiddled with my family, and snuck far too many goodies from my mother's Carb Corner. My father-in-law gave Pep and me his Jazz tickets Wednesday night, so I got to spend Valentine's Day with my favorite missionary, which was a highlight of my week. I also ate lots of tacos with my mom, Jess, and my sisters, and got to see a couple of my brothers who drove in from the Uinta basin with their families to say hi.
Jess and I went wedding dress shopping, and miracle of miracles, she found the perfect dress at the very first store. This allowed us time to lunch at Sizzler, so I got my Malibu Chicken fix. We also finalized details at the reception center, figured out bridesmaid dresses and centerpieces, and got a good start on the announcements. I feel very good about where we stand now, wedding wise. And I loved every minute I got to spend with my girl.
My mom, sisters, and sisters-in-law threw a bridal shower for Jessica on Friday night, and it was perfect. I kept thinking it felt like a party for me, as I was able to see some people I haven't seen in ages and catch up with my college roommate/best cousin. I also got to watch my sweet daughter bask in the love and attention of this most fabulous posse of women. That alone was worth the whole trip.
(a big shout-out to Lois Holt, photographer extraordinaire)
The night before I flew home, the BYU Ballroom Dance Company performed at the conference center in Salt Lake, and I finished out my trip watching the 2018 version of what I did for three years in college. It was amazing, and the cherry on top to my week in Utah.
But of course, great trips must come to an end, and I returned home to an early morning CT scan and appointment with my doctor. I'd had labs done in Utah, which showed improvement in my liver, and yesterday's numbers were even lower--almost to normal. Dr. C said there must be something about the Utah mountain air, as I seem to have turned a corner while I was there. I agreed, choosing not to tell him about the inversion/air pollution people like to complain about. Because inversion or not, there
is something magical about Utah.
Maybe it's the mountains and the sense of being protected by those ever-present, surrounding peaks. Maybe it's Lagoon or the canyons and the memories I have of all the places still touched by childhood wonder. Or it could be I-15 and just knowing where everything is instead of having to GPS every time I need to go somewhere. Or maybe it's passing temple after temple and chapel after chapel and feeling like these are my people and this is my place.
Or maybe--probably--it's where I can go and be a little girl in my parents' house again. I had some weird double vision thing going on this week, so my mom and dad dropped everything and drove me pretty much everywhere I needed to go. Every morning I woke up to the table set for breakfast, and at night I fell asleep in a room snug with the space heater my dad turned on so I wouldn't be cold. In the hours between, they watched me with concern in their eyes, encouraging me to nap, then tiptoeing in their own home so I wouldn't wake up. At one point they even bought me an ice cream cone, handing it back to me where I sat in the back seat like I had as a child.
Almost forty years have passed since I leaned over the seat in Blue Car and listened to my parents laugh while all their kids sat with bellies full of a homemade lunch, secure in the knowledge that this was their family and good things were ahead. I still know the feeling. And I'm sorry,
Reader's Digest, but you're wrong.
This is the best medicine.
