Dash TV#384 Yellowstone Park

                I would guess that I have been to Yellowstone Park at least 15 times.  I have mentioned it in ten posts and posted at least five pictures of my family over the years.  Yellowstone always feels brand new as it changes.  For the most part we found lodging in West Yellowstone and would just drive the west entrance to the park each day.  But there were at least four times we got lodging inside the park.

          I couldn’t find any photos when it was just me and Patrick.  Kayla would have been a baby when this one was taken in 1976

This one is of me with Kayla probably 1978 or 1979

Corey and Kayla in 1982

My missionary farewell was in August and my grandma was in town from San Francisco.  We took both of my grandmas to Yellowstone park in 1984.  We stayed at Old Faithful Inn which we had never done before.

 I left for the mission training center two days after we returned.

  

Patrick and I were both on our missions when this photo was taken in 1985

 I can’t seem to find any still pictures of our adventures in 1988.  Patrick and Sunny were newlyweds.  We had a joint cabin with mom, dad, and Corey on one side.  Kayla and I had to share a room with the love birds.  It was gross.

We saw more of the park that trip than we usually see during one trip.  Corey had played Teddy in “Arsenic and Old Lace” and was really into Theodore Roosevelt at the time and so we had to make seeing the Teddy Roosevelt Arches part of our agenda.

Corey filmed everything.  So we do have documentation.  It was the first or second week in July.  It was great that we were able to see so much of the park and that Corey was able to capture most of it on film – for the day after we returned home we learned about the fires changing the appearance of so much of what we saw – including Old Faithful Inn and I think the arches (here)

This is the last time I was at Yellowstone Park 1998 – it was just my mom, her mom and I that went.  

That was a really great trip also.  We would drive to a destination and mom would say, “Do you want to walk that trail?”

Sometimes we would get out of the car.  Sometimes we would just decide to enjoy the view from the car.  I don’t recall grandma going on any trails with us, though this photo indicates differently.

We saw a lot of animals as it was the end of May.  We saw the most animals on my birthday and had lunch at Trapper’s Inn.  It was the best chicken Malibu that I had ever tasted!  It was a great birthday.

My Tasteless World

            I remember a time when I stayed home sick from school.  My mom was also ill.  We both shared strong colds.  I remember she made us a beautiful lunch: halibut, baked potato, cottage cheese, corn.  Only the textures were different.  All of it was tasteless because of our stupid colds.

            When I was younger, I remember my dad using Fisherman’s Friends to cure a sore throat.  Those things were nasty!  Until my taste buds freaked out on me I have never been able to handle keeping a Fisherman’s Friends in my mouth until it was completely dissolved.  I am now able to keep one in there for the duration. I can barely taste it.

                                 

          I think that this loss in taste might just be a temporary thing.  Before I got my latest sinus infection, I recall a sister in the ward not showing up for a meeting as she reported her sinus condition.  Another sister swore up and down that if she would take 15000 dosage of vitamin D3 every three hours for nine hours that she would be cured.  15000?  That seemed like a lot.  And when I came down with symptoms of my own, I figured it wouldn’t hurt to try.  However I could not find 15000 – not even 1500.  The closest I had come was 1000 which I selected and took every three hours for nine hours – for three days (as it did not go away in one).  Turns out I have overdosed on vitamin D3 – which I had suspected but didn’t realize I would lose my taste buds as a result.  I hope it’s only temporary.  I would like to enjoy eating again.

On the plus side I have lost weight and will continue to do so as I just don’t enjoy eating.  Oh, I did have some Top Roman noodles for lunch.  I added some crushed seaweed and tomatoes which I could taste slightly.  It is the first thing I’ve eaten for the last four days that felt almost worthy of eating.  I wanted to share that good taste with Roland.  His taste buds are working just fine and evidently my lunch was too overpowering for him and he did not appreciate the taste.  I suspect I wouldn’t under normal circumstances.

LaTiesha's Timeline

Last year I took a job as an educational assistant for the school district.  I sub for aides who need time off for whatever reason and will accept assignments at three of the five schools in our district.  I briefly mentioned in my last post about an instructor creating an assignment for her students to create their own personal time line (as they have been learning about historical time lines) and passed out papers of a horizontal time line starting in 2005 I believe.  I’ve gone back just a few years prior to that and have created my own time line – but changed the scale from horizontal to vertical as it will be easier to post it that way.

She had her students start with their birth, but as I did not choose to go that far back, I started with my marriage.  Her instructions were to have ten events and three pictures.  I have twelve events and blog references for more detail and well over three pictures.  I found it to be kind of a fun project.

Timelines Include Good and Bad

                I remember my niece had some kind of surgery and had worn a pink cast in the hospital bed.  Her dad, who is a professional photographer who always takes huge amounts of pictures, did not document any of Anna’s time at the hospital.  It was a sad event not to dwell on and he didn’t want any of the family to have that painful memory.  That doesn’t change what happened.

          My sister and I have a great four-year-old nephew has cancer.  His parents (or other family members) have taken lots of pictures.  It’s a sad event – one the family just assume forget and yet it’s a milestone that may need to be documented so one day the family will have proof about facing a challenge and learning things that perhaps they would rather learn another way.  It’s not a pleasant milestone – but there will be growth and learning experiences to share.

          Anna has another cousin on her dad’s side who has battled and may continue battling cancer.  I remember Bill sharing a picture of the family standing with their then four-year-old son who had cancer.  They thought it could possibly be the last family picture with him in it.  His mom just recently dropped him off at college.  He’s a survivor and I’m betting my nephew will be also with many years ahead.

          Yesterday one of Jenna’s former instructors showed a slide of an old car seat from the sixties.  After the students made their guesses as to what it was, she told them about an incident that happened to her family involving the car, a similar car seat and an overly cautious father (ahead of his time for car safety).

          He’d been driving the family car.  They were on vacation and had pulled off the highway to get something to eat.  Because it was summer and cars didn’t have such features as A/C’s (not to mention GPS units or even seat belts in all cars as it was optional back then) the windows had been rolled down and apparently a grasshopper had invited itself to roost on their dashboard.

          The mother and father changed places so that he could lie down in back.  He had strapped himself in with two seat belts.  The instructor who told the story had been five at the time and rode in front.  In between her and her mother was her one-year-old sister sedated in the old-time car seat which did not come with a belt.  However, her father (who had purposely purchased a car that not only offered front seat belts but back seat belts as well) had removed a seat belt from a junk yard car and bolted them into his own so that a strap could be placed over the one-year-old in the car seat.

          The mother, who was driving, decided to get rid of the grasshopper. Unfortunately she made the choice while she was driving.  She somehow managed to overturn the car so that it rolled two and a half times away from the road.  The car landed upside down.

          The dad somehow managed to free himself and crawl through the window, rescuing the instructor first and then her sister.  Everybody was fine.  The mom had received a few bruises and broken skin on her left hand as she had grabbed the bar that separated the winged vent from the rest of the driver’s window.  Other than that, there weren’t any injuries to any of the passengers – only the wrecked car that had to be towed.

          The teacher telling the story said that when the police arrived, the family was asked, “Where are the victims?”

           What a great thing to survive! Well, the results being great but not so much the event itself. 

          After telling the story, she assigned the students to each write a time line including at least ten things of significance that happened during their lives.  She said some memories will be sad.  Some will be happy.  Some will be first-hand events that are remembered first-handedly and some will be the memories of other family members that have told about what took place – like the birth of the individual.  Everybody was born and so had to come up with nine more things.  I found it to be quite an interesting assignment. 

          Later I had asked Jenna if she had ever had that assignment.  She said she had not.

Another Sense Dulled - Maybe Even Lost

I can remember staying home from school one day when both my mom and I were sick.  She made us a really great lunch consisting of halibut, baked potato and corn.  Neither one of us was able to taste anything on our plate.  The only real difference about the food itself was the texture on the tongue.  Otherwise the taste was pretty much the same.

I had forgotten about that incident until yesterday when I added salt to the chicken noodle soup and later on the spaghetti (never in my entire lifetime have I added salt to spaghetti before) because I couldn’t taste them.  I couldn’t taste the pancakes or egg I had this morning.  I couldn’t taste my orange juice or medicine.  Great for the medicine.  That stuff is nasty – and I wonder if that is what dulled my taste buds in the first place or if it is this sinus infection.

I still don’t feel  as unhealthy as I did in May when I wanted to die.  Still, I don’t feel great.  If my taste buds are now a permanent condition, it will be so much easier to lose weight as I normally eat for enjoyment and not necessarily out of need.  Right now there is no enjoyment involved.  So why bother.

Walls and Bridges

          The Roseburg Stake had a blog which would refer members to stake conference.  It provided a list of speakers and the meeting agenda.  I remember the leaders referred to it in years’ past, but did not have any information for it this year.  I unfortunately did not write down the name of the speaker who gave a beautiful talk comparing physical walls and bridges to what wills us. 

          She started out her talk with a brief history of the Berlin wall which was built in 1961.  Citizens were informed that the wall was for their protection.  Whether we choose to call it protection or defense, for many the wall was a personal prison.  The wall did not come down until almost two decades later.  That is a long time to feel trapped and apart.  It isn’t healthy.

          The speaker then went on to talk about the bridge that was built between Afghanistan and Uzbekistan – a simple bridge really.  There didn’t seem anything special or sophisticated about the structure itself – and yet the bridge seemed to open many doors and provide opportunities that the bridge eventually became known as “Friendship Bridge” because it provided a way to transport things through.

          She compared this to the ministering program – how sometimes we may run into sisters who have placed walls in front of themselves and may not wish to share personal information about themselves – and that is okay.  Perhaps we can be the ones to build up the bridges that if they ever decide to move beyond the walls that they may choose to extend that bridge.  I realize I am not doing the talk justice with my notes.  I hope those that read may get the gist of the message.  Sometimes it is just the small actions that help build and support lasting friendships.

          For more information on the history of the physical wall and bridge see here, here and here or go research on your own.  I know it's just a small sample.  I wish I could have documented the entire talk - I just don'e write that quickly and my short term memory isn't great.

high waves and hidden beaches

I took over 250 pictures on the coast and on our return yesterday.  Here is a taste of what we saw:

Bandon

This is Sunset Bay where we usually go

pictures of us on this beach found here and here

Shore Acres

shore Acres