Mary

When we were little, Mary was my closest sibling.  We spent a lot of time together.  We used to have tickle fights.  We had a smaller than twin size bed with a non-standard sized foam mattress on which we slept.  A tickle fight was a kind of wrestle in which each participant tries to tickle the other.  We would howl with laughter.  It was the most amazing fun a little kid could have.
   At age five I had a dream which still makes me ponder.  I dreamed that Mary and I were in a large room with no furnishings--colorless--maybe white.  We were playing with a bag of blocks.  Then I was playing alone.  Then I was in the bag suffocating.  Then I was being carried down a long hallway to a room where my mother waited in a large, bed with large metal (brass like) headboard.  I was an infant being handed to her.  That's all I remember of the dream.  I do not believe that the infant brain records memories--at least not like the more developed brain does, but I can't help thinking that this dream was about my birth.
   In the coming years Mary connected more with Jeanne and Anne than she did with me, so I don't have many memories with her after that.  She would have been part of all of the family activities and neighborhood activities that I would have been involved in: fishing trips, neighborhood night games, Christmas puzzles, shelling walnuts while Mom read stories to us, weeding the garden, etc.
   When I was a little older Mom and Dad went out for the evening and left Mary in charge of the younger children.  I was playing in our backyard which was fenced off.  Mary left and went to play night games with the neighbors.  The little ones escaped.  The little ones would have been Eileen and Lillian, Howard, and maybe Sam, though Sam would have been very small at the time.  When our parents got home, Dad didn't stop to ask what the deal was but beat my butt for not taking care of the kids.  I didn't get a chance to tell him that Mary was in charge.  I have lived in an unfair universe ever since.  Hahaha.
   When Mary went to college she took a job working in the Language Training Mission's cafeteria.  She was cashier at the end of the line and got to meet all of the Elders.  I think she must hold the record for most missionaries written to at the same time.  This is how she met Jonathan Snow, a very mild mannered man who went through medical school and became a pathologist.  A pathologist is the person who does autopsies, or who studies biopsies to aid in diagnosis.  The major advantage is that the pathologist is never on call, never has to work the savage hours of a hospital doctor, and makes good money if not as much as a surgeon.  It's a great choice for a family man who wants to dedicate time to church and family.
   Some years ago Mary and I began to have political run ins on the family web site (my family.com which no longer exists).  Mary would sometimes post things without thinking of their full ramification and I, feeling it my duty in live to point out all such errors would call her on these.  One, in particular was a piece that Mary had posted which suggested that the nuclear family was under attack and that certain politicians must be supported to prevent--something terrible.  The piece was fear mongering, and was politically motivated--something that completely escaped Mary.  I won points for my challenge to the post from the liberal leaning members of the family, but drifted somewhat away from the conservative element of the family.  I don't regret, and don't think I ever will regret my political stance, but I do regret the trouble I have been through and have put others through as I have learned how to discuss politics without rancor.  (No, I'm not quit there even now.)
I will say that one of my nephew's spouses wrote to thank me for my comments.  Mary didn't realize how unkind her post was to people in the LGBT community, and this dear niece by marriage was feeling alone in a largely conservative family.  My post let her know that she wasn't alone.  
    Political posting is something that I still struggle with: One side of me wants to set politics aside and focus entirely on missionary work.  The other side of me feels like I must stand politely, but firmly behind my political beliefs.  Forgive an old man who is conflicted on this issue.
    Some of you might remember a four day visit I had to the hospital in Springfield, MO.  I was suffering from pneumonia.  I have always avoided taking sick days, even when I am legitimately sick.  I had a bad cold.  It wasn't getting any better.  Jon and Mary Snow were visiting here in MO.  I think it was a little after Mother's funeral.  Jon could tell how sick I was and tried to talk me into visiting the emergency room.  I didn't want to do it.  I finally, after much pressure admitted that the emergency room co-pay is $250, even with insurance, and we didn't have $250.  Jon offered to pay that for me if I would go.  I couldn't say no anymore and allowed him to take me.  The emergency room doctor put me in an ambulance and sent me to the hospital in Springfield.  Luckily, it snowed, school was canceled and I only missed a day or two of work.
  Shortly after this Jon and Mary left for their mission to New Zealand.  Mary and I have both mellowed considerably in the last twenty years.  We don't discuss politics much, which is fine with me.  Mary seems to have accepted that she won't change my political stance, and I no longer find posts of hers to which I need to respond.
   This summer when Mom and I got to the Weber with Emily and Uncle Sam, I may invite Mary to spend a day of two with us.  Despite the political strife, she is still very dear to me.  I may find that my relationship with her will be like that with my father: I can love her from a distance better than I can up close.  But I don't think so.  I believe that Mary and I will find a way towards peaceful coexistence.  At heart, we really feel the same way about most things.  I ponder deeply the problems of daily LDS practice, while Mary simply accepts things unquestioningly.  I won't fault her for that.  And I hope that the Lord will not fault me for turning over every stone and examining every beehive. I believe fiercely that there is an answer to every question.  Some of my questions are answered by the Lord in moments of my asking, and others have taken as long as 20 years of study and pondering.
   In my wanderings through life I have learned that sometimes apostles are wrong, but that the united voice of the quorum of the twelve has never been wrong.  I have learned that some things that men who are or who become prophets say are wrong, but the pronouncements of the First Presidency have never been wrong.  I have also learned that the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles has moved closer to the Lord since the quorum was first organized, and is more unified now than it has ever been.  (Not my idea, but Boyd K Packer's)  It is natural that the quorum would grow over time.  There is a sweet refining taking place that we should learn from.  If it continues, the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve will be ready to lead us to the Savior at His second coming.  
   Well, I'm starting to ramble.  This marks the halfway point in my family.  I am number seven of thirteen--the smack middle child of a very large family.  Next week I start on the group of siblings known to the older ones as "the little kids."

Jeanne

Your Aunt Jeanne was the most adventurous and rebellious of my sisters.  (Though I have to say that none of my siblings were terribly rebellious.)  The three girls just older than I were a trinity.  In my mind the three of them were one, though with age their various personalities became clear to me.  We had a vegetable garden in the backyard of the Lakewood Dr. home.  We were given the chore of picking bugs from the plants--not as effective an insecticide as Ortho, but good at teaching children to do chores.  I remember Anne, Jeanne, and Mary working with me on this task and others.
   Mother used to put the four of us in the tub together to bath, in birth order.  Anne was in front, and I was in the rear.  We have since had great fun reading Shel Silverstein's poem: There are too many kids in this tub, there are too many kids in this tub.  I just washed a behind that I'm sure wasn't mine.  There are too many kids in this tub.  I imagine that your little ones will have similar memories.
   When I was a young teen and Jeanne was an older teen, Mother left her in charge for the afternoon.  I consider that this meant that Jeanne was in charge of Howard, Sam, and the younger siblings.  I didn't consider that it meant she was in charge of me.  Sometime around 11:00 or 11:30 am I decided to make myself a sandwich.  Jeanne was adamant that I wait until lunchtime.  I wasn't able to sneak and make a sandwich, so I told Howard and Sam to go out and play in the street, which they were happy to do.  Jeanne took off after them.  She could catch one, but never two.  With the drag of the first on her, she couldn't move fast enough to catch the other.  So, while this entertainment played out through the window, I made my sandwich and ate it.  Finally, Jeanne returned with two boys.  Her wrath was great; I saw the danger and made for the back screen door.  Jeanne was in hot pursuit.  I ran to the back of the garden and noticed a wire our father and strung to mark  his straight rows of peas or some other vegetable.  I gave a little hop over the wire and ran by the fence at the back of the garden.  Jeanne didn't see the wire.  The speed of her pursuit threw her face first into the soft earth of the garden--soft from the organic matter (manure) that had been tilled into it.  I dared not come home for a long, long time.
   In high school, Jeanne was a stud magnet.  Sometimes two at a time would be at our house.  Jeanne would tell me about the undesirable boys who would flirt or hang around.  These stories made me a little self conscious when it came to girls.  But, they also taught me to be respectful of boundaries.
   Anne, Jeanne, and Mary conspired to teach me to be a gentleman.  They would wait at doors for me to open it for them.
   Jeanne was the most artful of my sisters, and that is saying something because all of them are artful.  I remember painting river rounded pebbles with acrylic paints.  This is a great family activity.  Jeanne would also glue the pebbles together to create stone sculptures.  I remember little stone VW Bugs, Indian chiefs, and even missionaries.  Her talent for art is passed on to her daughter Alisa Peterson.
   Jeanne moved into an apartment in the basement of an older home in Provo while attending BYU.  I remember visiting there and getting to know some of her roommates.  It was at BYU that Jeanne met Brad Mitchell, returned from a mission to the Philippines.  Mom and I visited Jeanne and Brad when they lived in the apartments our Grandpa Wood owned, and later a small house in Orem--before Brad got a job with Ditch Witch and they moved to Oklahoma.  We visited them in Perry on a couple of occasions.
   Jeanne taught Seminary and Institute for quite sometime.
   When Mom and I took our student group to Italy, we sent Emily ahead to Missouri and then dropped Jacob off at Jeanne's house before we went to the airport in Wichita.  Jacob was asleep when we left him.  Jeanne took him to Missouri for us where he spent the week with Emily at my parent's home.  Jake was terrified of Aunt Jeanne for quite some time afterwards.  No fault of Jeanne's.  But Jacob developed a terrible separation anxiety that made him very easy to discipline.  All we had to do was put him in the tub.  He couldn't stand to not have us in his sights.
  Jeanne, over the years has become one of my most compassionate sisters, though I think that all of them are.  She quickly sees the emotional suffering of others and moves swiftly to offer comfort and safety.
   Uncle Brad is a wonderful man, but too authoritarian for my taste, and I'm very authoritarian as you well know.  Brad served a short while in the military.  That may be where is hard core conservative tendencies originate, but I think that these tendencies were born in Utah and were simply compounded by military experience.  Uncle Brad has the hardest time of any of my in-laws when it comes to my liberal stance.  Yet, to his credit, he maintains a good relationship.  We just avoid politics--except on Facebook.  And on Facebook we are doing better now than in the past.  I think it is important to see the good in people beyond their political views.    

Anne

I don't have a lot of memories of Anne from my early childhood.  I interacted mostly with Mary.  She was kind, and always had something to laugh about.  When I was a teen, Anne (along with Jeanne and Mary) would wait at doorways for me to open the door.  They were insistent that I learn to be a gentleman.  Along with Jeanne and Mary, Anne did well in school.  I remember seeing the honor roll when I first entered jr. high.  Anne, Jeanne, and Mary were all on it.  I felt considerable pressure to not do less than they had done.  So I was a motivated student.  Even in 7th Grade, I would stay up well past my bed time if I had a Math problem that I couldn't solve.  I would read the chapter over again to see what I had missed.  If that didn't work, I would read the next chapter to see if I could learn something there.  I had good grades all through jr. high and high school.  Anne, Jeanne, and Mary were my motivation.  I couldn't be outdone by my sisters.
   Anne didn't date a lot in high school.  She was the nerdy time--bookish, you might say.  I remember that after high school Anne began to worry about marriage--who to marry.  There was a guy named Babcock (who went on to become something fancy, lawyer maybe.  Rich.  He proposed to Anne, but she couldn't ever find it in her to give him a positive answer.  She was concerned.  My father gave her a blessing.  She turned Babcock down.  I don't know how she and Darrell Hansen started dating.  It happened when I was on my mission.  Anne was a bit worried because both Jeanne and Mary married before her.  As an older sister, it's not fun to watch your younger sisters marry off before you--despite being in the modern age.  Anne has often remarked that she knew Darrell from the bus.  He rode the same bus to high school, and would sometimes exit via the emergency exit on the back of the bus.  At least that's what I remember of the story.
   I was at about the half way mark in my mission to Finland when I received the wedding announcement.
    One episode that I don't like to remember, but it was part of my learning experience: after my mission I was at home and fixing myself a sandwich in the kitchen.  For some reason Anne was visiting, and for some reason Anne decided to mop the kitchen floor.  She was just the type who was not comfortable leaving work undone.  She was pregnant with your cousin, Rebekah, and needed help.  I was not in the mood to worry about it and let her do the job on her own.  I felt as guilty as can be not pitching in and helping my pregnant sister mop my mother's floor.  What an idiot I was.
    I worked for Darrell for a while.  He was building some houses and needed a grunt laborer.  I was the grunt, running electrical wires, putting up sheet rock, and mudding.  I'm not skilled in this area at all, but did learn enough from Darrell that I have been able to do some of that kind of work myself.
   It wasn't long before Anne and Darrell moved to Missouri.  Your mother and I visited them when we went on our honeymoon.  We visited Church history sites in Missouri and Illinois, and spent a night at Darrell and Anne's first place--before it burned down.  We put up a tent (a very small, cheep, pup tent), and were washed out by a Missouri style flood.  The tent didn't keep out much water at all.
   Anne was very kind.
   Later, my parents visited Anne in Missouri.  At the time my father was farming a ten acre farm that had been his father's at Green Jacket.  On their visit to Missouri my father was impressed with the quality of farmland and the low price.  Before he and mother made their return journey to Utah, Mom had Dad's signature on a bill of sale for the place Lucy and Sam now own and where your mother and I are blessed to live.  Later, my father would become homesick for Utah and tell my mother that he was going to sell their home and move back.  My mother refused--and they had the worst argument of their lives.  My mother won, and the family stayed.  But Sam and Lucy thought that a divorce was about to happen.  It didn't.  And my parents have become a sort of legend out here as model Mormons, which I think they were.  Most people here don't know of their terrible argument.  All they know of them is the wonderful examples they were of faithful service in the Church.  Something to remember if you ever have a terrible argument from which you think there is no going back.
   Some time after my parents moved to Missouri, Anne was diagnosed with breast cancer.  She and Darrell didn't have insurance to fight it.  Darrell's parents were very much into homeopathic remedies and encouraged Anne to deal with her cancer with herbs and such.  I know that Anne received priesthood blessings, but I remember feeling that I needed to get to Missouri to bless her myself.  We made the trip.  I don't think any of you would have been old enough to remember much of that.
   Anne finally decided to go ahead with chemo and surgery with some financial help from our parents.  She told me that she decided that she wanted to be here to raise her children.  Interestingly, she became pregnant while on her chemo--something that should have been impossible.  I believe it was with Luke.  Sammy came later.  Anne has made a complete recovery.
   I don't remember exactly when, but my mother was also diagnosed with colon cancer.  This scared me to death.  I was working at SILO at the time I received the phone call telling me.  Both of my grandmothers had died of colon cancer, so I thought this was a death sentence.  But treatments had improved considerably and my mother lived--with half a colon.  A few years after than my mother would be diagnosed with another type of bone cancer.  She would live with the effects of this until her death.
    Anne is an amazing teacher.  She is gifted at engaging children. Her home is filled with books.  She lives her profession.  In the Church she gives freely of these talents, especially in primary where I witnessed her work as chorister.  This might seem a less than important calling in the Church, but Anne was the example of the person who magnifies the calling until it is the greatest calling in the Church.  Her impact on children's lives cannot be measured.
   The curse of having a building contractor for a husband is that you never get to live in a finished home.  Darrell never had the motivation to complete a home.  He was always busy with the projects that he was paid for or service for the Church.  Anne lost two homes to fire, and the third was hit by a tornado.  (It might have been three homes that burned.)
   Darrell had build Anne her dream home, and this one was (at least I believe) mostly finished.  But it wasn't to be for long.  The high school was discarding the foam padding from their poll vault pit.  Darrell was happy to haul it home with the intention of building his kids their own poll vault pit.  (Darrell is a sports super fan.)  One of the boys was playing with matches behind the house where the foam was stored, and lit it on fire.  The foam burns slowly--at first.  But once it is started it is almost impossible to stop.  In the middle of the night the back side of the home was completely involved.  Everyone gathered in front of the house.  Darrell had called Peter, who had responded, but fallen back to sleep.  A head count revealed that someone was still in the house.  Darrell wrapped a towel around his face and went back for Peter--saved his life.  The fire spread to the two out buildings and destroyed everything.  All they had were the clothes (pajamas) on their backs.
   A local Christian church came to their aid, and the local Wal-Mart also.  The family was back in clothes.  At the time of the fire, my English class was reading a poem written by an early Puritan, Anne Bradstreet, titled "Upon the Burning of our House."  The similarities between the poem and my sister's experience are interesting.
   Anne's example of cheerful service, of dedication and hard work have been a great blessing to me.

Joe

Joe is roughly five years older than I.  I didn't have much to do with him when I was very little.  Almost all of my early memories are of my older sisters.  There was no rivalry between Joe and I, at least not in the traditional sibling rivalry sense, although in later years a kind of rivalry did manifest.  The rivalry existed between Joe, the alpha male, and Katherine, the alpha female.  I don't remember much except that these two would be after each other when Mom and Dad were out for the evening.  I remember one occasion on which Katherine was chasing Joe around the house with a chair from the swing set.  That nothing was broken is a miracle.  Joe was with Dad and me on some of our Uintah backpacking trips.  But the age gap between us meant that Joe had little interest in me.  When I was eleven or twelve Joe and I would play RISK! together.  He beat me time and time again.  I never gave up.  I began to play RISK! with my friends, and anyone who would give me the time.  Sometimes we played just Joe and I and sometimes the sisters would join in.  Those games took a lot of time to play.  The winner, it seemed to me, was the one who was lucky with the cards.  But eventually I gained the skills and beat Joe.  He never would play me again after that.
    On one occasion I was lying on the bed taking a nap when Joe came in, sat on my face and farted.  At some point Dad built a triple bunk for the boys.  Sam and Howard shared the bottom bunk which was less than a foot off of the floor.  Joe had the middle bunk--about three feet above that.  And I slept on the top.  One time I found Joe's wallet unattended.  It had about $8 in it (a lot for a kid back then).  I took the money and hid the wallet under Sam and Howard's pillows with the ID cards and other contents scattered around.  I was never suspected.  So, for $8 I let Joe fart in my face.  You could basically figure it like that.
   A few years previous to that--before the bunk--Joe woke in the morning in intense pain.  Mom and Dad couldn't find any cause or cure.  Joe was suffering more than I had ever witnessed before.  We knelt in prayer and asked Heavenly Father for help, and almost immediately Joe remembered that when he went to bed the night before something had bit him on the back.  He had squished it between his finger and thumb and tossed it across the room.  We looked where Joe indicated, and there was a squished black widow spider.  Mom and Dad took Joe to the hospital and got him the antidote.
   Joe had a girlfriend in high school.  I was just reaching the age where I thought Joe walked on water.  The girlfriend was classy and added to these thoughts.
   Some of Joe's friends were into marijuana.  I remember a time when Joe had to give me a ride--to some place I can't remember.  But I do remember the funny smell in the van accompanying his friends.  A few years later Joe invited me to come to a concert on the U of U campus.  Joints were certainly passing around that place.  I don't know how much into that Joe might have been, but when he turned 19 he served a mission to the Canada, Ontario Mission.  It was a great joke.  When the draft (for the Viet Nam War) was announced, Joe's number was something like 36--very low, which meant that he would be drafted--no doubt.  Joe was able to defer his selection for his two year mission.  Joe told his Liberal buddies (who knew what his draft number was) that he had discussed it with his father and with his bishop and stake president and they all agreed that he should skip the draft and go to Canada.  In those days a lot of war protestors went to Canada to avoid the draft.  By the time Joe's mission was over Nixon had ended our involvement in the Viet Nam War.
   I was very proud of Joe as a missionary and read a few of his letters home.  I think that Joe get married before my mission.  I don't remember without looking, I think so.  When Mom and I were newly weds we visited Joe and Lee in Spring City a few times.  Luisa and Zina were little girls at the time.
   Joe started his interest in pottery when he was in high school.  It was the hippy thing to do.  My cousins Scott and Mark Bennion were also into pottery, as well as other friends at Orem High.  Of all of these, only a couple seriously pursued pottery.  Joe is the only one to professionally pursue it.
    When Joe was in a class at BYU he had prepared several pieces for a show in which his pottery was to be showcased.  Joe had laid out all of the pieces he was considering on the living room rug.  The center piece was a porcelain plate that he had thrown.  The plate was exceptionally thin, desirable for plates.  Joe was very proud of it.  Eileen came into the room carrying a baby--probably Lucy.  She couldn't see the pottery on the floor and accidentally stepped on the prized plate breaking it to pieces.  Everyone was horrified.  When all was said and done, I learned that one exceptional piece does not make an artist.
   Joe has taken many opportunities to develop his craft.  Eventually he visited several countries including Latvia, Estonia, Russia, Japan, etc.  He has built his own wood burning kiln in Spring City and is world famous for his pottery.  Mom and I have a few pieces of Joe's work, but not much.  If you have the chance and the money to purchase pieces you should.  They will be highly prized in years to come.
    In the early days of his pottery career Joe and Lee were starving artists, taking various odd jobs to make ends meet.  Young artists cannot sell their wares for what they are worth.  It takes years of dedication to develop a following and to gain the respect necessary to ask a fair price for art.  Joe and Lee once bought and cleaned out an old chicken coop to make a studio for their art.  They worked as gas station attendants.  The worked at a local dairy.  Eventually they became self sufficient with their art.
   At some point Joe started running rivers for Tour West, which he still does to this day.  When John was a young teen Joe offered him a spot on a trip down the Green River (I think).  John didn't want to go at first.  I had a talk with John about the foolishness of exchanging a chance to run a river with his uncle and playing computer games at home.  John saw the wisdom and went with Joe.  Later Joe invited John to attend a sweat ( a ceremonial sweat bath in a sweat lodge built in Native American style).  I was glad that my brother reached out to my boy at a time when it was needed.
    I have not been able to spend the time with Joe that I would like.  Mother and I used to visit Joe and Lee and play cards.  But that was a long time ago.  We keep in touch via Facebook.
   I should also mention that my taste in music was greatly influenced by Joe, who wasn't into the "American Top 40" and Cassy Kasem.  The first ever record album I ever bought was Neil Young, After the Gold Rush.  Joe had the record, but I wanted my own.  Dad had a stereo in the living room and I used to put on the record at a very low level and listen to it as I drifted to sleep at night.  Eventually I would buy records by James Taylor, CSNY, and others that Joe liked.
    One other experience is worth telling.  Mom and Dad held a family reunion at Green Jacket.  Dad had farmed there for a while and owned about ten acres.  Everybody brought some kind of dutch oven dish that we cooked on location.  I made chicken cashew.  One oven cooked the rice, and the other the stir fry.  I was very proud of my creation, considering it an unusual dutch oven recipe.  But I couldn't get my father to so much as sniff my offering.  He was completely taken with some savory meat that Joe had prepared.  I felt like Jacob, whose brother Esau had his father's affection.  I felt like Cain, whose offering was rejected by the Lord.  This was the one point of rivalry that Joe and I played part in.  I was crushed.  Mother noticed and gave my cooking great praise, but she couldn't pull Dad away from Joe's bar-b-que.  Sometimes life is like that.
   That's a sad note to end on, so I'll mention how Joe spends time every month visiting the Native American inmates and the prison in San Pete County.  He preforms the sweat lodge ceremony for them and is accepted as a medicine man among them.  They in turn share sacred things with Joe.