The Hills Are Alive

After a bookish jaunt on the Alm with Heidi and company this past week, Jeff and I went to Midway to stay at the Swiss themed Zermatt resort.  We had such fun eating pizza on Main Street; surrounded by a few tipsy customers and hilarious waitresses, driving through the misty hills, giggling at the knickers on the valets and watching the rain torrent down outside our room.  If you love all things swiss, this is definitely a great destination.  In the morning, we took a walk/scoot around the grounds and took pictures of the local wildlife--goats.  Two managed to escape their enclosure, I guess the bark on the outside is tastier.  The hills are still so green, I can hardly believe this is Utah in August.  It is no wonder that the Swiss immigrants settled here, its a small scale Alpine beauty.  On one side of the gazebo, we found the haunt of the "daughters of the terrible thing," a mossy bottomed pool, just as in my favorite story of Fearnot(Check out Jim Henson's Storyteller series, a collection of old folklore and fairy stories brought to life-- the library has it).

We had pastries at the bakery and headed off to Park City in search of some navy blue shoes for Caitlyn's skinny feet and some work shirts for Jeff.  I am not sure why we decided to start at the bottom and work our way up, but I sure got a workout.  It's funny, people treat me so much more normal on the scooter than when I use any other implement to get around.  Maybe it is because I look more athletic and svelte.  Ok. Svelte is a stretch, but at least I am at eye level and that's easier for others.  

In probably at least 25 years, I have missed Swiss Days in Midway only 4 times.  Once, missing Swiss Days as a grown adult, my parents called from the park grounds and I teared up just hearing the yodeling in the background.  My parents took us every year as kiddies and when I got older, I chose it every year as what I wanted to do for my birthday.  I still remember getting my first real purse one year and buying a custom-made button pin with my name on it for the purple bolster shaped tote. That was when I was still eating the giant scones.  This year will add to the total of missed festivals.  Death by the craft-crazed doesn't sound all that appealing for some reason.  I will miss it, but Zermatt and Heidi gave me a good fix for the year.   I usually don't buy anything (call it a case of "I could make that"or "they want how much for that?") but I love to walk around, sample a grilled ham and swiss, visit the Relief Society bakery tent, grin at the Swiss Miss royalty, and hear my favorite yodeler, Kerry Christensen.  Really, if you are there this upcoming weekend, pay attention-- you will be stunned at how a human can make those sounds and melodies, with a male voice no less.  So, for my birthday, I will part with tradition, find my yodeler on YouTube and finish the project I vowed to make on my own from last year's festival.

My New Wheels: Forays Made Easy

That's right baby, this hot little number is speedy fast, especially down a carpeted hallway.   Good:  I can steer and scoot, I will work some of those sedentary muscle groups, and mostly I look more like an athlete.  Bad:  Mine does not have a basket, so I wear a backpack from the old days-- then I look a little more like an athlete,  the turning radius just a little too big, so I make many 8 point turns, and mostly my poor atrophy knee cries out at actually being used for something like holding me up.  So, now I think I have achieved the height of ambulatory devices:  wheelchair, scooter, walker (2), and crutches.  It makes it easier to accommodate those whining muscle groups and keep my sore self guessing as to balance and speed.

My first trip on this sweet ride was to Old Navy with the rest of Provo and Orem to get my hands on some $10 jeans.  Both of my boys grew like weeds this summer.  Cait grew, but in her usual "who knew?" way.  I guess we will be sticking to the same 4T jeans as last year. It was nice to have a place to sit in the middle of the frenzy.  I couldn't get close, so my mom and kids just brought their finds to where I was parked safely outside the danger zone.

Trip 2 was to the mall.  This thing is the way to go with a crowd.  In a wheelchair, people often forget to see me because I am only 4ft tall.  With the scooter, I can rise to my full 5'3" stature and be seen.  This was especially useful because we were on a time sensitive mission.  I got an email from Shade Clothing Corporate that they shutting down their business for an undefined duration.  Aggghhh, I am in no shape to shop for clothes (on so many levels).  I knew that there was a denim skirt destined for my closet and I raced to the website to find that it had been slashed from $42.50 to $16.99.  SCORE!!!  I must have said skirt.  However, Shade is always too tight and I didn't know whether to order the size that my jeans say or a size larger like the logical part of my brain opted.  I had to try the sucker on.  The mall is tiled,which means lots of  bumps, requiring focus and nerves of steel to navigate.  Luckily, we used the secret entrance to the mall and were there without many crowds.  Shade stores are small.  Jeff paraded me around like a fancy personal shopper, piling clothes on Benjamin as if he were a footman.  Even though space was tight, Jeff is not timid.  I would point, he would "excuse me" his way in there like a pro.  Maybe all the ladies who left their husbands at the door (yes, there were a few loitering about out there)  were shocked at a man voice in a girl store.  I am sure that a bunch of people waited a long time to get a fitting room while I was busy testing Jeff's selections one-legged.  I finally ended up with and a cute fall shirt (which has been slashed $4.50 since).  I rarely have good luck shopping when I actually have the money to spend, so I was really happy.

Mall Museum, yes small, but yes there is a museum in the mall.  Use the outside entrance between Nordstrom and the mall and the spiral staircase (or elevator) will take you there.  I passed through the metal detector with flying colors, nary a beep.  Hey, wait; is it even on?  I doubt that the scooter is surgical steel, I am thinking lightweight aluminum.  I guess we didn't look dangerous enough to turn those puppies on.

Trip Three:  Church.  What could be a bigger spectacle than crutches?  I knee scooter of course.  All the kids in Primary think that this is the coolest ever, even better than me showing them my x-rays for sharing time.  The older boys wanted to know how fast I could go and if I had tried any hills.  Do I look like Tony Hawk?  NO, I am a sissy mom who was ultra careful before my crazy break, no hills for me. They were disappointed in me, but really I lack the proper training facility.  The cracks in the sidewalks are danger on this scooter and there isn't really a place to get up speed without rocks or cracks.  I laughed at them, silly boys.
Epilogue:  Sunday night, I dreamed about cruising on the knee scooter on the river trail near Bridal Veil Falls, going fast and downhill.  Awake, I wondered "I was wearing a helmet right?"

Sharing, Sharing That's the Thing to Do... Public Foray #6

Last Sunday, I made my first foray back to church.  I hoped that I was ready for the event because church is a major undertaking at 9 am with all your limbs.  I got up early, had a whole-grain cheerios breakfast, shaved my legs -- yes even the broken one that no one would see, got dressed, did my hair and makeup, put on my giant boot and was ready to roll--back into bed.  Wow, what an easy Sunday.  And then it hit, Jeff was in bed, the kids had no idea where their church clothes were and we had only 25 minutes to go.  I will admit that I grumped everyone into action, especially the boys that threw their shirts in the back of the closet after church last week and required me to attempt yet another first, ironing.  Did I mention that I was doing Sharing Time?  We made it 10 minutes late and miraculously there was a bench only three rows up. That NEVER happens.  Nothing like walking in late, except doing it on crutches really is more distracting for everyone.  Lucky for us, they were in the middle of singing.  I was more than a little embarrassed and tears were stinging my eyes.  I dearly hate being a spectacle.  I was in no mood to feel the spirit or do a seated song and dance for the Primary kids.  

Our Sharing Time was themed "Jesus healed the sick,"  and I am just the sick person to teach it.  I had been reading for the past week in the New Testament and found that this time something new stood out.  In Matthew, nearly every chapter from the time that Christ ended his 40-day fast until his arrest--  he was healing someone.  I got a new picture of people streaming in and following everywhere he went to be healed.   Just remembering my scripture study started to chisel away at my negative attitude.   I talked about this with the kids and how doctors didn't know very much and couldn't do very much in Jesus' time.  Which was a nice segue for me to talk about breaking my own leg and how it couldn't heal on its own, so the doctors had to use an idea of using screws and plates.  I showed them my x-rays, bolts and all.  The little kids were speechless for about 10 seconds, then hands shot up all over the room because everyone needed to tell me about how they or someone they knew had broken something.  One little boy told us about how his dad fell off the roof and broke his foot.  Wow, ouch.  Well, no sympathy from the 3-7 set.  I bet when their parents asked what they learned in Primary, they only said that 'Sister Macedone is screwed up."  A lesson to us all, kids get distracted by gore.  

Senior Primary fared better.  I had the good sense to ask if any of them had broken a bone from the get go.  They didn't care for much but seeing the screws and bolts, hmmm-- too many video games? Lesson 2, more sophisticated audiences want more gore?  I had known that this group would need more examples.  We talked about the priesthood power.  I shared a story from General Conference from Russel M. Nelson (May 2003).  I guess I like the anatomy-based teaching too, because I thought it was only a couple years ago.    He talked about a man with a heart problem that couldn't be fixed with any of the surgical techniques available.  The man went to then Dr. Nelson and told him that he had prayed and been led to Elder Nelson as the man who would fix his heart.  He encouraged Elder Nelson to pray to know how it was to be done.  In the very moment, Elder Nelson was directed where to make stitches, folds and cuts to repair the man's leaking valve. Don't worry, I was sure to point out the repaired valve on the heart diagram that I had brought.  The kids were riveted.  A couple kids shared personal experiences of someone being healed.  It was really cool to feel the spirit so strongly and my day could be turned around by the spirit so easily.  I think that is party of being "easily entreated,"  allowing the spirit to drive away your stress and negativity.  All in all, a positive foray.