March Forth

“Marching Forth”

Dear family and dear friends, 8 March 2009

More than one friend has approached me recently to tell me they are sorry they did not return my email, but they loved getting mine---“Please don’t remove me from your list!” So, maybe I can account for my famine in writing with a recent incident. Well, not so recent, actually. I think it was in late January about when I was due to send another “hello” that I got an indication from a child that something big was coming (and oh, by the way, what if we don’t share it?) Okay. So, Mom, the record keeper, is to write about everything except the elephant in the room. Easy enough…a hiatus from family letters! But now the elephant is exiting its hiding place…a college daughter is sharing her intentions to marry, and we are gearing up to launch—one child from single to married status, one child from high school to college, and the last daughter from junior high to high school, all in just a few months.

The first launch date is set for Thursday, June 25th. Copilot is Zachary [Archie] Archuleta, no relation that we are sure of to David, though they both sing. Location of launching pad is the Logan temple. (Laurene and Val married there nearly sixteen years earlier, Grandpa and Grandma Gee, nearly fifty-one. And Great Grandpa Hillman and Lucille Rowbury were married there close to 75 years ago.) Two days later, on Saturday, June 27th (a day after Laurene and Val celebrate a 16th anniversary and many of us have traveled a day’s worth of mileage points north and west) Kristen wishes to introduce her husband and celebrate their marriage with friends in “Seattle,” which basically means Bellevue. Do keep your ear to the ground, and hopefully we will each hear which way the wedding train is coming and going. A reception nearby to Archie’s family from Sandy, Utah is in the wings for Saturday, July 18th.

Amber has ducked any wedding winds and is steadily “engaged” with finishing her senior year in style, enjoying Hamlet and Hardy, and facing daylight’s savings with a hardy outlook, wondering if Heritage Halls A or B rooms are to be or not to be in her future. I have heard her say that some of her calculus questions are “fun”…but I am actually unsure if it is my aged ears that should be in question. Maria is teaching us from debate about begging the question and results for insufficient evidence as she prepares and recovers from mock trials, adding early morning AP geography reviews to begin her week on top of Sunday March 8th’s springing forward.

My favorite pun of the week happened during Wednesday’s family reading in Alma, when someone read that “they marched forth”—great timing for the day and Amber remembered that it was March 4th all day! Another thing the Starkeys do with scriptures happened last night. When I heard Elder Bednar uses every opportunity to study his scriptures, I put an old seminary Bible in my bathroom—handy for use while combing hair and doing other non-thinking tasks. However, this morning the Bible was missing. I asked Val what he did with it (who else would steal this book?) He didn’t know. I found it on Amber’s pillow in the family history room. Good studying, Amber! But no, it wasn’t Amber. Maria? It must have been removed to help with her Sacrament talk. Well, not exactly. You see, Mom, there were two spiders on Daddy’s office door that needed help into the next world. So, now you know what the Starkey family does with scriptures. (Stamp out evil?) Glad to know the “word” to be more powerful than the “sword;” hopeful it is wielding perceptible benefits to your lives; thinking of you! The Starkeys

Great Expectations with Extra Reaction Time

Great Expectations with Extra Reaction Time
Dear family and dear friends, 18 January 2009

"To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven…" Opening Ecclesiastes at the break of a new day, I am reminded of the blessing of ebb and flow in our lives. Gratitude and kind feelings to each we heard about and from in a season of giving. In the space between two semesters, maybe it is time to pause to reflect. Week before last we got the intensity of pacing through Dickens' Tale of Two Cities and Great Expectations the same week. Seeing students whirling to the close of their semester, racing through, having a dickens of a time keeping up, Mom read aloud during going to bed rituals, then puzzled about the plot, popping into the middle of things, has checked out both books from the Kaysville library to catch up. I have not gotten to the best of times or the worst of times; however, my expectations of the author are far from diminished. Charles Dickens' has captivating style--he pulls in his readers, shares the depths of his characters' thinking, and wraps things together, connecting unexpected, trivial details to make a coherent whole.

It was fun to see that even President Monson wanted the college students to ponder about Pip. What I am learning from him and his great expectations is that sometimes we chase ships and dreams not likely to make or keep us happy. It is funny how hearth and hard work, as homely as they appear and feel, can offer contentment, fulfillment and joy. Thursday my parents invited me to come with them to visit James and Cherie's family in Draper. A red-haired, eight month old Patrick has come to their home. Aside from a little cold, he seemed pleased with the surroundings, with four year old Katie and first-grade Daniel, eager to entertain each of us with newly acquired chalk boards.

Daniel, teacher at the big chalkboard in his upstairs room queried his four year old pupil, "What is one plus one?" And he chalked his tallies on the green slate. A red-cheeked sincere student peered at the numbers. He wrote them again next to each other, to show more clearly.
"One plus one…Is it eleven?"

It did look like eleven, even to a six year old. So our teacher began again. Notes all over the walls and door reminded me of notes on our doors years ago. Daniels "Ruelsse: No jumping on the bed with shoos!" brought back memories of Amber's bedroom garage sales with various prices and our homemade security system--a sign adamantly scrawled for the front door: "No robbers allowed!"

Our tale of two cities came the day after Christmas, when Archie joined Kristen and our family in a detoured and scenic route to Bellevue, Washington and other parts known and unknown. Archie and Kristen were "wowed" with an elevator up the space needle and ending their evening at Pike Place Market, even if they missed the flying fish. Val was "wowed" with four grandchildren, one who followed him around for hours on end calling either "Gwandpa" or "Bumpaa". Grandpa was constrained to acknowledge that a few of his genes may be passed through to another generation as eighteen-month Ellie, though she has not taken the door knob off with a butter knife at age two like her "Bumpa," she does like to traverse the house turning door locks, and to the stiff "child-lock" rubber bands under the kitchen sink, she simply removes the rubber bands, gets what she needs, then puts them back on. Her cousin Kaleb, a year old, has convinced his parents to allow him to assist with dishwashing. He can proficiently shut the dishwasher on command! And Ellie's little brother, Thomas just watches, appreciating everything. We got to see Riley for a sleepover (the night we arrived.) Riley was hoping it could be a campout like a year ago July. With the record snows that dumped just before our visit, April deferred. Riley, on the phone now, updating his Grandpa with what has happened in the weeks since, assured him that next time that Grandpa leaves, he is not to leave Riley's present with anyone else: "Don't let this happen two years in a row!

What was the present? It was something from the Jepson era, where people can talk to each other and see them. A lady in my mom's neighborhood speaks with parents in the Philippines daily at little or no cost. So, we are practicing how to connect—have tried it with Tom, April and baby Thomas, and hope to accustom Ellie before we try special features allowing alien eyes and Roman noses.

Maria is getting to be the family computer expert, having just taken a computer class, practicing Office 2007. Our favorite funny happened recently, as returning from our 1800 mile journey, unpacking and purging to begin a new year fresh, Maria announced the day before the rough draft for her largest term project was due, that a paper containing her experiment data with hours and hours of sampling was nowhere to be found (not in the nine loads of trash or recycle dutifully marched into the yard, nor in her locker, nor anywhere in the stack of her school materials.) A fast email was dashed to the teacher: "The Dog Ate My Homework—but We Have No Dog!" and the teacher forgave the rough draft, with two remaining days to present the final product—which came at the expense of a night's sleep for one student, and a couple of parents passing batons, also patient friends and family members willing to pump a pretend gas pedal, distracted by cell phone chatting. Reaction time, she discovered, is significantly slowed. We were thinking to involve her sleep-expert brother on testing slowed reaction times of missed slumber…but are happy for some catch-up time over term break, and Maria is gladdened to receive a cash prize, as science fair judges valued her project and its presentation as one of the third places. Maria has talked about using the prize to fund her own cell phone.

Finally, we are grateful to benefit from talents of kind friends. Driving back from Seattle, all the passes in Washington were closed. We have recently received an email with a link to see the devastation on the same roads resulting from the melted snow. As we drove south through Portland, to make our way, our neighbor friend and weather man advised us to keep driving through the night to miss another storm brewing. All night we drove, and home we came! Archie and Kristen helped firm up the second leg; Amber, recovering from wisdom teeth extraction helped drive, and we welcomed the extra help. Chaining up at Snoqualmie has never been easier. It pays to have friends! As we begin a New Year and term with great expectations, aren't we blessed that we can depend on one another; that we can watch our rising generation with interest and awe, and work together to love and learn in the balance! May this month bring fulfillment of your grandest expectations, and may your reaction time be sufficient. Blessing to you! The Starkeys

Winter makes me feel love

I love you
Mom

Onions for Lunch

This was written a week ago... For update, Kristen brought 5 friends (yes extra chairs) for Thanksgiving and put up our tree with help from two high school buddies--one Buddhist, another Jewish. I celebrated the day after with onions for dinner (and Sister Mark's famous salt remedy for outsmarting a head cold) after sending out my nephew to bodyguard two daughters with Black Friday. We did not lose anyone. Only one bruise. Looking ahead to a cheerful season. Much love to you, the Starkeys

Onions for Lunch
Dear family and dear friends, 23 November 2008
I have been chuckling about something that happened on the way to the commons with our junior high daughter. At Bowmans, Reams, and several local grocery retailers, if a shopper is courageous, a twenty-five pound sack of onions often sells for as little as fifteen cents a pound. Quite a savings! The catch becomes keeping the vegetable viable and round and savory to the final onion in the bag. One summer at our Peterson family reunion at Ogden Canyon, Val’s mom and dad ran into some neighbors of Val’s great grandparents in Farr West, near Ogden, Utah. They remembered that in the flu epidemic of 1918, the Starkey family had no illness. They credited this stroke of good fortune partially to the fact that they grew onions and ate onions with every meal. To evidence fidelity to a good name, Val secured a hefty mesh sack to store on the north side of the house where he estimates basement room temperatures stay significantly less warm, verified by chilly children searching for slippers.

Rather than spending moments running to find last minute meal-trappings, yours truly conjured a terrific method to keep them close--put eight or so in a paper sack sitting on the kitchen fridge door. It occurred in a pianissimo thought, that the paper sack might be mistaken under duress for the luscious makings of Amber’s evening and morning vigil of preparing lunch for her sister. No worries. That lunch would ever be placed on the top shelf, front right, though oft overlooked in the stress of bell-racing at 8:02 a.m.



Sure enough, on a crazy busy day, I heard news of the morning. A paper sack had indeed been grabbed. School ensued. Students gathered.



Meals were purchased, and brown bags unfolded. To open-eyed consternation, rather than granola bars, gala apple, and whole wheat with fresh peanut butter and Aunt Arlene’s blackberry jam, the sack had unveiled a brown-papered surprise. Healthy, yes! No epidemics here.



Two years ago last May Maria took a focus week teaching yoga and nutrition, including a healthy dose of Feng shui, the Chinese system of arranging things. Because, we enjoyed Maria’s energy and patience teaching us the principles, at the tail-end of garage sale season we found a paperback Clearing Clutter with Feng Shui, that we had to buy if only for humor’s sake. After four testimonial chapters about how clearing clutter encouraged good fortune into the homes and mailboxes of previous readers—with new stereos, homes, and lottery prizes, we watched an unsuspecting dad clear boxes out of his office only to find in the mail a few days later an envelope containing significant unclaimed state property from decades ago. He and Grandma Starkey are planning a family history trip (and the rest of us are committed to clean!)

Speaking of cleaning, our forty-dollar garage sale washer gave up the ghost to be replaced with a Craig’s List stop gap until we are ready for a full meal deal remodel. This idea of rhythm went hand in hand with a piano recital Friday. Focusing on the counterpoint of Maria and Pamela Davies whirling to create a cheerful round of melody, harmony with Clementi motion, and counting with eighth-grade Zoe to waltz through the Ural Mountain tinkling, haunting tune of Lara’s Theme, I have concluded that “timing” may equal “location, location, location.” Precision and timing seemed to fit with BYU’s Tuesday forum where Lynne Truss, the British author of Eats, Shoots & Leaves, (a witty best-selling book on punctuation], validated a mother’s voice that thoughtful wording of personal messages can engender respect in a society crying out for courtesy.

An amazing moment happened shortly after the end of this BYU broadcast, after a long bout with our computer money manager. As “Pomp and Circumstance” (a celebratory graduation march) sprung from the neglected radio, I dashed in, dragged Val with exaggerated steps across piles of gas and grocery receipts, sat him at the computer’s helm, gave him the coveted mouse, and watched. At the end of “reconcile” when credits and debits are combined, if the numbers match with beginning and ending balances, and the difference equals zero, the ka-chink ceases, the computer opens a new screen and (voilà!) an illustration of a handshake pops onto the screen. This is a rather effective method of illustrating to a spouse the drama and thrill of a conciliated ending balance. Words still echo about being “reconciled to thy brother” and “reconciling yourself to God” when the menial task of budgeting can unlock a little meaning.

A dear friend from Baton Rouge shared a video this week about Lake Peigneur in Louisiana, where a fourteen inch drill bit from a Texaco oil rig searching petroleum miscalculated, struck a salt mine, causing a startling and chaotic series of events which changed the complete make up of the lake. So both location and direction matter.
(To see it, try: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLWxcZmATw8).
Speaking of directions… Val mentioned yesterday after judging at Maria’s debate tournament that hearing what was coming up and what was expected helped his judging. Student discussed the benefits of modeling United States’ health care systems after the French’s--according to our 9th grader, the best health care system in the world. One set of grandparents is suggesting different topics that may be worthy of debate in such a forum. And we contemplate what may come with adjusting our focus!

As we set aside our blue and red colors from the regrettable Saturday sports contest to cross the street and view “The Scarlet Pimpernel,” a spy story set in the French Revolution, we heard the main character in the face of a society that decried decency and order, with “neighbor denouncing neighbor.” His question “When is the time?” preceded an answer--The timing is “now” and the persons to act is “us.”

With the seemingly effortless assistance to carve a quarter credit from a busy senior’s schedule (just to remember, this is midterm) my stress rose sufficiently to lay one of us horizontal for a few extra hours. I decided that such a day would effectively increase sympathy pains for the aftermath of Amber’s Twilight all-nighter. It did. I am centering on the words “weak and simple.” I get the weak part. I am currently working on simple! Plowing through stacks of silver and plates, and then heading toward spinning cycles of bleached cleaning cloths, I am realizing what blessing it is to simply move! From clearing clutter to speaking out and advocating for each other, positioning our personal drill bits as far as possible from the danger of sinking mines, as we thoughtfully arrange our words and our lives to reconcile ourselves to healthy vibrant patterns, may we each grab the right lunch, and if not, learn to relish onions! May your week be plentiful with pumpkin, celery, spice and the sweet suspense to someday surround a table without empty chairs—Thankful for you! The Starkeys

Look Out Ridge

“Look Out Ridge”
Dear family and dear friends, 9 November 2008

Our niece Katie turned four yesterday and celebrated with trampoline traipsing and pony gathering with cousins at a children’s gym in Draper, Utah. After agreeing to drive, we serendipitously collected two extra cousins to transport south. Too confident, when my mom suggested that I print a map quest, I sat, typed the starting and destination addresses, zapped out printed instructions and scooted along with an errand or three on the way to fill.

Doing errands with five women in four different stores (even within five blocks) will ever be like herding cats, so I felt fairly accomplished to collect teens after finding two pairs of jeans and five shirts, their grandma from returning anniversary jewelry, and their auntie narrowing in on a birthday card uniquely suited for a twenty-two year old returned missionary. After personally, not patiently, persuading Costco’s photo machine to take a 22 megabyte wedding picture in less than an hour and a half, the challenge remaining was to zip 30 miles south in 30 minutes—not impossible with a high occupancy vehicle until my brother called. He wondered which exit we were planning to turn on. Try exit 288.

My “google” map said exit 289. I exited on 289 and made a raft of winding turns twelve miles through the suburbs and hillsides of Riverton—after five miles of state highway and main thoroughfare, we turned right at Ambermont, left on Rolling Brook, right on Orchard Spring, Right at Lookout Ridge which became Pulley Lane. We then turned left at Blue Ridge and right to come into Lookout Ridge, Pulley Lane, and then Mesa Circle, which was supposed to lead to the address in the pink horsie invitation, but the Mesa Circle was just that—a round dead end, propped in the middle of nowhere—no houses, no buildings—but miles to look, as far as you wanted to see! Arriving at Katie’s shindig 75 minutes late, in time to wrap up ice cream and un-wrap packages, I have since decided to triple check sources and pay attention to quiet voices encouraging me to come the simple way, even if I do have instructions (and sure ones!) with greater detail. Life can be simpler than it is made out to be!

A few joyous, simple things: emptying the freezer of a turkey today to make room for a new one—happy to rotate a less costly meat, connecting with family members bearing whole wheat honey-and-ginger snaps and snatches of Sunday and talk tidbits. Then, sitting in stake conference, we heard the stake youth sing echoes of their summer’s Zarahemla camp.

“Amelia signed me up, Mom.”

Glad to be signed up. During a two-day Halloween break, our motivated twelfth grader applied for admission into the college she has always wanted to attend, and the day following she began searching for avenues to help finance her ventures. During hour-long conversations on walks near and around the neighborhood, she shared a recent epiphany of appreciating and living in the “now” in spite of interest and energy in preparing for paths ahead.

It is always a blessing to have a family now and here who loves me (and does not mind a few extra bottles of paraphernalia on a bathroom sink top or overflow of clean clothes from basket piles on bedroom floor.) Home made bread on the counter in the kitchen offers welcoming odor and apples from a valley farm add crisp tartness and color to an autumn lunch.

A freshman facing her first debate against a high school team captain unexpectedly triumphed. And a sister senior wading through hopeless Chemistry and Calculus tests and assignments coupled with paltry expectations experienced an incredible discovery of palatable grades, lauding glazed doughnuts to garnish the gaiety.

Three more terms to go! Mom and Dad Gee’s “moving pictures” have touched their progeny. After taking their nearest daughters to watch Errand of Angels, they decided to perform their own, positioning and pounding wrought iron frame holders to my family history room walls. Now leaves fluttering on the wall paper envelope every child…and counting!

Thomas Alva Starkey and April celebrated the coming of a brand new Thomas Alva junior--eight pounds four ounces, twenty inches long, on Wednesday, 29 October 2008 at 8:17 p.m. at Bellevue, Washington. Val is beaming, and to celebrate, he purchased a full case of flood lights! Little Thomas is truly a light, and his sister Eleanor cradles, coos, and apparently does not want to let him out of her view.

The green and purple kale planted in the aftermath of a completed window well last spring blossomed beyond measure. If there is ever a famine, we may have plenty of roughage! Meantime, my mother, coveting the unbridled blooms bought more for her home and mine--see if we match Alaskan cabbage heads next year! The flaming red bush that frames our house and the pathway to our Main Street chapel boasts brilliant colors, as do some of the Wasatch hills, still.

Even though our morning or evening paths may be dark, narrow and coupled with more than one dead end, having the morning clouds break to unveil beauteous pigments of autumn glory, we are constrained to continue to Look Out over Ridges of disappointments and count our blessings. Thank you for signing up to be a good part of what we are thankful for! Love, the Starkey family

Long Upon the Land

"That Thy Days May Be Long Upon the Land" 14 October 2008

"Bye, Mom. Oh, and can I use the car?"

Those two sentences may have made the two feet of difference between a seventeen-year-old at the wheel finding herself behind and not beneath a Ford Explorer that crossed two lanes and crushed her bumper, radiator, crumpling the front end of our little blue 88 Toyota Camry on her way to work on Thursday. I joking have decided that the act of honoring parents saved a life. A simple goodbye and a pleasant request--enough seconds to slow her from much more intense personal impact.

This week each of my brothers, and today, my sister will have had the blessing of honoring our parents. My maverick mother and father returned from their pioneer home up north a week ago last Sunday, having single-handedly winterized the house and taken down a trampoline, with help of mom's younger sister, who cheerfully reminded them, "We are farmer’s daughters! We can do this!" Before break of the next day, they had plowed the "East Forty," or peeled and processed at least that many bottles full of plump peaches, placing each carefully on pantry shelves.

Isn't harvest time heart-warming—to look up and around at crimson leaf-bearing limbs suddenly aware of color and change? And then glancing at vines, stalks and foliage in a plot of earth that was recently sod, pulled up by roots after which tiller blades separated the soil preparing it for seed. New growth from spinach, lettuce, turnips, okra, parsley, and thyme stood beside tomatoes and jungles of squash vines varying from hidden monster zucchinis to acorn and Hubbard. The last few weeks of summer brought "grandchildren" raspberries from another grandma and a strawberry rhubarb fruit sauce from a plant extracted from a gift of a dear now-deceased friend. And pumpkins! Who knows which bird planted the front yard spread of vines with small orange extensions sprawling on both sides of our front steps? Now the palm-sized pumpkins are piled and planted on the front steps, announcing a culmination of harvest and the change to winter—each was harvested this week, to escape nipping from frosty mornings.

The door opened and closed quickly today, allowing consideration of coats and gloves to accompany braving below-freezing brisk walks. It is a season to gather, to count the harvest, to rejoice in our blessings. Mom planted, A watered, M plucked the plants, and God gave the increase!

As siblings flew and drove from Seattle and various other beginning points to meet my parents in Provo at 6:30 in the morning Saturday, it was a fulfillment of a dream that I had a hard time imagining, working fervently to find family names to commemorate a fiftieth wedding anniversary. My dad had celebrated each week, with an email installment remembering our little family’s beginnings…but this day was a means of reaching out, of sharing with someone else the joy of the nature of eternal families. Grateful to the girls for giving up precious slumber time, my heart clasps the image of a little girl grown up to fit into a college-age smile, garbed in a white jumpsuit, wet hair, having just stood with her grandfather in an oxen-surrounded font, comfortably crouched, sitting on her bare feet, telling me with her body language, "This is a happy place that welcomes me. I love coming here!" She does. Often…with her roommates…and it was her food lab boss in white who issued clothing and helped us stamp our cards. A little like when a five-year-old invites you up to a special tree branch, this touched me.

I whispered stories to her about her great grandmother's gumption--traveling across the United States with a near-toddler in tow to be with a young, distant husband--no matter that this Indiana girl had never before driven more than a few miles in a stretch! The same great-grandmother also made a point of learning along side her teenager, studying nursing and serving in a local hospital when her peers were retreating into less active retirement. Grandma A also learned dots and dashes to speak with ham radio friends near and far, and filled her walls as she dabbled in acrylics and oils from the Southwest as she and Great Grandpa traveled.

It isn't hard to honor those who have honored us with choices of sacrifice and goodness and giving! And it is not as hard to rise in the dark to begin a morning with a brief pause of thanks, to tender pages of holy writ and ponder meaning of the day together before a back pack zips and a connoisseur of chemistry and calculus doggedly marches in early morning query to devoted teachers. Not long after, when sleepy-eye sister claims bathroom mirrors and repeats a similar routine, our hearts embrace the words of a wise leader: "Be at the crossroads!" So here we are. And aren't we blessed when they let us be! Dad’s mom reminded us at Sunday dinner that seven years to the month have passed since another leader reminded us about the parable of seven plenteous and seven lean years. Aren't we blessed to have had plenty? If this is our crossroads, aren't we blessed to have been taught how to prepare for inevitabilities that come our way? Aren't we blessed to have one another…to be reminded that our life is not a dead end (crash or no crash)…and aren't we glad to have another day?! May your days be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee!

Happy Tuesday to you each! From your “gathered in” friends