Yet another of life's milestones is fading from sight in my rear view mirror. On the 23rd of May, AJ, the youngest of my children, graduated from Canyon Del Oro High School. He is talking about becoming a missionary sometime near his birthday in November, but his planned (note that the use of the word "planned" in reference to the mind of an 18 year old may be more supposition than fact) activities between now and then are shrouded in mystery. At last count, he had acquiesced to at least four mutually exclusive requests, as follows: 1. to spend the summer with his aunt Karren and cousin Ashley Zumwalt in Tucson, 2. to spend the summer with Symantha in Eagar, 3. to spend the summer accompanying David Ellis in his motor-less south to north traverse of the United States, and 4. to keep his part time job cooking at Nona Maria's while getting a second, full-time job somewhere near Oracle. All of these options have positive and negative aspects associated with them. Currently, he is spending a week with David Ellis, in some ill-defined location(s) supposedly north of here. Stay tuned for late breaking news...
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On May 23, Nathen and I attended the funeral of Gerald Lee Wren, the oldest son of my mother's sister Evelyn, and the first grandchild born to my grandparents Sessal and Charlotte Allen. Gerald's path through life was neither easy nor straight, and his life story (as told by an uncle) was both entertaining and gut wrenching. His ashes are buried between the coffins of his parents (both killed in an automobile accident when Gerald was two years old) in the Woodruff cemetery. His sister (Janet Shumway) attended with some of her family, and I had the opportunity for an abbreviated visit with Calvert Shumway before our flying trip home for AJ's graduation festivities. Doesn't Calvert clean up nice?
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During a short stop in Taylor to check on the progress of Nathen's new house there (I think he wanted to verify its actual existence) we encountered the Taylor Fire Department demonstrating their high rise fire fighting equipment to children attending a local elementary school. It is not intuitively obvious what was to be gained by showing off in this manner, but the children did seem happy watching and the white water arching through the blue sky was an impressive sight. I can now sleep better at night knowing that all the high rise buildings in the Taylor/Snowflake area are safe from fire.
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 This is Nathen's house. Judging from the numbers affixed to one of the porch columns, I surmise that his address is 580 South Lovelake Road. You really can't see it in this photo, but all the screws and nails used in this construction are gold plated. They must be--there is simply no other explanation why this house should have cost as much as he is paying for it. |
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Heading south out of Holbrook, we got behind a house being moved. Note the placement of the wheels under it in relation to the lines on the road in the photos above. I may not the brightest light in the stadium, but it didn't take me long to figure out that attempting to pass this behemoth was a particularly bad idea. This stretch of highway can justifiably be termed "lonely," and most of the time there were no problems, but at one point, a large truck heading north encountered the house while crossing a culvert. The resulting damage to the sign marking the edge of the road is shown in this photo. Note the debris (presumably from the house) on the road. Given that we didn't reduce our speed more than 10%, it should be noted that Nathen did an impressive job capturing this sequence.
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It was so windy in Woodruff the day of Thelma's funeral, that they were forced to dig her grave only a short time before the interment. If they had done so earlier, it would have filled with blow-sand before they could have used it. The breeze did create some interesting hairstyles, and people equiped with contact lenses needed the services of a seeing eye dog.
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 I came across this scene just a few miles (as the wind blows) from the cemetery. The fence acts as a barrier and catches the tumbleweeds traveling courtesy of the atmospheric pressure gradients. I am surprised that some adventuresome young fellow has not tried to create a fire five miles long and twenty feet wide... That would be a truely awesome sight viewed from an aircraft (and no, I am not advocating that act of random violence). |
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This weekend was Memorial Day, and I stayed with my daughter Ameilia two nights. In addition to helping my Aunt Joan with computer "stuff," I went with my brother Mark to visit the town of Zeniff where my grandfather (Sessal Allen) lived for a short time with his mother (Susannah Janet Heward Allen Bates) and grandparents (Lehi and Susannah Talbot Heward). Currently there is little left to suggest it was at one time a town. Grandpa almost always referred to the location as "Dry Lake," and if I understood him correctly, said it was dry land farming (as opposed to irrigated farming). It was with some surprise then, that Mark and I came across a creek with a washed out dam and a wide/shallow ditch (the kind that would have been made with a team of horses) contouring from that dam to a pond at the corrals, past the ruined houses, and off towards what must have been fields. Fairly large trees growing in this ditch suggest that it is not of recent construction. Zeniff was abandoned in the dust bowl days of the 1920's, and it may have been that the creek was dry most of the time the town was inhabited, but it is clear that some attempt at irrigation was made.From the walls that are still standing, the double (adobe) brick construction is evident. There was also the remains of tongue and groove flooring, and plastered/white washed walls, suggesting that the homes may have been quite comfortable. |
