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Tuesday, July 21, 2009

The Twilight Zone Part I

Help! I've fallen and I can't get up!

Seriously, peeps. I'm duct taped to my in-laws in the middle of bee-U-tiful Ideeho at a cabin in Island Park with no internet or cell phone reception. (btw, did you know that the Ideehoans spell their state Idaho? whodathought!)

I miss you peeps! I really really MISS YOU! There better be internet and cell phone service in Heaven, otherwise I might have to raise some major helk.

I am going to publish a post I wrote in the car while I was driving home from St. George. It's not complete, and I can't add the photos because it's hard to move your hands when you're duct taped to your in-laws, but it's better than no post of all.

Am I right or am I right?

This post was inspired by a stop in southern Utah to see my grandmother on the way home from St. George.

..................................................

I started writing when I was nine years old. I was trapped in the Twilight Zone at the time.

The Twilight Zone is a tiny isolated town in the middle of southern Utah called Mt. Carmel.

Directly across the street from Mt. Carmel perches a mountain called Sugar Knoll.

Sounds awfully sweet, doesn't it? You'd think so, but too much sugar can give you cavities, you know.

I have a lot of emotional cavities.

Every summer my dad would load us up into his purple VW van and drive us 4 hours south past all the sage brush and red rock to the Twilight Zone. My mom never came. The Twilight Zone had taken it's toll on her by then, just as it eventually would on all of us.

When I was nine I didn't understand how deep and wide the emotional cavities in my dad's family ran. And I certainly didn't understand the ties that bound their family to a little old house on Tait Lane where my grandmother was born out of wedlock in 1924.

But shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh . . . that's a secret. Everything that happened in the Twilight Zone is a secret.

And what isn't a secret is twisted and distorted beyond recognition.

But I didn't know that then. All I knew was that there was no running water. No T.V. No phone. No bathroom. And no sugar (despite all the sugary sweet knolls and mountains.)

There was no food either.

Well, there were promises of food too. Lots and lots of empty promises. Juicy pork chops and garlic mashed potatoes smothered in gravy. Corn on the cob dripping in butter. Cold sweet watermelon. Icee lemonade. But whenever we sat up to the table, either the adults had already eaten most of it or they had changed their mind to egg salad sandwich and a bowl of canned peaches.

My grandmother is extremely gifted. She's the only one I know who can spend 5 hours preparing egg salad and opening a can of peaches. I think it took her so long because she was always so busy receiving revelation for her family members.

Somehow she had a direct line to the powers that be. She knew what everyone should and shouldn't be doing. I think it was because she was so spiritually in tune.

One thing she knew for sure was that children should wash the dishes and then go outside and leave the adults alone to quote scriptures and cry about all of our dead loved ones.

They cried a lot about our dead loved ones. Especially when we children needed things, like a ride home from the Thunderbird motel pool in Orderville after all the local kids tried to drown us. Sometimes we walked the whole two miles home before they were done crying about our dead loved ones.
TO BE CONTINUED

20 comments:

Kristina P. said...

Maybe I need to use the crying about dead loved ones when I don't want to do the laundry.

MakingChanges said...

I'm sitting on the edge of my tiny chair (with my HUGE behind) waiting for the rest of the story. I can picture it all. My mom grew up near the Twilight Zone and there are quite a few nightmares that have come from her neck of the Zone that I have just started to learn about. Sad that it took 3 decades for all of it to come to light. NOW I KNOW why I am a mental case. I'll share with you sometime.

No solutions for the duct tape. Just roll with it. Your in-laws are great.

DeNae said...

Sister, you are on a roll. I can't wait to hear how this ends.

And what's the deal with us passing each other up and down the I-15? I just got back from Idaho, and probably passed you when you were still in St. George. Cryin' out loud!

Amber Lynae said...

I'm with Kristina on the laundry I would do anything to get out of laundry duty.

Can't wait for part II.

Melanie Jacobson said...

Damn, Crash. That's GOOD.

Barbaloot said...

Washing dishes and being sent outside? Sounds like my family!

springrose said...

Sounds like my family, children are to be seen and not heard. Also don't forget the laundry, vacumning, oh and make the dinner while you are at it, then all the adults will eat it and the kids can clean that up as well!! We are talking serious child labor laws being broken here!!

TisforTonya said...

I'd comment, but I'm due to spend a few hours weeping over my dead loved ones this evening...

can't wait to see the completion of this one :)

Liz said...

oh my gosh, crash! part two better include the heinous (heinous to me) news i just found out about today while sending off a letter in the post office!!
i told the first person i saw when i found out. sorry, but before i was sworn to secrecy, i had to cry and gnash my teeth to someone!! luckily this person was tevita. which means nobody else knows. ok, tevita was talking to mark james when i blurted it out but mark is just as good a secret keeper as tevita is, i think. plus, is it even a secret??

Just SO said...

Wow. I can't wait to hear what happened next.

val of the south said...

I'm not sure which is more indicative of needing therapy...having to go to the Twilight Zone, or driving there in a purple VW van!

I hope your M-I-L is saying all kinds of cute things while you are bound together!

Miss ya!

Skeet said...

OMGGGW(oh my gosh golly gee willickers) Crash, for a second there I thought I was reading the first book of the best novel I'd ever read. Seriously, What's gonna happen next! Love Ya

Skeet said...

Did I say book, I meant PAGE.

Stephen said...

Very good. Brings back alot of memories. I was telling grandma as we were leaving that I was taking a trip to Spain and Italy. She went on and on about a temple they were going to build in Italy and that I should go by there, so I came out of the closet and told her I was an apostate. She didn't know how to react. Then Nick and his wife were talking about dad death and Nicks wife said "Didn't he die when a cabinet door hit him in the head?" So I told them the truth and said that that story must be a family secret cover up. Then I got out of Dodge as fast as I could.

April said...

Why is it that people who drove in VW's as children had flashbacks this week? {shiver} I now despise VW's and flashbacks. True story! {sitting on the edge of my seat.....}

Alyson | New England Living said...

I'm loving this and wanting MORE!

Tiffany said...

Crash,
I am off the computer for the summer, but there are some days I sneak on and read you blog. Today is one. shhh dont tell. I love your guts!!!
tiffany

Welcome to the Garden of Egan said...

Hope you are able to work through those issues!
Enjoy Island Park! I'm 45 minutes from there!

The Songer said...

I really hope one day i get to read a book about your life growing up!

I love how you call it "emotional cavities"!

I actually started another blog and that would totally be the perfect title.... you get full credit if i steal it.

Heidi said...

Brilliant. can't wait to hear the rest.