Oh Beautiful For...

I once saw a picture of me taken at Easter. I was in a striped shirt and holding a colorful basket half my size. I looked stunned but the context of the picture denotes I was looking for eggs. Judging by my age and again my expression, I’m sure I was failing miserably at the task on hand. Not much has changed in the past 20 years.

This past weekend, I accompanied some friends to Idaho for a little holiday festivity. Getting out of town and away from usual activity is good for the soul. So we jumped in the car and three and a half hours later found ourselves in nowhere, uh hem, Idaho… somewhere right outside of Burley, so I re-assert my first comment, nowhere, Idaho.

The land expanded flat and brown. Farms abounded and though the crops are either not yet planted or just having been planted, most of the ground was a rich brown until it bordered a dreadfully pale green yard. The land was vast and the spacious sky was a plush blue until it collided with purple mountained majesty.

It is a different terrain than the tree inundated, vivid green east or the rocky, steep, "in your backyard" mountains of Utah.

My friends’ family celebrated the bulk of Easter on Saturday and so Saturday we walked into “grandma’s” house with celebratory attitudes in tow. We barbequed and ate hamburgers and potato salad. (I use the term “we” loosely as anyone who knows me knows potato salad wouldn’t even cross my fork’s path, much less my lips.)

I laughed when my friends’ dad asked me if I ever participated in any redneck activities. I inquired if he had a specific one in mind. When he asked if I ever shot skeet, I mocked him relentlessly. I relayed to him my having passed my hunter’s safety exam at age 12 with a perfect score. I corrected his assertion of skeet shooting to be a redneck activity. It’s a country activity and I am from the country indeed.

Yet I had to laugh when the man I ridiculed came to my rescue for the Easter egg hunt. All the offspring participate in the hunt with the men hiding them beforehand. And after 15 steps, I recognized myself as the child from the picture in the frozen woman on the edge of the yard bordering one of the immense farms.

His mercy was hilarious as he tried to direct me with a flock of children waiting on his every command to pillage my would be plunder if they weren’t faster. Yet his patience was unfailing as he would mislead them and merely smiled at me and pointed in a different direction.

The woman that deliberates is lost. – Joseph Addison