Fusion

 It has come to my attention that I am the sum of my life experiences all jumbled up and spit out into a 41 year old who lives in Utah and doesn't know what to do with himself most of the time.

A lot of those experiences happened in the 90's, that time of my life when I was a teenager and learning to communicate with others, learning what was cool and what wasn't (nothing really is or isn't maybe?), and learning to deal with emotions, tragedy, connections, BIG things, little things, and every other thing that there was for me to experience.

Tragedy. For years I kept a manila folder with clippings from newspapers that contained obituaries of people I knew--my neighbor (one of my mom's best friends) who died from cancer, my grandma, kids I knew at school who took their own lives. I also kept the printed programs from their funerals. It moved from my childhood desk drawer to file cabinets after I moved out of my parents' house. It existed between folders with bank statements and tax returns. On the folder I had written "Funerals and Stuff." I can't say for sure why I included "and Stuff;" maybe it took the sting out of the morbidity of this collection of reminders of the stark reality of life's fragility.

It makes me think of one person in particular. I didn't know him that well. He was a young twenty-something man who I knew through my job at a bank. He would bring in wads of cash to deposit in his bank account. He was a server at a restaurant, and this was his tip income. We would have really pleasant conversations whenever I had the chance to assist him. One day I realized that I hadn't seen him in a while, so I pulled up his info to see if perhaps he was going to a different location. I saw that his accounts were all closed, and, as I dug a little deeper found a note that indicated that he was deceased.

I couldn't believe it. I Googled his name and found his obituary. He is buried in the Provo Cemetery. Last year when I was at the cemetery visiting my dad's grave, I looked up on the map where this young man was buried so I could visit his grave and just acknowledge him and his life. I went to where the map indicated his grave was, but there was no marker. Somehow that broke my heart. I really don't know that much about him outside of the little he shared with me in our brief interactions, but I feel like it is important for me to remember him and to be grateful for the goodness he brought into my life.

Hi Guys

 Me: Well hello.

31: Uh hi.

Elder Holdaway: 😳

Me: I guess it's time to check in again. 20 years since we went to bed for the last time in Michigan. 20 years since we got that last letter. 20 years. Whew.

31 and Elder Holdaway: A beard? 

Me: Yeah.

31: Ok. I could try to guess what this all means, but I know you won't tell me. 

Me: Yup. Hey, remember that job offer you turned down?

31: Yeah. Why?

Me: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

31: Dude.

Elder Holdaway: It's getting really late. I should go to bed.

Me: Oh hey, before you do. Elder Mahana and I are singing in sacrament meeting tomorrow! Cool, huh?

31 and Elder Holdaway: Yeah!!

Me: All right then gentleman, I'll let you get back to it. 

Potato Soup

Because I need a place to write this down that I can access quickly without searching through a bunch of scratch paper. Welcome back to the blog.

Boil a handful of chopped red potatoes in just enough water to cover them, then add a box of veggie broth.
Chop half an onion and mix in a bowl with a can of corn and a can of carrots (drained). Pour a little oil in and season--salt, pepper, thyme, garlic salt.
Add the stuff in the bowl to the pot when the potatoes are kind of tender.
Add thickening agent (a stick of butter melted and whisked with two heaping table spoons of corn starch)
Add some half and half and shredded cheese.

Call Me Sparky

Six years ago we took the first of a series of family vacations to Disneyland, a locale known as "the happiest place on earth." In my current occupation at See's Candies, though, I have customers who argue that See's actually owns that title. I respectfully disagree with both notions, because we all know that the happiest place on earth is actually this little corner of cyberspace that has British people doing voice overs for animals.

ANYWAY.

Here are the stories of the three trips to Disneyland that we have made as a family. I'm doing this in preparation for an upcoming trip that we have planned next month to the one and only Disneyland Resort in Southern California (Registered Trademarks and all that).

Trip number 1: Taken in October of 2007. This was a difficult time for our family. I had just graduated from BYU in April, and had imagined to myself that I would be working as a Seminary teacher full time, but I didn't get a job teaching Seminary. So following graduation, I worked for a little while as a server at Carrabba's, but by October I had given that up in hopes that I would find some solid full time work somewhere. At the time of the vacation, I had not found anything (I think in some ways I was a little relieved about this, because it worried me that I would have to try and get a week off from a brand new job ... I guess I worry about silly things).

We had two children, Joshua and Morgan. Josh was three and Morgan was one. The thought of having two small children in a place like Disneyland kind of terrified us a little, so we invested in some of those harness things (child leashes) and thought that we would use those a lot. We didn't. What we eventually did was purchase a second stroller, one of those cheap umbrella strollers, so that we had one for each child.

We flew to the Los Angeles Airport (the one known as LAX), and rode a shuttle (actually a bus, it looked nothing like a space ship) to our hotel. The not-really-a-shuttle-but-only-a-bus stopped at what felt like three hundred hotels before it reached ours, The Tropicana, located directly across from the entrance to the parks. We went on this trip with Jessica's family (as we did the others and we will on the one next month), and so our "party" (and what a party it was!) had four rooms, give or take. We got settled into our rooms and one of the first things I noticed was that the hotel lacked a swimming pool, which was kind of disappointing, because ever since I was a little kid the idea of a vacation was intrinsically linked with water and swimming. In fact, when I was young, my family could have saved a lot of travel time and just stayed in a local Provo hotel, and as long as it had a swimming pool, I would have considered it the greatest vacation ever (also, I probably wouldn't have thrown up quite as often if our road trips only went a few miles).

Where was I? Oh yes, the hotel. It did have cable TV, though, and that was the other element of a vacation that I considered essential as a kid, so one for two wasn't awful. Most of the channels were some variation of a Disney-themed channel (or so it felt). I came to really love the show, "The Replacements," about two orphan kids who found a cell phone that allowed them to call in any kind of favor they could ever want, including asking for parents (their parents were a secret agent mom and a dare devil dad). I thought this show had remarkable comedy for a kids' cartoon; my favorite moment was when the kids had created duplicates of their parents, and when their dad saw his duplicate, instead of wondering what on earth was going on, he just greeted it with a, "Hey there, handsome!"

That one still gets me.

We had an enjoyable time at the Disney parks. We rode the Buzz Lightyear ride 783 times or so, and also some other rides too. I was really timid to ride anything too thrilling, and so when everybody finally talked me into trying California Screaming I was very nervous, so much so that in the picture that gets taken at a certain point on the ride, I looked as if I was going to pass out. I think I had a fear of getting nauseous. That's still one of my biggest fears. What's it called? Upchuckaphobia? I'm not sure, really, but it scares the daylights out of me (but not the puke out of me, that would be torture).

Jessica and I went back to the hotel early every evening to put the kids to bed. They were absolutely exhausted each day, and it gave us a chance to hang out and talk or watch TV or whatever, but just to be together. Those were some of my favorite moments of that vacation, just being with Jessica and focusing on her while the kids slept peacefully.

Trip number 2: Taken in February or March of 2009. Joshua was four, almost five, Morgan was two and a half, and Jack was about six months old. Actually, Jack's age was the inspiration for writing this blog, since this next time we go to Disneyland we will have Lucy, who is six months old, and I was trying to remember if we had ever made the trip there with an infant before. And sure enough, we have.  Things were more stable in our family at this point. Following that first trip I was hired by Saturn of Orem to work as a sales consultant, a job that lasted all of nine months. But then in November 2008 I was hired by Seagull Book to be a manager in training, and that was where I was working when we made this trip to the theme park.

We flew again this time, but we opted to fly to an airport that was nearer to the park than LAX, so we went into Long Beach. I had hoped that an airport located in Long Beach would be near an actual beach, but was disappointed to see no ocean very near the airport (I had a false memory in my brain of ten years prior when I flew into the same airport for a school trip when I was a senior in high school; I thought for sure the airport was just a few steps away from beautiful sandy beaches with the tranquil sounds of waves crashing on the shore, but I was sorely mistaken). Also in contrast to that first trip, instead of riding a (ripoff-fake-not-really) shuttle, we rented cars. Minivans! With car seats for the kids and everything.

We picked up our cars, an ordeal that seemed to take much longer than it should have, and made our way to Harbor Blvd or Ave or Rd or St, or whatever it is, and found our hotel, not The Tropicana this time, but the Candy Cane Inn. Jessica's family had stayed at this hotel years before and had fond memories of it. It is located on the same side of the street as the entrance to the parks, but a short distance further down the road, so it was a little bit longer walk every day for us to and from the parks. This fact became the catalyst for a well-intentioned yet poor executed adventure one of the first evenings we were there.

There came a point that evening that Jessica and I were ready to head back to the hotel with Morgan and Jack (I think we had Jack anyway, though he may have still been with Jessica's mom). We didn't want to necessarily walk all the way out of the park and then back down the street to the hotel, and I thought I had seen on a map that if we went through Downtown Disney (Copyright, FBI Warnings, etc.) that we could make a much shorter trip back to the hotel. As is my habit, though, I made a huge mistake (do I have to cite Arrested Development if I say that?), and I misjudged where we should turn heading out of Downtown and we quickly found ourselves walking through residential neighborhoods in Anaheim. We kept turning toward what we thought was the direction of the hotel, and eventually, after walking for what felt like an hour and a half, we found The Candy Cane Inn. Morgan was an amazingly good sport for this walk, and so was Jessica. I owe them big for this to this day.

The Candy Cane Inn had delicious, but small, flaky, buttery croissants as a part of their continental breakfast. I ate lots of those croissants.

This trip was marked by Josh's fearlessness in riding any ride he was tall enough to ride, including the ride that became his favorite that trip, Tower of Terror. He had the ride memorized, including all of the video introductions and sound effects, and he repeated these to us multiple times. We also rode the Buzz Lightyear ride, probably 316 times. The kids and I spent many fun hours in the hotel pool.

When the day for our departure arrived, though, things got a little difficult. We had discovered (happily we thought) that the company we had arranged for our rental cars through, had a location just around the corner from our hotel. What a wonderful coincidence! Instead of having to go to the location in Downtown Disney, where our reservations indicated for us to go, we figured we could just go to this other, much more convenient, location and pick up our cars there. We even began to put the plan into place the night before we left, by visiting the nearer location to make sure we could pick our cars up there.

But it was not so easy. We had to spend hours waiting for the rental company to figure out how to arrange for us to get our cars at the other location, while in the meantime checking out of the hotel and trying to find a place to wait with three children for everything to work out. Eventually it did, we got our cars, went and had some lunch, and then went to the airport, where we waited in a very long slow moving security line as the guy who checked id's spent a painfully long time looking at every passengers license, carefully inspecting it with a light, front and back, and staring at the passenger to verify it was really them.

All in all, good times had by all. (If you are still reading at this point, my congratulations to you, you deserve a prize. But all I can offer is a few hundred more words. Sorry.)

Trip number 3: Taken in May of 2011. Josh had just turned seven, Morgan was four, and Jack was two. And Jessica was eight and a half months pregnant. We decided to try driving this time, instead of flying and having to either take a bus (not a shuttle, come on!) or rent a car. Jessica's extended family, including her uncle, aunt, and cousins, came along as well, and we considered it a family reunion. We drove half way and stayed for a night in a hotel in Primm, Nevada. I made this wise decision based on the fact that the last time I had made that drive (6 years before), I remembered seeing these hotels perched right on the Nevada/California border that advertised their very low room rates, and I thought it would be a great place to stay for a night.

I was wrong. These hotels were casinos first, and hotels second. They were smelly, hot, sticky, and when we checked in, at 6:00 in the evening, our room had not been cleaned yet. We decided to get something to eat, and so went to an in-house Denny's that had a long line. The kids were not thrilled with the wait, nor with the food. Thankfully, by the time we finished eating our room had been cleaned and we went up and went to bed. In the morning we packed quickly and left Primm with a vow never to stay there again (including the night I had booked for the drive home; I will give them this, they refunded the money no questions asked when I canceled the future reservation). Lesson learned: if you are staying in Nevada, stay in a hotel that does not double as a casino, at least if you are not in Las Vegas itself, and if possible, find one that is smoke free, like the Comfort Inn we'll be staying in this time in Henderson. Oh, also lesson learned: Primm, Nevada was not built with young Mormon families with small children in mind. (Duh, you say? I deserve it.)

If it seems like I'm doing a Clark Griswald impersonation on these vacations, I promise it is not intentional.

Maybe I can be forgiven for the Primm debacle on the merits of my hotel selection in Anaheim for this visit. We decided that, this time, we did not want to stay at the Tropicana or the Candy Cane Inn, so we began searching for a different place. For a while, we considered a Marriott, not a bad choice since Marriotts are typically very nice, but it was a little bit further away from the parks than the Candy Cane was, and that was one of the things we had hoped to improve on. We were working with a travel agent, the same one who had booked our other trips, and he was doing his best to meet all of our needs, but it was hard to do that. So I decided to see what I could find myself.

I did a Google street view search of Harbor and found the images of the hotels most conveniently located in relation to the entrance to the parks, and then researched those hotels. One of them, The Park Vue Inn, seemed pretty decent, in fact, it seemed great, maybe even ideal. So I talked everyone into giving this hotel a try, because they promised a good, free breakfast every day, rooms big enough to fit families with a number of children (we got a room with two queen beds and a bunk bed), and even a complimentary dinner each night. If it's any indication how we felt about the hotel, we are staying there again this next time. (Warm cookies in the lobby every day!)

The parks were a lot of fun, especially for Josh, who was old enough to really appreciate most of the rides, though he still wasn't tall enough for some of them. But he had a great time going on rides with his uncles and aunts. Morgan had a lot of fun too, but the poor little guy was sick most of the week we were there, so he took quite a few midday naps. Jack had a blast, and won over the hearts of nearly everybody he met, including the characters who roam the parks. Goofy and Chip (of Chip and Dale fame) took especial liking to Jack, giving him extra attention while making others wait a little longer to greet them. Jack has that affect on people.

One of the days we took advantage of having a mode of transportation available to us, and we drove down to Laguna Beach, and spent a few hours there, playing in the surf, and exploring tide pools. The boys found tons of shells, including one that, after getting back to the hotel, we discovered still had a little hermit crab living in it. I drove the crab back to the coast that evening.

We also gave Knott's Berry Farm a visit one day. It's less kid friendly than Disneyland.

On the drive home, we opted not to stay over in a city on the way, and just drove straight home, arriving sometime after midnight. This was Sunday night/Monday morning. On Tuesday, Jessica gave birth to our fourth little boy, Lewis.

So this trip will technically be Lewie's first, and also Lucy's first. We are looking forward to it, and are excited to see how the kids enjoy it.

Wish us luck.

Rule Breaker, in which I do it

Me: I'm breaking the rules here. Elder Holdaway: What rules? Me: The rules I made up along the way during our conversations. You know, about how at first I was just talking to an Elder Holdaway who was in a static temporal vacuum, not at a specific point in time, but then as I talked with you more and more I decided that we were at an exact ten year separation, and then I decided that was how it was, and so once I was ten years from you getting home, I couldn't talk to Elder Holdaway anymore. Those rules. Elder Holdaway: Um. Ok. Me: Well, I thought about this a lot, and it's all right if we talk even though we are more than ten years separated. I like this arrangement. Elder Holdaway: I'm not so sure I do. You're kind of weirding me out. Me: Well, I telepathically promised Spencer that I would talk to you again, so deal with it (and I really mean that in the friendliest way possible). Elder Holdaway: I think I have work to do. Me: Hang on, time pretty well stands still during our dialogue, so there. I needed to tell you that Spencer felt kind of bad about putting part of a Less than Jake song on one of the tapes he sent you. He told me this through a medium called facebook. Let that sink in. Elder Holdaway: What? Me: Sorry, I'm trying to be funny for anybody who reads this, since they will be reading it in my reality and not yours. But the joke wasn't funny. It was terrible. Elder Holdaway: Oh. Well, tell Spencer it's not a big deal. His tapes are the greatest things. I love listening to them, and my companions think they are great too. Me: Good. That's what I thought. Elder Holdaway: So I can expect more of this, huh? Me: You betcha! Elder Holdaway: K.

Welcome Home! in which we chat, but it's different this time

[Recently Released] Elder Holdaway: Hi.

Me: Hi, how was the plane ride?

[RR] Elder Holdaway: I got to help out a mom with her young kids. That was pretty cool.

Me: Oh yeah, I remember that. Hey, so you got that letter last night, right?

[RR] Elder Holdaway: The one from Jessica Smith and Sara Nash?

Me: That's the one.

[RR} Elder Holdaway: Yeah, why?

Me: :D

[RR] Elder Holdaway: What?

Me: Enjoy your hot chocolate and cookies tomorrow night. I know I will.

[RR] Elder Holdaway: Um, ok.

Farewell? In which we talk again, maybe for the last time

Me: I had an interesting experience today.
Elder Holdaway: What was it?
Me: I helped a customer whose last name was Calton, and I took a shot in the dark, and asked if her husband had served as mission president in Michigan. She looked a little worried when she said that they had served there, and asked if I was one of their missionaries. I explained that I arrived six months after they left, and then... that was it I guess. It was just cool, though. Any little connection to the mission is still very thrilling.
Elder Holdaway: Yeah.
Me: How was zone conference yesterday?
Elder Holdaway: Incredible! And so emotional.
Me: Yup.
Elder Holdaway: President Church changing the closing hymn, Elder Pace's talk! Everything!
Me: I just read the journal entry about it. Wow, it's amazing to remember all those things.
Elder Holdaway: Yeah. It's so weird to be knowing that I'm going home in a few days.
Me: There is a lot I feel like I should tell you, but I guess it's all stuff you figure out. Maybe we'll talk again before you go.
Elder Holdaway: That mustache?
Me: That's one of those things you'll just have to figure out.

This one's for Mark, in which I acquiesce

There you go.

So long, in which I'll be shaving now

The trip, the game, the time spent with my brothers... it was all awesome.

But the stache is gone today.

Question, in which I have one

Just out of curiosity, for the combover sporting man, how long does it take to grow out said combover? Five months at least, right? And what on earth do you do with the shock of hair you grow to cover your head in the time that it's not long enough to go from ear to ear? There's not really such a thing as half a combover? Or two thirds a combover, right?

It's all a mystery.

More Existentialism, in which we meet again

Brian: Put 'er there, Elder.
Elder Holdaway: Gah! Bwahahahahaha!
Brian: What?
Elder Holdaway: Hahahahahaha!
Brian: Are you ok? What's wrong?
Elder Holdaway: Hahahahahaha!
Brian: :{/
Elder Holdaway: Hoohoohoo!
Brian: :{/
Elder Holdaway: Ah-ha, ah-ha, ah-ha...
Brian: :{/
Elder Holdaway: Hee, hee, ah, oh, ah-ha...
Brian: You're in Okemos, now, right? Enjoy these last few weeks.
Elder Holdaway: Heh heh heh heh, Ah! Hahahahahahaha!
Brian: Another time, huh? Ok.

Emoticons, in which a whole new world has opened up to me

Jessica taught me this:

:{)

:{D

:{O

:{/

Unpredictability, in which this week is really exciting

If there is one thing the NFL is, it is totally unpredictable. The only two certainties this season are the best and the worst teams (Green Bay and Indy). Otherwise, anything can happen in any given game, like Arizona beating Philly, and Seattle beating Baltimore. Or a team with a quarterback who goes 2 of 8 winning. No really, 2 of 8!!

That quarterback, by the way, the one, the only, Tim Tebow. The same QB who has led his team (sort of) to two straight wins and has put the Broncos in contention for the AFC West Title. The same QB that I will be watching live this Thursday, as the Broncos take on the New York Jets (just lost to New England tonight).

This is going to be awesome.

Poser, in which I'm just pretending

Jack has somehow become convinced that because I have a mustache (or pushstache, as he says it), that I have been mysteriously and miraculously bestowed with the skills of the handy man. "You can fix our broken windows, because you have a pushstache," he tells me earnestly.

Poor Jack. What will he do when he figures out that I have unjustly taken upon me the persona of one who can do things?

Hey RJ! in which I make an obscure movie reference

Get out of my office! And take that ridiculous thing off!

7 Days, in which there is only one week left of this nonsense

My boss stopped by my store today. He almost fell over laughing when he saw me.

Date Night, in which Jessica was brave enough to be seen with me in public

She must really love me.

Fish Eye, in which I utilized Photobooth

Too Tired, in which I didn't do this last night

But the morning works too, I guess. The time change has me all messed up.

Intrigue, in which the game will be a good one

Congratulations to the Broncos and the Jets on their wins today. This means that each team might be playing for something (playoff berths?) in 11 days when they meet in Mile High Stadium.

Good news for the mustache brothers.