In the Back of That Old Station Wagon

We had a station wagon that was blue. And it was old. I really wish I had a picture. We may have brought it from Utah. One day my parents said that we lived 5 hours away from Grandma and Grandpa's house in Daly City, California (a San Francisco suburb). I remember thinking that sounded terribly, horribly, no-fun long. And yet at the same time, pretty cool that we could just get in the car and drive there.


One of the times we drove to Daly City, Sam and I sat in the "way back." That's what we called the very back of the car next to the back windshield. It had a seat that could fold out, and that seat faced backward.


There are two things I remember about riding that way to Daly City.


First, Sam made up this game where we would count all the cars we passed. We were playing this in Pleasanton, where there were four lanes of traffic going the same way we were. So we really had to be diligent. And then he threw in a new challenge...we had to subtract for any cars that passed us! We were hopping. But I don't think we played that game extensively, because it really was mentally exhausting.


Second, somehow, the back window of the car had broken, so it we had no window back there. So Sam and I hooked ourselves up with all kinds of blankets, and we made sure we had our coats, so that we could keep warm on the drive. I'm not going to lie, it was freezing, and that part of it was just not fun at all. At all at all. But I also remember that we had a good time, anyway. Sam has always been someone I enjoy talking to. He is very easy to have a conversation with, and he is creative and fun. So in spite of the freezing cold toes, etc, it is a good memory for me.

Jepson

In Corcoran, we moved into a huge house--maybe it was and maybe it wasn't, but to an 11 year old coming from the house on Meadow Drive, it was huge. It was 2 story! 1310 Jeppson. We loved it. This is the house where Mark was born. The front door opened up into the living room, which ran along the whole front of the house. It was the biggest living room we'd ever had, and it was a long rectangle. Right across from the front door was a bathroom, I think it was a half bath. (My mom always thought that right across from the front door was a very tacky place for a bathroom. I think I would have to agree with that. Hello, welcome to our home. Nice view of the bathroom, eh?) To the left of the bathroom was the staircase leading upstairs. On the left side of the living room there was a door that led to a huge room. We used it as a bedroom. I'm not sure if it was supposed to be a family room or not, I don't remember if it had an "official" closet or not. I do remember that for a little while it was my room. On the right side of the living room, a doorway led into the kitchen. It was another nice long, skinny room, perpendicular to the living room. (So it ran along the side of the house). I remember it was big, and I remember it was very very yellow. The table was at the back of the kitchen, but even the side where the cupboards, fridge, stove, sink, etc. were was nice and open, lots of floor space. At the back of the kitchen, there was a doorway to the left that led to a sort of small little room. I think there may have been a half bathroom back there, but it could have been just a room. Nowadays we might call it a mudroom, but for us it was just full of stuff. With your back to the kitchen, there was a back door on the right, leading to the back yard. Further ahead you would come into the big bedroom (or family room?) that had the door to the living room. Once in that big room, there were sliding glass doors on the right, that led into a step down add on. I'm sure that at one time it led outside. The add on had a wall of windows, and was carpeted, and we used it as a family room. (That is the room where I first watched Anne of Green Gables. Very important fact to note!)

Back at the stairs...it was one long staircase that went straight up, no turns. On the ceiling above the stairs was a swamp cooler, so many a hot summer day, the staircase was our favorite place to sit because the nice, cold air would just pour down on us. Even now I can remember the relief I felt just standing there, letting that air wash over me. At the top of the stairs there were two bedroom doors. The one on the left led to a bedroom. I remember that it was my room at one point. Straight ahead from the staircase was another bedroom. This bedroom had an entrance to a jack-n-jill bathroom, which led into the third bedroom upstairs. This third bedroom was huge. The entrance to that bedroom led to the hallway that ran along the front of the house...the wall it shared with the staircase was to the left.

We lived there for maybe a year and a half, and then moved to a smaller house at 2200 Bell, also in Corcoran.

Here are some pictures taken inside the Jepson house.

This is all of us kids just after Mark was born. Celeste, Sam, Me holding Shannon. Dawn is in front of Celeste, and Mark is, of course, the baby. 

Celeste being goofy.

To California or Bust

We lived on Meadow Drive until the summer of 1985. My dad had just graduated from Weber State with a teaching degree, and been hired to teach school in the small town of Corcoran, in California's Central Valley. I remember that a big truck came, and we had a portion of it that we could load our things into, and someone else would drive it all to California, so we only had to drive the car.

There are three things I remember from this trip: 1) I had some money--no idea where I got it--and I got to buy some candy at the gas station for the trip. That kind of thing NEVER happened, so it was a big deal for me. 2) We drove all the way to California with our dog, Scruffy, in the car. I think it was a blue station wagon. 3) When we got into California, we drove through a big windmill farm. (Is that even what they're called?) The windmills were turning, and our parents told us they were all waving to us, welcoming us to California.

Grandma and Grandpa Stowell

This was my Grandma Chandler's parents' house in Pocatello. I was always fascinated by this house, because it was three stories tall. At least, that's the way I saw it, because it was a two story house with a basement. It was a beautiful house inside, and it had that "Grandma" smell. Oh how I loved it. I didn't get to go there a whole lot, but every time I did it felt like I stepped back in time.

Here is a picture in their back yard. It's not a very good picture at all, but I am glad to have it. Back row is my Grandpa Chandler, Grandpa Stowell, and my dad. Front row is me, Grandma Chandler, Shannon, Grandma Stowell, Celeste and Dawn.

Croquet was a big thing at the Stowell house. Everybody loved to play croquet, and made a point to play it whenever they visited. I'm going to guess that the boy bending over is Jared Paredes, my cousin, the girls are probably Karen and Melissa Chandler, Tom's girls, and the other boy is probably Josh Paredes.

That's me in the front yard, when I was a college student. Looks like my Uncle Sergio and one of his kids with him.

My Grandma Chandler is Grandpa Stowell's daughter. Here we are on the porch: Grandma, Celeste, Great Grandpa and me.

This is me and my Grandpa Chandler sitting on the couch inside.

This is my Grandpa Stowell, visiting his wife's grave. This is also where he was eventually buried.

This is Grandpa Stowell with my family in front of our Springville house in Turlock, California, shortly before Sam's mission.

My Grandma Stowell died in about 1992. I think it was the year 2000 that Grandpa Stowell died. Jared got to meet him at my Grandparents' house that year. This is the Grandpa who was born in Colonial Juarez, Mexico, where his family had fled to escape the laws of polygamy in the United States. His father was Brigham Stowell, and his mother was Brigham's second wife, Rhoda Bybee Stowell. This is the Grandpa who was friends with Phylo T. Farnsworth growing up. (Farnsworth invented the television). This is the Grandpa who owned the root beer stand where my grandma and all her sisters worked, where she met my Grandpa after the war, who she would end up marrying. This was the Grandpa who would pull nickels out of your ear, and he loved North's Chuckwagon. 

This Grandpa had a very full, rich life.

John Muir Middle School

I started middle school when we got to Corcoran, at John Muir Middle School. The first thing I noticed about my new school was that there were outdoor hallways. That means that the door to each classroom opened to outside, rather than an indoor hallway. I remember thinking that was so crazy, but awesome at the same time. Because now we lived in California, and it didn't snow there.

This was also my first experience having different teachers for every subject. I had not been eased into the process, nobody had helped me prepare for it, other than to mention that that's how it works in middle school. At least, I don't especially remember any particular training for it. But I did okay, I didn't get lost, I wasn't late to any classes trying to figure things out. No traumatic experiences there. (yay).

I went to this school for two years, and there are a handful of things I remember from here...

1) My science teacher was a lady with super duper short hair. In her class we dissected a worm. I know that I also dissected a cow's eyeball at some point, which may have been in her class, or it could have been at Turlock High School.

2) I had a history teacher named Mr. Ranger. He was adored by everyone. Not really for any other reason than that he spoke softly, and said really funny things without cracking a smile. I ate that up, I loved it. He always called us "Little Ones," and his tone of voice when he said it was so funny. His response whenever anyone decided to whine or complain about something was "Oh well, life is hard and then you die." Again, the way he said it--with this lazy kind of drawl. Great stuff.

3) My English teacher was Ann Martin. She lived on my street, but way, way, way down. She was not married, but she had a daughter named Adrian who was a couple of years older than me. Ms. Martin would pay me to stay after school and correct papers, and then she would drive me home. I adored her. It may have been in her class where we did an exercise called "fluency." We would get paper and pencil, and she would start her timer, and we had to write continuously until the timer went off. If we couldn't think of anything to say we had to write anyway, even if all we wrote was "I can't think of anything to say I am so bored this assignment is so hard why do we have to do this..." Sometimes I did write that I didn't know what to write about. The idea was that writing like that would loosen up thoughts and ideas that were wedged in the deep dark corners of our minds. And really, lots of things came out of my pen during fluency that probably never would have otherwise. It was pretty cool!

4) Lastly, I had a math teacher named Mr. Hampton. His daughter Darlene was my friend, and their family was in our ward. I remember hearing years and years later that Mr. Hampton had committed suicide, and my heart broke. And then one year (maybe just a summer) Darlene lived down the street from me at College, and was in my ward for a little while.

Early 80s Me

"Grandmas"

We lived in Utah, which is very far away from Daly City California, where our Grandma lived. And so we had a way of finding local grandmas. One of our local grandmas was Sister Hadfield. We loved to go up the hill to her house. From our house, we went up to the other end of Meadow Drive, and then turned left. The street immediately went uphill, and about half way up on the left was Sister Hadfield’s house. We just loved to go and visit her. I don’t remember anything at all about visiting her, just that we loved to go. She probably had cookies, though. =)

Another grandma we had lived kitty corner to us, on Chatlain. I don’t know her name, and I don’t know how in the world we found her, but we would go visit her, and she would give us toast with cinnamon-sugar sprinkled on it. That was so crazy to me—my mom would have never let us sprinkle sugar on our toast! (As a side note, I remember learning that people sprinkled sugar on their cold cereal, and that never, ever ever, happened in our house).

Upside Down

Here’s another fun thing my mom did with us—one day, she painted eyes and a nose, upside down, on her chin. Then she grabbed a sheet, and got on the couch with her feet sticking up, and her back on the seat, with her head bent over the edge of the seat. Then she took the sheet and covered her face, all but her mouth and her chin. Because she was upside down, the eyes and nose she had drawn were above her mouth, and it looked like a tiny little face with a big mouth. And then she started talking—saying hello to us in a sing-song voice, and even singing fun little songs with us. More shrieking with laughter. It was crazy! It looked so funny! It was this little tiny face, like a whole different person. And all the time, of course we knew it was mom. We loved it so much that we just begged for her to do that to our chins so we could have a turn. Oh the fun we had, upside down, performing songs for our siblings. Honestly, we were nutty.

Country Stars

Before my dad finished college to become a school teacher, he worked as a full time radio disc jockey. And he was good! I remember that in Ogden, he worked at a country music radio station, and I would call him at work and ask him what time he’d be playing “my song.” I don’t even know what song it was, just a song that had a tune that spoke to me, I’m guessing. And he would always tell me what time it would be on, and I would listen.

As part of his job, sometimes he got to go to concerts. I was the lucky one who went to a few of those. One concert I remember clearly was Lee Greenwood and Barbara Mandrell. I have no clue right now what Barbara Mandrell sang, but apparently she was good, because she was the main deal. Lee Greenwood was just the opening act. But I can close my eyes and see him up on that stage, and hear him singing “Proud To Be An American.” How cool is that??

I also remember that I went to see Alabama in concert. They are one of my all time favorite country groups, even if they are a little “old,” because so many of their songs have such good messages.

I’m not sure if he was part of the Alabama concert or not, but we also went to see someone named John Conley. (?) No idea who he is, but we did get to go back stage. And you know how cool it is to go back stage.

Mom the Water Fountain

My mom was just silly. Really, both of my parents have just always been naturals with kids. They get a lot of enjoyment out of it. I remember that when I was a kid, and it was summertime and very hot, my mom had us all lay down on our backs, next to each other, and the game was that she would come by with her giant cup of water, and carefully pour a little bit into the waiting mouths below. She would start at one end, and, one by one, work her way down the line. I’m sure it was me and my siblings, but if truth be told, there were probably plenty of times when neighborhood kids were also part of the fun. It was so funny, because she was standing up, and it was a long way from her cup to our mouths. She would pour, ever so carefully, just a little bit. And a lot of times the water went into our mouths. But even when it went in our mouths, there were plenty of times when it wasn’t the straightest shot. To this day I can still feel the trickle that missed, moving from the corner of my mouth, down to my ear and into my hair. And we would just shriek with laughter. We tried so hard to catch all the water, but I’m sure we secretly hoped some of it would trickle out and get us wet. We never ever got soaked, but we always got wet, and we always had a super great time.