Days Gone By

Summer makes me think of days gone by. In more than one sense, too. Especially now, at the end of the summer, I'm counting the number of days that have passed and comparing it to the ridiculously few days that remain until the start of another school year. But in a more "big picture" sense, summer can really take you back to when you were a kid; the time when days were endless and free of care. I was waiting for one of my favorite summer moments--5 pm on a Saturday night when the old refrain of the "Tishomingo Blues" starts, followed by Garrison Keillor singing the introduction to "A Prairie Home Companion"--when I caught an interview on NPR. The following quote is absolutely brilliant.

It reflects a time that feels incredibly complicated but, in hindsight, is very simple

and we have this gift of NOT knowing...that it will never be like this again.

(Wil Wheaton, on the coming-of-age film, "Stand By Me")

I have never seen "Stand By Me." In fact, my only recollection of Wil Wheaton as an actor comes from "Star Trek: The Next Generation." But I intend to remedy that soon, especially with the promise of dwelling on such a bittersweet truth. Can you imagine how your childhood would have been spoiled if you KNEW that someday soon it would all be gone? If somehow a person could have flipped a switch in your head and you would have understood that you are living some of the best days of your life, and soon it would stop and those days would never come again? I love the way Wheaton says it: it's a gift that we don't know that the simple, endless days are passing, never to return.

But I have allowed myself to be sidetracked. My main purpose was to talk about the days that have gone by this summer and how we have filled them. At long last, here is my report on the summer of the "M" states--Minnesota, Montana and Missouri.

A little over a year ago, the family came together to grieve for the loss of my Grandma Liechty. Early in July, we came together again for the funeral of my Grandma Asp. I feel no shame in saying that both funerals were a celebration of a life, and so it was good to see family and be together with them. But this year I was not in a place to enjoy my family as much as last, and I think that was reflected in the number of pictures we took. Eric did a good job photographing, as he always does, but though I had my camera with me the only shot I took was this one (with my phone). It was ironic, and comforting, I guess, to see another Minnesotan in southern exile remembering their roots. And it was nice to see Grandma Asp's oft-used exclamation on a license plate.

I did enjoy my time with the family, especially the pool-side conversations with my siblings. They were the types of conversations I wrote about in my last post: weighty, but good.

I flew into DFW on Wednesday, returning from the funeral, and we drove out on Thursday. Much of the Montana trip seemed like a really long commute just to get a vacation started, but I pulled out the "travel presents" parenting gem (inherited from my mom) to help pass the time. Every few hours the kids would get a new present that was intended to help them pass the time until the next gift. Most of them were duds, but the boys still enjoyed opening them; and for some reason, focusing on the amount of time until the next present eliminates the question, "Are we there yet?" or "How long until we get there?"

Technically, the photo above isn't Montana--it's Wyoming. But our border crossing happened somewhere in the great Yellowstone National Park.

I love natural places. I had dreamed of seeing Yellowstone. There's nothing like a good wilderness, I always say. (As the joke always concludes...) "And Yellowstone is nothing like a good wilderness." Don't get me wrong--it is beautiful and largely untamed. But I feel like my sons were more wild than the Yellowstone we saw. It was WAY more touristy that I thought it would be (I don't know why I wasn't expecting that). Herds of cars would park by the roadside to snap photos of herds of deer. And they weren't really herds--three or four together, at most.

There is a lodge not 100 feet from Old Faithful that serves ridiculously over-priced (and bad) food. As you can see behind the boys, hundreds and hundreds of tourists sit on benches, munching their crappy food, waiting to see the next scheduled eruption. And even that seemed too domesticated. It was like a movie theater: "The next showtime for 'Old Faithful' will be in 25 minutes!"

I am largely to blame for my lack of enjoyment at Yellowstone, however. We made it there on the third day of driving and were on a bit of a time crunch to see everything. Exhausted from driving+needing to get somewhere=no way to enjoy a national park.

But the rest of the trip was fantastic. Being good Texans we brought along our cowboy hats. The horses were great, the Neal family, owners and operators of the Black Otter Guide service, were wonderful, and the scenery was gorgeous. Here Aydan sits astride Cassidy (must have been named after Butch, because he was a male).
The boys did so unbelievably well on the trail ride in. It was probably close to an hour or hour-and-a-half, but they never complained--in fact they loved it!--and they were finally QUIET. After 22 hours of them chattering in the back seat of the car, it was a blissfully silent ride up the mountain to our campsite. I prayed and sang "How Great Thou Art" and "Great is the Faithfulness", just soaking in the glory of creation. Above, Brennan gets a feel for Snip (short for Parsnip).
The riding was one of the best parts of the trip. Here's the fam, with Heather riding Chica.

And of course the scenery was amazing.

Being the old cowhand that I am, having ridden EXTENSIVELY at Crossroads Camp in St. John, ND, I was glad someone as skilled and experienced as me had some challenges, like crossing this river.

But seriously, it was pretty challenging riding a horse (even my faithful steed Doc) with a broken leg. The place where the stirrup rested against the side of the horse was just at the break line and was somewhat uncomfortable. Then on the way home, I leaned out of my saddle and returned to an upright position using my left leg. Big mistake! The ride down the mountain was excruciating.

If you would have asked me what I wanted from Montana, I would have described a scene like this. Emerging from a dense forest into a rolling mountain pasture, ringed by mountains and covered with a blue sky, all on a glorious, sunny-but-cool day. Amazing. This is where the wildness and the true beauty were.

While Aydan may look like he is in blissful repose, he had in fact just sprained his ankle running through the meadow. He is moaning and wailing under his hat in this picture, but had you not known that, it would have been picturesque, right?

What good cowboy doesn't chew on a piece of grass?

Each day in mid- to late-aternoon the mountain storms would roll in. We all had rain gear, so it was no big deal, and we didn't let it slow us down. Sometimes, during the heaviest rain, we'd huddle under the big central tent where we shared our meals. Fortunately, I brought some card games along and we still enjoyed that time as well. When the rain was light we would still go adventuring.
I mentioned Aydan's injury before because it prevented him from going with Brennan and me when we started exploring on our first day in camp. We just kept climbing higher and higher until we reached the top of the mountain. Unfortunately, it caused Aydan to worry so much that he couldn't eat dinner (such a sweet kid!), which we missed. Still, it provided one of my favorite pictures of the trip.
This may look like an ordinary landscape photo, simply demonstrating the beauty of the mountainside. But look closer.

On the second day we took a ride through the surrounding mountains. Riding was a definite treat, and we got to stop and eat lunch in magnificent surroundings. Some other favorite activities included gathering fuel for and stoking the fire, and feeding and saddling the horses. Seriously, the boys could have done these two jobs all day long. Aydan so enjoyed helping out that he desperately wants to return next summer to work for Black Otter. And the Neals were so kind and appreciative of the boys' help. Gary, the trail boss, even taught Aydan and Brennan how to crack a whip.

Unfortunately, the creek (which is a misnomer--it was like a roaring, cascading river) was too high and fast, due to an unusually high amount of snowfall from the previous winter, which is still melting and flowing down the mountainside. Sadly that meant that the boys could not fish, which has become the ultimate of activities for them this summer. (I'll have to post a picture about that later.) All in all, though, a great trip.

Then last week we went to Missouri to celebrate the 60th wedding anniversary of my father-in-law's parents. It was a good time to re-connect with family, some of whom I haven't seen for ten years. In fact, we went to the exact spot for Jack and Annette's 50th anniversary. Above, all the "grandkids" sit and talk to Grandpa Jack. For me it was all about hanging out with Heather's family and enjoying time with her brothers and sister. Oh, that and cliff jumping.

See me behind the tree branch? This is a pretty decent cliff, right? Maybe 15 feet.
Well this was just a warm up for the real, main event.

This photo was taken 10 years ago. I'm almost positive it's the exact same cliff we jumped off last week. The previous trip was taken in Autumn, so we weren't as crazy about getting out and swimming. As a result, the picture isn't very descriptive in terms of scale.
Well, we remedied that problem this year. Here I am standing in the water at the base of the cliff. And don't worry--the water depth drops pretty rapidly. We jumped into approximately 8 feet of water, with good soft mud at the bottom.

Seen here is the top of the cliff face from which we jumped. The highest point of rock you can see, just right of center in the photo, was our launch place. The goal was to jump over and clear (aiming just slightly to the right) the tree branches below.

Here I am in mid-plummet. We estimated that the cliff was probably 40-50 feet tall. It had a pronounced affect upon ones bottom when one hit the water. That's a polite and proper way of saying it made your butthole sizzle when you splashed down.

To give you a better feel for what it would have looked like watching from a boat in the middle of the lake (and yes, we did have spectators), here is Kelly in mid-jump. I must say, for the honor of all the Faszholz children, that (although not pictured) Heather, Jason and Kyle all jumped as well. But I was an idiot and forgot the camera for the first time. So Kelly and I paddled back to the cabin, got the cameras (there is also video footage this time), and were the only ones to repeat the jump for documentation. Did I mention the butthole situation?

But thankfully I did not remember the butthole stinging from 10 years previous, and I was only too glad to be the first to make the jump again this year. I have included pictures from the last time just for nostalgia's sake.
This shot of Jason really does well to capture how huge a jump it was. I'm not going to try to sound all tough: it was terrifying standing up there, trying to get the nerve to jump.

And here's me. Unfortunately my scanning job made an already off-center situation much worse, so you can barely see me in the top left corner.

Ah...what beautiful days this summer has held!