I like Walmart, and I shop there regularly (it helps that we have a brand-new store, with un-sullen workers, so far). I know it’s the nadir of taste, style, social conscience, and seven other sins, but I am unashamed. And I really think that unless you’ve lived for a couple years in a third-world country where you have to go to five different stores for what you could get at Walmart, and it still isn’t what you really want, you don’t get to judge me. (Places like France are different. There, it’s a pleasure to walk from store to store. There, I would walk five miles uphill both ways for a shop that only sells pastries, because they’re worth it.)

Penance (not really; actually a pleasure, but pretend):

I like Sassy Scoops, a review website of local Utah places. Their mission is a great one, and their reviews of all different kinds of businesses, from restaurants to carpet cleaning to yoga studios, are informative, visually appealing, and usually pretty funny, too. Right now they’re spreading the word about buying local first and supporting Utah businesses by offering the chance to win $100 in gift cards to local businesses for posting about Sassy Scoops. I admit, I’d love to win the gift cards (it wouldn’t hurt my feelings if they asked me to Guest Sassy with them sometime, either ). But really, I think what they’re doing is great.

Some local businesses that I’ve been impressed with since moving back to Utah include:

Mi Ranchito. I love yummy, cheap Mexican food. Grampa took us to a new age Mexican place in Florida once and the food, while good, was just a little too healthy. You want some grease and salt with your beans, you know? Mi Ranchito is it.

San Gelato Cafe. I took my kids there during a girls night out sponsored by Sassy Scoops and the Casual Blogger Conference (which starts tonight! in Utah!). It was super-yummy and child-approved, and I’m sad we didn’t wait out the market a little longer and buy in Daybreak.

Memory Mixer. There are a lot of digital scrapbooking options out there. Memory mixer, created by Utah ladies, is the best (easiest, non-proprietary, flexible, affordable) that I’ve tried. I’ll be hosting a giveaway of their software after my electricity fast, if you can wait that long.

Timpanogos Storytelling Festival. It was a dark and stormy night. We love it. The end.

There are a bunch more, like the Back Alley Salon (a little bit ghetto, but way unpretentious!) in American Fork and my neighbor down the street who does hair in her basement. I’m in awe of women like Raw Melissa who does the personal chef thing and the doula thing. While businessy-type things often make me skittish, the whole local-person-you-meet-face-to-face-and-partner-with-to-grow-the-economy thing is conversely very appealing. Local businesses (especially house-cleaning-for-post-partum-mommy-outfits)! Contact me! Or not! Either way!

I have a good friend who has spent most of her life in Utah, and who doesn’t have very fond feelings for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormons), the church I belong to. I know how (unintentionally, I hope) oblivious we can sometimes be to the feelings and preferences of people who don’t belong to our church, especially in Utah, where many or most people do belong to the church. I think that my friend and I get along well because a) we don’t get to see each other very often, so when we do we have other pressing things to talk about and b) I’ve lived in several places where I was the minority, so I understand how she feels.

But today I want to talk about my little brother, and the two-and-a-half-minute address he gave at his high school graduation last Wednesday. I confess that there were a couple moments when I thought that, if my friend Laura had been there, I would have been worried to see how she was reacting to Ryan’s speech. I might also worry how Dick’s family (who are also not Mormons) would have reacted.

You see, Ryan talked about God in his Salutatory remarks. His English teachers, who reviewed all the speeches before they were given, told him to take out the references to God, and when my mom reported this heinous attempt at censorship, I was ready to organize a sit-in and a nurse-in (Spot could pretend) and a march on the school campus. But Ryan’s principal read over his speech and said that it was fine. I didn’t even get to tell Ryan to remember that his nieces would be in the audience and to not let them down. (Also that he is all set to attend BYU, like his four siblings before him, and really, what could those power-hungry demagogues do to him?)

Ryan spoke third, after a nice speech from the Valedictorian and an entertaining piece from his co-Salutatorian (both bright young women). His was pretty standard stuff: remember the lessons of the past, set high end-goals for the future, strive to be happy, and then he quoted from . . . no, not the Book of Mormon, or even the Bible, but from Benjamin Franklin (he also quoted the Scout Oath and Muppet Treasure Island):

I believe in one God, creator of the universe, that he governs by his divine province, that he ought to be worshiped, that the greatest service we can render to him is in doing good to his other children.

and later

That God governs in the Affairs of Men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his Notice, is it probable that an Empire can rise without his Aid?…Our Lives are comparable with the Empire Benjamin Franklin references. He continues, without his concurring Aid, we shall succeed in this political Building no better than the Builders of Babel.

It is often said that terrible things are done in the name of God, and I find myself too often apologizing for being a religious — or “organized religion” — type person. Maybe I don’t apologize verbally, but I wince or wish someone bearing testimony of Christ in a place where I don’t expect that sort of thing — I wish that perhaps they would just do it a little quieter, so that my friends and family who don’t believe as I do won’t think we’re so weird or so fanatical, or so, so irrational as to suppose that there is a Higher Being who concerns Himself with the affairs of the people on this earth and who also at the same time, allows such terrible things to be done in His name.

And here is what I have concluded, and what I hope Ryan has learned, and will continue to learn and practice and preach as he goes on to college and then to serve a mission for our church in a year.

It is right and good to be bold in the faith, for me to be bold in my faith, to proclaim, yes, this is what I believe, and I am not embarrassed to say that I believe in this faith of my youth, more with every passing year, in fact, even if that marks me as hopelessly unsophisticated. But, it is right also to be humble (even uncertain) about our personal righteousness, our individual right-ness, to be meek, and timid about ourselves, and repentant of our shortcomings and sins. Bold about Christ and retiring about Jane. Putting God first and on our sleeves, and not trumpeting our own accomplishments. Concentrating wholly upon the beams in our own eyes rather than the motes in others’.

I think Ryan is learning this, and I wanted to give him a standing ovation, but that felt a little over the top. If nothing else, the people gathered that day to commemorate graduation knew what Ryan believed. He spoke with such conviction, such earnestness that they would remember devotion to this “divine being” along with honor and integrity as they begin their adult lives. Who can argue, even the greatest of atheists cannot argue, I wager, against worship of a God who decrees that the greatest service we can render is “in doing good to his other children.”

I guess I could have figured this out sooner. The first two principles of our religion are faith and repentance. Some are called to call others to repentance. Ryan will be called to do that as a missionary. I hope he remembers to preach faith first, and to never forget his own repentance as he invites others to join him. He will be a wonderful missionary, because he is not afraid, and is not ashamed of Christ.

Ireland

Yesterday we joined my family’s yearly Memorial Day camping pilgrimage. We used to go every year to the cemetery where Aunt Jodi and Uncle Kurt are buried. I’m sure my grandparents and Mom went today. We had insane temper-tantrum kids this morning; sometimes all you can do is strap them in their carseats and turn the radio up really loud. And think to yourself, as you pass the turnoff to the cemetery, that Aunt Jodi would understand, and we’ll try to make it next year.

Washington State

As we drove up the canyon, I kept nagging imploring Dick to look out the window. I pointed out the green fields, and those mountains that are brown ninety percent of the year. I love it when you can see seven different shades of green, from sage to myrtle. Dick said (smug, impatient voice) “I grew up in Washington State. This is nothing. This is crappy.” (I might be exaggerating a tiny bit). So, we are not in Ireland, or even Washington State, but right now, this is as beautiful as Utah ever gets. Enjoy it.

Utah

Top 10 Reasons to Live in Utah

10. Fry Sauce. I heard someone ask a new transplant if they’d gotten “used to” fry sauce yet. What? “Used to”? Fry sauce is to French Fries as hot fudge sauce is to vanilla ice cream. Start with ketchup or barbecue sauce, then throw in some mayo and maybe go wild with a drop or two of liquid smoke (only on the ketchup-based one, I’d think). Or I could send you Some Dude’s Fry Sauce.

9. Caffeine-free Mountain Dew (C-F MD). I was extolling the virtues of C-F MD to a new transplant (see above) and other Utahns chimed in to say, “What’s the point of that?” Which is a valid concern. Mountain Dew is glorious for its efficient caffeine-delivery system. Yet there are times (late at night, say), when a caffeine-free version is preferable. Oh, said my new friends, That’s what beer is for. But since A) beer is not an option for me and B) I don’t believe you get a sugar high from beer, I just don’t think it would be the same.

8. Dooce. Everyday trips to the grocery store for edamame are exponentially enlivened by the possibility of running into a mom who, though she acts as though having one kid is as hard as having a million, or, say, three, gets that letting your daughter watch Cinderella seven times in a row is completely healthy. (I have no idea what Edamame is).

7. Grandparental babysitters. So Dick and I can go enjoy nature.

Taken just last week 10 years ago.

6. Young-skewing population growth. I could probably have a playdate every single day for my girls, if I were so masochistically-inclined.

5. Utah Geek Bloggers group. There were probably geeks and/or bloggers in the other places we lived, but I didn’t meet them, and I doubt any of them could be any nicer than those we’ve met here. Laura Moncur is one of the nicest people I’ve ever met, but that’s another story. I love talking with blogger people, even if they are “getting used” to fry sauce and think that beer could ever substitute for Mountain Dew.

4. Speaking of beer, Rootbeer on tap almost everywhere. If I ever won the lottery, I’d have a soda fountain installed in my family room with Coke — Mountain Dew — Cranberry Ginger Ale — Mug Rootbeer — Sprite (for the kids) — Caffeine-Free Mountain Dew — Apple Slice — Code Red Mountain Dew — Squirt. Not that I like carbonated beverages or anything. Do you know what a can of Coke can do to a rusty nail in four seconds?

3. Grandparents who like to babysit.

2. National Parks and Monuments. Sure, the Great Salt Lake may be pretty shallow, and salty, but Utah is gorgeous. I went on a week-long survival trip to Southern Utah as a senior in high school. I don’t know that it changed my life, but I’d spend time in Escalante National Monument any day.

Calf Creek

1. It’s where some of our dead are buried, even if our living childrens sometime prevent us from visiting them or otherwise living normal lives.

It’s fortunate that we have found something even better than seatbelts for containment.

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I’ve linked this to We are THAT Family’s ‘Fro me to you. Thought my Snow White/Superman photo was humiliating enough to qualify!

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