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Show Obltuarle. Ststc IjOCAL F2 F3 F4 Opinions EDITOR: ERIC RUTAR Fl THE DAILY HERALD SUNDAY, JULY 2(1. IW I;, If r-- ; ' Mike Patrick -9 Of newts and hits: 4 This is a fine time just to remember i f -- l.MW - to i- - : V.'! V L Tl J April 1,500 miles away would like to hear. Weather's nice except for a tornado warning. Kids are nice except for one; he's a turd but nobody pays much attention to him. ' Dad's job is nice and the house is nice and Mom is, well, nice. Love you so much and miss you so much, Grandma, it said. Mom put on a PS. to explain that even though the weather was rotten and the people a little backward and her husband's job a pain and their bulldozyoungest son, a er, rolled out of control down a hill toward the lake but was rescued by Dad and didn't even cry, life was still pretty good. It would be good anywhere, so long as we were together. SCHOOL WAS school. It was better than the dentist's office, but not much. At least with the dentist, you had fun eating the junk that landed you in the chair. So it was something of a surprise to all who knew him when the seventh grader brought home an invitation to the middle school's honors assembly. : Must be a mistake, they said. No, the boy answered, he was sure he was supposed to be there; just didn't know why. I So when the big night came and the programs were handed out, sure enough, his name was there with a handful of other gifted young actors and actresses. And nobody clapped louder for him than his older brother, who once played an extra on "Father Murphy" and got to touch a rubber cake that Merlin Olsen used in a birthday prank. ; THE BALL whistled as it sailed, cjearing the iron fence around the apartment complex by a good inch or two. The slugger, all 40 pounds of him, touched 'em all: the pine tree first second base, the blase, the and the flatthird base, fjace post tened milk carton home plate. He stomped on home, too, arms raised in triumph. J My little boy was smiling and crying. After a thousand cuts, he'd finally hit his first whiffle ball homer, and just like that, he ran smack-da- b into the realization that precious moments like these fly over fence too soon. But thank God, the memories dpn't. ;; And that's why, as my sons both tflrn a year older this week, youH see me smiling. Crying, too. ; te 'Mike Patrick is managing editor of fhe Daily Herald. COPY v; cm ? Jv ' . . ' . i ' v. j FRKD MC(illRKmie Daily Hcral.l The long haul: From left, Jim Catano, Eric Hyde, Rick Moody and Larry Peel clean dump a load of trash that the Grandview Fifth Ward had collected during their activity. fc,, . It was a message to grandma from her grandson. It elaborated on the child's move te a small town in the Midwest, and iiaaid all the things a grandma r ) marching to morning prayers. Hunched and humble, he was playing a game. ; Not so. On closer inspection, the boy was cradling a dead pet, his beloved newt. This was a solemn funeral procession of one to the burial ground beneath his bedroom window. . Tearfully, he explained that he wanted his dear newt as close to him as possible. I Without having to smell it. ; L984. i i He looked like a little monk .:THE LETTER was dated X t h ... ;.: jr. : V spurns 5 ,! ; A- ,- .,.. ; ' '"' t - i; ' "6 By ALEXANDER STOCKS In Greece Saturday, congregations of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-da- y Saints cleaned up litter at Mars Hill and the : j The Daily Herald . PROVO i ' .; t" - FRK.D MCUIIIREThe Daily Mcr iM little off the top: Above, Rachel Rawle, 8, of Spanish Fork, prunes a rose bush at a park in Spanish Fork with a little help from her mother, Sandy. Below, Gary Stone, of Provo, vaccuums out one of the old cabins at the pioneer museum on 500 West in Provo. A Acropolis. Closer to home, in Seneca, Md., church members organized clothing drives to bene- i rnT,..'.-,' ' .j .;. t , WiiWMt Willi m ..u.fc... -- mv-t ' fit an Interfaith Clothing I. r Center. At the same time, in another state, several miles of the Ohio River shoreline were being cleaned by church members in Cincinnati. All over Germany and in ,1'.B-"'' Switzerland, handmade quilts were being donated to orphan' ' ll!--.',ages and children's hospitals, .. nl in ii.ia irrii and in neighboring Austria, ii..... .. ... t MATTHEW R. SMITHThe Daily Herald saints joined forces with an known as Helping out: Dean Pitts cuts a organizations while Michael Powell, "Shalom" to renovate Jewish and Matt Powell, 6, hold the board at a ser-Pitts, 5, left, . ' 4 v mi iti : if j """"" -' v " .... I s...t'-... : li.-jiVf-- : ,, ii two-by-fo- Cody See SERVICE, F3 vice project in 7, American Fork. sisters talk, sing their way along trail 3 By PAT CHRISTIAN The Daily Herald SPRINGVILLE "Pioneer children they sang as they walked and walked and walked and walked." LDS children often sing these lines from a Primary song at church. all But three sisters grandmothers in their 50s who pulled a handcart along the Mormon Pioneer Trail found themselves singing those lyrics to ease the miles and the pain of traveling the trail. "We sang and talked our way down the road," said Dianne Smith of Springville. Dianne said one of her sisters, Becky Mitchell of Logan, arranged for her and another sister, Susan Montgomery of Aurora, Colo., to spend a week pulling a handcart on the trail. Joining wagons and hand ijMiM-- carts, the trio met near the near the NebraskaWyoming border and traveled with hundreds of others who are retracing the Mormon exodus from Illinois to Utah. " old Fort Laramie V Childhood memories Dianne said her sisters are close in spirit but lire miles apart. Along the Mormon Trail, they began to bond. And sometimes, they say, they saw the girls of their youth in each other. "When we were small, I used to sleep in the top bunk. Becky would sleep in the bottom and we would gibber and gibber until Dad would finally yell for us to stop it and go to sleep." Something similar happened in camp one night. "In the tent, Becky and I were just eight inches apart from each other talking and o d -- Of. s V DIANNE SMiTHCounesy pholo talked and talked and ... From left, sisters Becky Mitchell, Dianne Smith and Susan Montgomery take a rest from the rigors of the Mormon Trail during their recent travels along the pioneer trek. The sisters say talking and singing helped the hours of walking to pass more quickly. They talking for a long time. Finally, we heard a man yell from a nearby tent, 'It's after 11; could you keep it down, please?" Braiding hair Becky remembers watch- ing Dianne braiding Susan's hair on the trek and thinking how much it looked like a scene from their youth. Much of their talk focused on their ancestors who had See SISTERS, F3 |