Hearing a loud knock, Roy Austin, 21, opened the door of his line shack, surprised to have a visitor that far from town. Before he could make out his visitor’s face, he could smell whiskey, a smell that made his stomach churn.
“Hello, son.” His dad swayed from side-to-side. “Long time no see. Do you have any grub?”

Father’s Day 2025: “You seeing this?”
A photo of smoke and flames shooting up from Westwater accompanied Terri Winder’s terse message.
I hurried onto our balcony where I could see the flames, dense smoke, fire trucks, and law enforcement vehicles in Westwater. The fire had apparently started in the canyon west of Center Street, a little north of where Kenidee and I walk every day.

I scrutinized the wide-angle, black-and-white photograph taken inside the Phelps Dodge Mercantile in Dawson, NM, circa early 1900s.
The ceiling, supported by massive pillars, was probably 20 feet high with long windows lighting the spacious building and electric lights hanging from chains every few feet.

“If I can turn the wheels enough,” my hubby said, “we’ll go down backwards instead of sideways. If we go down sideways, we’ll roll.”
Still out of breath from struggling up the muddy embankment, Ted hoisted himself, mud and all, into the driver’s seat of our new-to-us Toyota 4-Runner, which perched perilously close to the edge of a steep embankment.
He added, “We should say a prayer.”

Soon
by Sandra Skouson
I will travel
slower than the dune
and let the blue-black beetle
leave her lacy tracks
in cool still
waves across my skin.
That day
I will lie in the sun
and hear
the warm wind’s
welcome to the sand.
Grain by grain
I will abandon
the groping cottonwood
And never mourn the shade.
Once I will rise wildly

“I am His Child
Made with His Love
And it is enough to
Bring me to my knees
He’s reaching down
And I’m reaching up
And somehow I feel
the Maker’s Touch”
– Jenny Phillips, “The Maker’s Touch”
The trail sloping up toward a huge sandstone arch was rocky and dry. Ted, Kenidee, and I were hiking in an area called Behind the Rocks in San Juan County west of the Moab Rim.

“Was it worth it?” Ted asked as we looked up at the Supernova Pictograph in Chaco Canyon.

Love came down at Christmas, / Love all lovely, love divine;/ Love was born at Christmas, / Stars and angels gave the sign. Christina Georgina Rosetti
“We didn’t find what we were looking for,” my hubby said as we headed back toward I-70, “but we did find what we weren’t looking for.”

Wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving. – Kahlil Gibran
The road was snowy, and the temperature 21 degrees. We were on the north side of Elk Ridge, trying to get into Beef Basin by way of Indian Creek.

If you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man’s hunger.
– Kahlil Gibran
I always wanted to look like my mom’s mom, at least a little, but I resemble my great-grandmother Myrtle Mirah Mell, by a whopping 81 percent, or so FamilySearch says when I do the “Compare a Face” activity.

“The secret of change is to focus all of your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new.” ~ Socrates
After our long detour to Valemount, British Columbia, we packed up the next morning and headed for Prince George, where we had an appointment to have our 4-Runner serviced.

My aunt Helen, age 90, is a prayer warrior. You’d never know it by looking at her. She’s hunched with age, has short, sandy-colored hair, a long, narrow face, and what she describes as Bugs Bunny teeth. But make no mistake, she packs power in her slender frame.

In the spring, we traveled to the Kanab area, trailering our ATV behind. Our destination? A campground somewhere near the Coral Pink Sand Dunes State Park where we planned to meet our daughter and her husband. Since we arrived hours before they did, we pulled into the park where ATV’s, sandboarders, and sand skaters zipped down the tangerine-colored dunes and circled around islands of ponderosas. The landscape was beautiful and surreal.

“Pray to have eyes to see God’s hand in your life and in the world around you. Ask Him to tell you if He is really there—if He knows you. Ask Him how He feels about you. And then listen.” – President Russell M. Nelson

Families packed the San Juan High School auditorium, ranging all the way from babies to grandparents.
A cacophony of sounds rose as friends chatted, babies cried, and young ones ran up and down the aisles until their parents corralled them. The lights blinked, dimmed, and a spotlight focused on the play’s greeter. A hush fell as we all settled into our seats.