FAMILY TRUMPS ALL...

 

                                      A  FAMILY

About 20 years ago when I pulled up my schedule for September flying with United Airlines, I saw that I had been assigned eight days of vacation and had no vacation plans.  So, I decided to visit with each of my kids individually for a few hours (just one on one with me without their spouse or children) in the hopes that maybe I could get reacquainted with the people whose lives I used to be in the middle of on a daily basis for so many years while they were growing up.  Truthfully, I could no longer remember stuff such as who liked peas and who didn’t and what each person’s favorite Nichols Family activity was.  In spite of the fact some of the conversations took a more serious turn, I looked back on the whole experience as a satisfying one.  I liked it and had fun with each one of my kids.

 The next year I decided to PLAN my vacation time and do the whole “one on one” visit thing all over again.  Only that time I prepared some questions I thought might lead us into conversations which weren’t as superficial as “What is your favorite color and food now that you’re grown?” Though some of that information popped out, too, when I asked questions like, "What was most surprising for you when you became a parent?" and "What are some of your accomplishments you are really proud of?"  

Once again, I was not disappointed.  In fact, I came away from each experience thinking to myself we had some really great discussions about a variety of topics.  Best of all I was reminded of the terrific person each of my children is.  I spent a fair amount of time pondering the moot question “What in the world did I do to have the privilege of being the mother of the Nichols Kids?"  Whatever it was, I was so very glad we belonged to each other. 

In spite of the fact I heard later that the “one on one” with ”probing” questions made a couple of my kids uncomfortable because they saw it as a quiz about their life instead of a genuine interest in who they had become, I still think fondly on those two vacations when I purposely spent intentional time with each of them. 

Sure, the lunch or dinner, or the visit to my grandmother's tiny little town, or the shopping trip or just sitting on a bench outside the temple after a session were fun.  It varied with the kid I was with.  But it was just the "being" with them that made it special for me.  I loved them.  I loved being with them.

This September 2025 is the 30th anniversary of a Proclamation about the family which the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints published for the world.  It teaches about family, marriage, and gender, and their part in the kingdom of Heavenly Father.  "The family is central to the creator's plan for the eternal destiny of His children."

Family is one of the words that matter in this document.  It says we have a responsibility to love and care for each other.  And that includes our parents in one direction and our children in the other direction. We supported and cared for each other.  We celebrated birthdays, baptisms, weddings, graduations, mission calls, marriages, and many other things.  We as a family are there for each other!   

I continue to marvel at how well my children grew into their adult roles, providing for and nurturing their own families and friends along the way. 

But most of all, I appreciate each of them for their acceptance of me no matter what, even though I made a lot of blunders as a parent along the way—and still do even though I am staring my 80^th birthday in the face.

I once read that Denzel Washington said, “We’re all destined to leave some kind of mark in this world.  Sometimes we may miss that mark, but with a push in the right direction from time to time, we can set a positive example for others to follow.”  He continued, “We’re all extraordinary, in our own way, and that it’s what we do with our extraordinariness that sets us apart and makes all the difference.”

I believe Denzel Washington’s comments reflect how I feel about each one of my children.  Each in his/her own way is an example to me of some unique trait that is worth emulation. But that’s what families are for...to teach and to learn from each other.

And, I am glad we are in the same family--forever!

HOMEMADE KITCHEN DISASTER

 

If we want to talk about a kitchen disaster that could have had more serious consequences than it did, I would need to tell this experience.

When we lived in our first house, we still had only one car which my husband always took to work. So, the family either walked, rode our bikes, or didn’t go places or do things unless they were within walking or biking distance.

One day I was fixing supper and must have needed something at the store. And for some strange reason, the car was home in the garage. Perhaps my husband was on a business trip. I don’t remember.

And because I needed to steam the potatoes in the pressure cooker, which took less than 30 minutes, I figured we could jump into the car, buzz up the road to the brand-new King Soopers store, get the item, and be back before the potatoes were ready. No wasted time. I hurriedly put our little family into the car—and we were off.

However, to my horror, when we came down the steep hill and turned the corner to our home, there was smoke coming out of the house and a fire truck was there putting out a cooking fire in the kitchen. A fire that had begun when, for some reason the rubber gasket on the lid of the steamer didn’t seal causing the scant water in the pot to evaporate.

What a mess! In spite of the fact the firemen tried to do as little damage as they could to put out the fire, it was still awful. Though our insurance company paid the claim, it didn’t pay for someone to clean up the water bath and blackened paint on the walls. That took a lot of elbow grease to clean up! And it was MY elbow grease….

Lesson learned: NEVER, EVER leave the house when something is cooking on the stove! Anything could go wrong. Because the odds are it will!

Now, if we are talking about COOKING disasters, there are plenty of those in my lifetime, too. In fact, I hate cooking. The failure rate is way too high when I am the person doing the cooking.

Here’s just ONE experience of a major kitchen disaster:

Alexander* and I are two peas in a pod.  Some days are nothing but terrible, horrible, no good, very bad days.

Last Thursday was one of them. (January 2021)

I told my husband Louis not to eat before I got home after practicing the organ at the chapel following the religious education class I teach for high school students.  (He had gone to Seminary with me that morning to play a video during the lesson.) I told him I was in the mood for a REAL breakfast, and I was going to fix an omelet, bacon, muffins, and some cottage potatoes.  He liked the idea of a good breakfast.  Me?  I could hardly wait to get home and start cooking!  Yum!

But…I haven’t practiced culinary skills for a long time (nuking something in the microwave doesn’t qualify) and everything went wrong.  Well, almost.  The orange juice and milk were okay.

I got a terrific set of pans for my wedding 52 years ago.  They are heavy cast aluminum, but over the years the bottoms got warped from all the heat from the burners.  When that happened, my first husband Ross would take the pans out to the garage and hold a blow torch on them until he was able to pound out the bottoms for a flat cooking surface once again.  Voila!  Just like new.

Only, Ross has been gone for a long time, and Louis doesn’t do that kind of thing. Instead, he constantly asked me to get rid of the set and buy a completely new set.  One year for Christmas Louis even gave me a complete Rachel Ray set.  But I know HOW to cook with the ones I have. That new set was too fancy.  Expensive.  And I told him that if we were cooking for eight people every day like I used to, it would be worth getting a new set.  But not now.  It is way too late in the game for the upgrade.  I returned the pans to get a gift I could really use.

After that and a few more pointed suggestions that we get new pans, Louis got tired of my negative answers to his pleas. About three years ago he went out and bought two heavy—and I do mean HEAVY—cast iron skillets, because he saw a recipe online and decided to start cooking.  The pans were both too large and too small for the kind of preparation we do for two people.  And too heavy for me to handle.  My aging body just cannot pick up that kind of weight anymore.  Plus, Louis’ desire to cook lasted for only one or two meals.  Then nothing.

Louis got the same “cooking bug” again a few weeks ago.  This time, he went out and bought two frying pans—also odd sizes for our needs—but at least I could handle them.  

So, that morning when I got home the cooking adventure began.  I prepared the muffins first.  Easy, peasy and put them into the oven.  The omelet and potatoes could cook while the muffins were baking.  However, I wasn’t used to using these new pans, and I underestimated how fast and hot they prepared the food.

             The next thing I knew, the potatoes were scorched!  While trying to turn them over and eliminate the tainted ones, I began to smell an awful burning odor.  YUP!  The omelet—completely charred on the bottom and the top still a really runny egg mixture—was a disaster.  There was NO saving anything from that—though I did try to scrape char off the bottom and cook the rest of the eggs.  Didn’t work out.  What a surprise, huh?

The bell dinged for the muffins but, because I wanted to eat them HOT, I just turned off the oven and left them in for a couple more minutes while I wrestled with the burnt food on the stove top. 

By this time, I was screaming bloody murder stuff like, “No wonder I hate to cook!  The failure rate with me is too high, and I don’t LIKE to cook anyway.”  Louis heard the commotion and came into the kitchen offering to take over and prepare a completely new omelet for the two of us.  That made me even madder! I told him I wouldn’t eat it, so not to cook anything for me, and I flounced out of the house.  But not before I took the muffins out of the oven.  By then they weren’t burnt, but way too dry.  I didn’t care and took one with me.

Got into the car and backed out of the driveway….but there was no place to go.  No one to go visit.  No store where I needed to purchase anything. Nothing to do.  I had already practiced the organ that morning. Nothing.  I ended up sitting in the church parking lot and tried to read on my smart phone.  Couldn’t even focus on that!  So, I just sat there until the huff was finally over and then I drove home.  

Louis had indeed fixed a new omelet and salvaged enough potatoes for his meal.  He had prepared the bacon, too.  Then he ate and cleaned up the dishes and the kitchen.  By the time I walked in, it looked like no major crisis had happened at all.

I don’t remember what else I did that day.  Probably NOTHING that could have been considered great, since I was so over the top enraged about my cooking skills.  But you can be sure I more than likely thought the whole day was a piece of junk.  

Ah, yes!  Alexander and I could have been twins on that crazy morning.  Nothing worthwhile came my way the rest of that day, I’m sure.  My attitude killed it all.  

Some days are nothing but terrible, horrible, no good, very bad days.  That was one of them!

Welcome to my world, Alexander!

*Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day is a children’s book written by Judith Viorst and illustrated by Ray Cruz. It won several awards during the 70’s and was a Reading Rainbow book. Alexander and I could have been twins!