Sunday, March 29, 2009

A new addition

What a miracle the birth of a baby is! We are very, very happy to welcome Silas into our family and are grateful for the answer to our many prayers in his and Lindsey's behalf (oh, okay, and Dustin too!).

Silas - Origin and Meaning of the name
(from www.babynamespedia.com)

The boy name Silas is pronounced as SAYLahS. Silas is used predominantly in the English language and its origin is Latin. Biblical name derived from the element 'silva' which means wood, forest. Silouanus (Old Greek), Silvanus (Latin), and Silvianus (Latin) are old forms of Silas. The name was originally used as a nickname for someone living in the woods, or else someone whose job involved working with wood. The name appeared in Roman mythology as Silvanus, the spirit or god of the trees. In the Bible, it was borne by a prophet and companion of the apostle Paul and Timothy. The name was also borne by several early saints, and was adopted by English Puritans in the 17th century. In literature, the name appeared as the miserly weaver in the George Eliot novel Silas Marner (1861), and as the villian in the Sheridan Le Fanu novel Uncle Silas (1864). The name Silvana (German and Italian) is the female version of Silas.

Popularity of SILAS as a boy's name in United States
(from www.babynamefacts.com)

Year - Rank
2007 - 346th
2006 - 373rd
2005 - 412th

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

An "L" of a birthday*

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears! March 19 is Brenda’s birthday, a significant one in that it ends in a zero. Some weeks ago Brenda mentioned to me that she has never in her life had a birthday party with invited guests just for her. She’s been part of many birthday parties for our kids when they invited guests. And we have had family birthday parties to celebrate Brenda’s birthday. But apparently neither as a child nor in our marriage has she enjoyed a “real” party of her own.

I thought about organizing a surprise party to celebrate Brenda’s birthday. But her birthday falls during Spring break and many of the friends I would invite are out of town. So I decided instead to invite church members, friends, and acquaintances from former times and places to join me in wishing Brenda a Happy Birthday by phone call, text message, or e-mail. I printed copies of a little card I handed out to people in church inviting them to contact Brenda. I also e-mailed many people in my address book with the same invitation. Brenda is not aware, I think, that I have gone to this effort. It will be fun to see how many people take part.

Already some birthday cards have arrived in the mail. Brenda was a little puzzled to receive a card from one woman she hardly knows. I was relieved to see that the note accompanying the card did not let the cat out of the bag.

Tonight I will need to be a little sneaky to charge Brenda’s cell phone without her knowing I am doing so. And tomorrow I will have to come up with some excuse to keep her at home so those trying to call Brenda can reach her.

Happy Birthday, Brenda. I love you.

* Think Roman numeral L

Monday, March 09, 2009

Dickens: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times;"

Here are a couple of observations I noted in a recent economic report:

US employment numbers dropped by 651,000 jobs in February, nearly equaling the monthly declines in December and January. The national unemployment rate rose from 7.6% to 8.1%, the highest since 1983.

I finished graduate school in 1983 during a significant recession. It was very difficult to find full-time employment at that time. In fact, because I could not find work I accepted a position as a summer intern while I continued to search for a “real” job. I felt a heavy responsibility to provide for my wife and three little children and was very concerned that I might not be able to find work by summer’s end. So how did I get a job?

My manager was responsible not only for Human Resources (my educational background), but also for Corporate Services, which included all the buildings and office cubicles. Several office moves were scheduled for the summer months and I did whatever I could to help out. So instead of doing what I was educated to do, I helped plan and organize office moves. This was “down and dirty” work, often involved working late and on weekends to help with the moves when people were away from the building. Instead of working with the white collar professionals in the company, I worked in the trenches with the maintenance workers, office construction staff, and moving company staff. I think when my manager saw my willingness to pitch in and help with whatever was necessary, she decided I was worth keeping. I ended the summer with the offer of a full-time position.

The United States, China, and many countries in Europe have enacted economic stimulus packages, with the U.S. and Chinese packages proportionately larger than the European packages. Little impact will be felt before late 2009; most of the impact will appear in 2010.

Today I think it is necessary to adopt a strategy to “ride out” the recession. It seems clear that a recovery will take some time to occur. That said, I am confident that we will see better times again. During difficult times, we can all fall victim to two extremes of thought. We can mistakenly think that good times will always continue and not have a backup plan or build a safety net. I think this is what we have witnessed during much of the last thirty years. The prophets have been very clear that we should be prepared for emergencies, including loss of employment and reduction of income. Conversely, during bad times we can conclude that the future will always be bleak. Such catastrophic thinking may destroy hope that better days will come. Both extremes can cause us to make short-term decisions that have poor long-term consequences.

Life tends to follow a roller-coaster pattern, with recurring highs and lows. I once heard a speaker say that as adults our lives would likely move in and out of crisis every three months or so. At the time I thought his comment was extreme. I no longer think so. I can think of no generation that has not had serious challenges and struggles. Certainly the pioneers faced difficulties we can only imagine. Within the last hundred years the world has experienced two great world wars and countless smaller wars. Some lethal diseases, now rare, were once commonplace. And economies have fluctuated over and over again. So what we are experiencing to day, though it may be different in degree, is certainly not different in kind from what many others have seen. We have no reason to expect a life without challenge and turmoil. But that doesn’t mean we won’t be happy and experience joy in life. With patience, preparation, persistence and prayer we can – and will – weather the problems we face. “Therefore, let your hearts be comforted; for all things shall work together for good to them that walk uprightly … (D&C 100: 15)

Friday, March 06, 2009

My nickname in grade school ... and Book of Mormon nicknames?

When I was a boy there was a fast food hamburger chain in Salt Lake City called Dee's Hamburgers. Long before McDonald's came to Utah, the advertising image of this outlet was a clown. If the clown had a name, I was unaware of it; everyone knew it as the Dee Burger Clown. I was the only student in school named Dee. And guess what my nickname was? Yes, I was known far and wide as the Dee Burger Clown.


Today going for a hamburger is practically an everyday occurrence. In the late 1950s and early 1960s it was still a big deal to go for burgers. This photo of the Dee Burger Clown shows a price of 28 cents for a hamburger, but I can remember when I was in graduate school in the early 1980s there would occasionally be specials for 19 cents (Mom and I would enjoy a night out for fine dining!) and on a rare Friday the 13th the special promotion would be hamburgers for 13 cents.

I can still remember the advertising jingle that played so often on the radio: "Let's all go to Dee's ... Let's all go to Dee's ... That's what Daddy says and the family all agrees. Dee's!" Okay, so it was in the days before women's rights and gender equality.

Eventually this chain was sold to Hardee's and the cherished Dee Burger Clown disappeared. My nickname hung on through high school, though, as the memory of Dee's Hamburgers was indelibly impressed in the memory of many people. Interestingly, the chain had an outlet in South Africa as some entrepreneur from Utah (a returned missionary, perhaps?) tried an early international expansion. Apparently this was the first experiment at a fast food outlet in that country (see Wikipedia for more details). The next photo shows what must have been the eventual fate of all the Dee Burger clowns (sigh) -- except me.


Based on my not altogether pleasant experience with this nickname, when Mom and I had children we tried very hard to choose names that we thought would not lend themselves to terrible nicknames. Try as we might, though, various nicknames took root and flourished. Ben became known early on as BJ. Lisa was called Weesa and later as Chunga (ask her). Brian became Briney when one of the younger girls couldn't quite master the correct pronunciation. Laura was Oreo for a time when Lindsey couldn't say the letter L properly. Later she was Lorp or Lorpie, and I believe eventually Autumn tagged her with Woe-wee. And Lindsey will forever be known as Cheekers (ask Laura for the de-"tail" on this one ... pardon the pun). I've undoubtedly overlooked or forgotten many other nicknames; perhaps everyone can add to the list I've started here.

In the back of some editions of the Book of Mormon is a pronunciation guide to the names found in the manuscript. What I would really like to see is a list of their nicknames! During my childhood Nephi might have been known as Pop (because of the Nephi soda sold at that time). Laman would undoubtedly have been Lame-man. Perhaps Lemuel would have been called Lemur (a cousin to a weasel?). We already know from John Bytheway that Shiblon was dubbed Shibby (ugh!). And it is for a good reason that the brother of Jared was known by that substitute for his real name ... but I bet he had a nickname, too. Too bad it was so difficult to engrave on the metal plates. Or maybe the nicknames are in the sealed portion of the plates!

Thursday, March 05, 2009

100 and counting

In trying to decide the topic for my 100th blog entry, I have been considering themes that have to do with the number one hundred … century … Roman numeral C … and so on. When I thought about the number one hundred as ten squared, I was reminded of my grandparents who, coincidentally, each had ten children.

On the Oviatt side are three sons (Volmer, LuDean, Arden) and seven daughters (Vea, Grace, Agnes, Elva, Lois, Marva, Sally).

  • Volmer lives in Price, Utah. He was involved in fierce fighting in WWII, but I never heard him mention anything about his war experiences. We would stop occasionally on the way to visit our grandparents to see him and Aunt Rita, who is now gone.
  • LuDean and his wife Connie lived in California and we did not know him very well. The only time I remember seeing LuDean was at the Oviatt family reunion. They are both gone now.
  • My dad, who died in 1976 a month after turning 44 years old, was the first of his siblings to pass away. He is buried next to his parents in the Elmo cemetery.
  • Vea and her husband Leo Sabey lived in Midvale, less than a mile from the house we lived in from 1963 or 1964 to 1966. Uncle Leo was the manager of the Utah-Idaho sugar factory where both my parents worked for a time. Both are deceased.
  • Grace and her husband Albert Rodgers lived in Salt Lake City. Grace was famous for the wonderful caramels she made for Christmas gifts. Her boys sold us a gasoline powered go-kart we loved driving up and own our lane. Both are gone now.
  • Agnes lives with her son in Elmo. Even though she doesn’t see very well, she does intricate beadwork and has sent me a number of bead animals as gifts. Aunt Agnes lost a son in a coal mining accident. His body was never recovered.
  • Sisters Elva and Lois married brothers Ted and Bill Jensen. We frequently visited Bill and Lois, who had children my age, but seldom visited Ted and Elva, whose children were older. You have heard me talk about visiting Aunt Lois’ farm and sledding down a snow-covered hill onto the roof of a shed. The first time I saw a goat slaughtered was at Uncle Bill’s house. Only Uncle Ted is still living.
  • Marva Dawn and her husband Clifford Jones lived in Othello, Washington. I spent the summer of 1966 living with them and working on their farm. What an impact they had in my life and on my activity in the church! Marva still lives in Washington; Uncle Clifford is gone.
  • Sally and her husband Dan Russ lived in Cheyenne, Wyoming. My earliest memory of Aunt Sally is seeing her in uniform (Air Force). While we didn’t visit her and Russ when I was younger, I have enjoyed visiting her as an adult. Pray for Aunt Sally as she recovers from double knee replacement surgery!

On the Allen side are five sons (Jim, Lynn, Hugh, Bob, Dean) and five daughters (Reva, Zelma, Melba, Loretta Mae, Rolene).

  • Jim and his first wife, Connie, lived in California, where he had served in the Navy. After her death several years ago, he moved to Ferron, Utah and remarried (Dorothy). I have very few memories of Jim when I was young because he had already left home.
  • Lynn is living in Colorado. Upon returning from his mission, he stayed with our family in Midvale for a short time while he was looking for a job. His first wife, Betty, died and I know little about his current situation.
  • Hugh and his wife Carol lived in Grantsville, Utah. Hugh was terribly injured in an avalanche on a Boy Scout activity and nearly died. He also nearly lost his leg and had a very prolonged recovery. He finally passed away at a very young age of heart failure, no doubt hastened by his severe injury. I can remember Hugh digging out a basement under his house in Grantsville while he lived in the house. I never understood how the house didn’t fall in on him. Aunt Carol remarried and lives in Utah.
  • Bob and his wife Earlene live in Orangeville, Utah. I worked for a brief period with Uncle Bob while on break from college classes. Bob saved my life one time by not killing me when I painted a house he was finishing the wrong color because I couldn’t tell the difference in the shades of the interior and exterior paint. Aunt Earlene made it possible for Mom and me to go to Mexico and Jamaica by watching our five children while we were gone (we didn’t trust anyone else with our kids!). Remember eating “dirt and worms?”
  • Dean and his wife Connie live in Clawson, Utah. Dean went through the Salt Lake Temple with me as I prepared to leave for the mission field. I’m lucky this wasn’t work for the dead because of an earlier time when I was with him in a car he was driving and decided to show me what it was like to go 100 miles per hour on a country road!
  • Aunt Reva and her husband Norman lived in Lawrence, Utah. Aunt Reva was already married when I remember visiting with my Allen grandparents. But we enjoyed many visits to her farm, especially at lambing time when we got to help feed the bummer lambs with large glass bottles full of milk. Uncle Norman is gone now.
  • Zelma and her husband Jack Minchey live in Grantsville, Utah. We were frequent visitors at their home when I was growing up. One time I got into big trouble because I used my new tape recorder to secretly capture a conversation between my parents and Jack and Zelma. I have no idea what they were discussing. I remember that I was forced to erase the tape!
  • Mom was responsible for purchasing the house in South Jordan where our family lived from 1966 until she moved recently. My father thought the $110/month payment for a house costing $20,000 was beyond their means and wanted to move into a more modest place (a dump close to a bar). But Mom held her ground – a wonderful decision for us kids!
  • I never met Loretta Mae. When Grandmother Allen was pregnant, she slipped during a trip to the mountains and fell on her stomach. Loretta Mae was born disabled and eventually was placed in what was formerly called the American Fork Training School because of the care she needed for her severe disabilities. Coincidentally, she died shortly after my Grandfather Allen passed away in 1974.
  • Rolene and her husband Gale Rasmussen live in Vernal, Utah. When I was a child Rolene visited with us and taught me how to dunk for quarters. On the Fourth of July holiday, one activity for the kids involved a big wash tub filled with water with coins scattered in the bottom. We were allowed to keep as many as we could pick up using only our mouths (no hands!). Thanks to Aunt Rolene, I became very good at this and got more than my fair share of extra spending money. Rolene has served as a Justice of the Peace in Vernal.

Not many people are so fortunate as to have twenty aunts and uncles (even more counting their spouses!).