Utah in the fall. Who knew?

As I mentioned in my last post, my cousin Keith’s wedding wasn’t until 4 pm Saturday afternoon. The nature around us was so magnificent that we couldn’t bear to stay indoors, so on Saturday morning my siblings, some of my cousins, and two of my uncles went on a hike that Ben had found using his magical Ben powers. It was just…beyond breathtaking. Utah in the fall. Who knew?

“Which would you rather do, skydive or scuba dive?” Uncle Fred asked us as we gazed out over the lovely little lake at the end of the hike.

“Here’s what you do,” Matt said. “You put on full scuba gear, and then a parachute, and you skydive out of a plane and into water and then you scuba dive.”

“I’ve always wanted to scuba dive,” I said, “but I have absolutely zero desire to sky dive.”

“I’d rather skydive,” said my cousin Austin. “When you scuba dive there are a lot of different things that could kill you, but when you skydive there’s only one thing that could kill you.”

“I don’t know about that. You could die by crashing into a large bird,” one of my relatives chimed in.

But wait! Couldn’t crashing into a bird help break your fall, if your parachute didn’t open? What if you grabbed onto it? Matt and Uncle Fred began to discuss this in earnest. I don’t know what conclusion they reached. I stopped listening when they began to calculate landing angles.

By the time we got home we were late for lunch, which was unfortunate because we were also celebrating my Grandpa’s 101st birthday. He won’t turn 101 until November 26, but as the family was already gathered, we decided to celebrate early.

Those of us who were late ate our lunch, and then we brought out the cake and sang “Happy Birthday.” Grandpa stood up to make a speech.

“Around 30 years ago, the doctor told me that I had a stomach ulcer,” he said. “After that I had to watch what I ate, and make sure I didn’t eat too much, or else my ulcer would act up. I think that’s why I have lived so long.”

He said more than that, but that was the gist of it. It was a bit disheartening to those of us who were preparing to gorge ourselves on birthday cake.

4 pm rolled around eventually. The house was a bevy of activity as we showered, ironed shirts, combed hair, put on pantyhose, and did all the usual pre-wedding prep. Matt drove some of my siblings in his rental car, and the rest of us piled into the minivan with our parents and Grandpa.

As for the wedding itself, well, I suppose I’ll get to that part of the story tomorrow.