Reliquary Nest

Remembering her song...

Vay Anna Price Hooper

April 13, 1930 Wales, Utah
June 12, 1980 Yukon Territory, Canada

Bittersweet Memorial

Inside of bible signed by Mr Richard Price Jr, Wales Utah, April 16, 1900

Yesterday I had the pleasure of visiting with an elderly aunt. She is my mothers last surviving sibling. I loved seeing her. I enjoyed the stories she told...the memories she evoked...but after I returned home I was filled with angst...

...over the loss of my sweet mother, who left this mortal sphere when I was just 17. Over the loss of feeling connected...of belonging.

Over the loss of part of my story.

After my visit with my lovely aunt, my cousin drove me to the next town, and unlocked the door of my ancestral home so I could wander through.

Full of bittersweet memories...each room held haunting echoes from the past.

Decaying and forlorn, the old brick house was once stately, and even grand for this small township. The first house in town to have an indoor bathroom.

This was the place where my mother grew up. The place where her family loved her. The walls in which she was nurtured into the tender-hearted, generous, and loving woman I knew. My sweet mother who sang like a song bird.

This was the much anticipated summer destination of my childhood, when every two years my family would load up the panel van and traverse the unpaved Al-Can highway. From Alaska, through Canada, and then on to Wales, Utah. Over 3,000 long miles.

I loved those summers at this house...the place my mother called home..

It was our last trip that claimed my mothers life...and forever changed our story.

This place..this link to my heritage..a reliquary for treasured memories...a container...full of stories that now felt fractured and lost...a broken shell that had once held life.

A bittersweet memorial of a time now gone.

Aged relics were scattered amongst the jumble of crumbling debris and storage boxes that have been deposited over the years. A large tattered bible caught my eye, and I asked if it had belonged to an ancestor. She was sure it was something just picked up along the way...but when the cover was lifted there was a signature...a trace of our collective story. Our great-grandfather had signed this book on April 16, 1900.

My heart ached. I could feel the stories waiting under the surface of this neglected house that had once been a home...but we were hurried and needed to get on our way. I felt distracted... ...rushed...I longed for time...for solitude..so I could listen. But I could not hear. Whatever the walls wanted to whisper to me remains unspoken.

Glimpses

1. agates

2. sea shells

3. sand dollars

4. beach combing

5. memories of Oregon

Moki Marbles

In southern Utah there is found a true geological curiosity called moki or moqui marbles. They are named in reference to a native american tribe that used to populate the southwest United States, and who used them for games, ammunition for their slings, and shaman stones.
The stones are concretions of iron ore formed around a center of sandstone. They are trapped in the softer Navajo sandstone, and as the cliffs erode they are freed and gather in "puddles".


There seem to be many theories on how the concretions were formed. Minerals being deposited by groundwater, meteorites hitting the earth, or volcanic venting are the most popular. Some scientists believe they were formed millions of years ago during the Jurassic era when this area was under a sea. Similar stones, nicknamed "blueberries" have been found on Mars.
The following photo taken by Lane's dad shows hundreds of moki marbles being exposed as the sandstone weathers away

Click on the picture below to better see another curiosity Lane discovered on our hike

Glimpses

1. hiking in Snow Canyon

2. icy cold watermelon

3. a jokers marathon

4. pillow presents

5. cacti in bloom