seventeen

Ellie turned SEVENTEEN this month. Her birthday was filled with Kate’s lacrosse game and her own bass lesson. We finally met up for dinner, a late dinner. She picked SAPA in Salt Lake. The sun had set several hours before but we were grateful to celebrate one of our favorite days together!

With a day off from school Monday, we finally had free schedules during daytime hours. We headed to Salt Lake and decided to do our birthday photoshoot at Trolley Square. I am so grateful my girls participate in these traditions with me. They are the best!

My favorite things that Ellie brings to our lives:

her smile…whether she is laughing, joking and especially trying not to smile, but can’t help herself

her independence…she LOVES to drive, and drive her own car, even if a “nicer” car is offered to her.

hard work…she loves her jobs (she has two part time jobs!), earning her own $, she is paying for the majority of her humanitarian trip to Tonga this summer. She pays for her own gym membership…and GOES!

her heart…she is a loyal friend, a sweet daughter and contentious to do her best in the world. I love our evening talks and the life she is choosing for herself.

I am lucky to be her mom. <3

One response to “seventeen”

stevenlindsey1950 – Granada, Nicaragua – In seven hundred fifty-five words or less, this is what happened from late infancy until now: I struggled between the grip of Christianity and the squeeze of other world religions, embracing the restoration and living prophets. Made it through adolescence without killing myself in a car. I switched colleges six different times. I graduated with a right nice lookin' piece of parchment. I've collected lots of recycled crap from dead trees, all with signatures and seals showing that I bought into and played the game. I learned to play the harmonica half-ass, lived on the beach, lived in the desert, lived in the Rocky Mountains, all without gettin' laid or having to go to Viet Nam. In school I studied politics. What's to study? No one keeps their promises, everyone spends too much money, everyone lies and covers up their immoral and illegal acts, everyone works as little as they can, talks a lot of crap WAY too much. But, I earned a Bachelor's Degree in that pursuit, just like Ted Kennedy and Barack Obama. I drove back and forth and up and down the United States of America, Canada (including the Northwest Territories) all the way from the Arctic Circle to Chiappas, from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Flew over both oceans and beyond, and went more places than Columbus, Magellan, Leif Erikson and Amelia Earhart combined. I've been broke, wrecked, bankrupt, shot at, divorced, lost, confounded, cheated, slapped, kicked, robbed, drunk and insane (right before going totally crazy). Lived straight as an arrow and as a crooked, old man. I've caught, arrested, chased, shot, fought and threw a whole lot of punks, crooks, pushers, thieves, murderers, politicians, lawyers, drunks, druggies, hippies, truckers, cowboys, bankers, brokers and illegal aliens (from distant worlds) into the worst jail in the entire United States of Anarchy. I spent winters in Polynesia and summers in the North Pole. Somewhere, I met the right girl, got shuck of her, met another right girl, gave her everything and started over, finally living my life and enjoying each day. I helped make, deliver, raise and slightly ruin and greatly spoil a mixture of two (or three, or four, or five daughters), two sons, got them ALL partnered up with outlaws and inlaws, and found that the best part of all that was the baker's dozen (more than less) of grandchildren that heal my heart, restore my soul and teach me the world is real and real fun. I've lived in Frisco, Fresno, Mormon country, the Rocky Mountains, east Texas, western Canada, on the Florida coast in southern Alabama, on the Mexican border and in Central America. Been cursed with way too many lawyers by an old gypsy I shouldn't have thrown in jail and way too many of 'em were divorce lawyers. I've learned how to read and write, throw the houlihan, kick cow patties, kick ass, kick habits and kick my heels. I've done dope and quit dope and done it again and had it quit me. I've been wet and dry, drunk and hung over but never hanged…not yet. I tried to learn how to fly, jump out of perfectly good airplanes with a few strings tied to a real big silk handkerchief. Learned how to shoot pistols, revolvers, shotguns, rifles, cameras, slingshots, curls, the sh*t and the breeze. Been a ranger, a sailor, a teacher, a preacher, a poet, a stranger, a prophet, an officer, a gentleman, a gol-durned son-of-a-bitch, a trucker, a logger, a farmer, a rancher, a lover, a writer, a reader, a breeder, a bachelor, a husband, a father, a brother, a uncle, a grandpa, a gambler, an aviator, a horse trader, a thief, a hunter, a trapper, a miner (49er), a pirate, a devil, an angel and a ghost. Climbed mountains, scaled cliffs, rafted on rivers, wandered through canyons, trekked through forests and burned my feet and face in deserts. Built a few homes, tore a few of them down. Put seeds in the ground, in wive's wombd, in minds, in gardens some very strange places. Watched things grow, watched things bear fruit, watched things age, watched things die. Tasted the bitter and the sweet, seen the light from the dark, felt both sorrow and joy, but I'm still tryin' to figger out what's right and what's wrong. Never learnt to sing a note real good, but have found I can carry a song in my heart.

stevenlindsey1950 says:

March 22, 2019 at 3:34 am

What a blessing to have such a family, for all of you!

I’m blessed to have you all as cousins.

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