Memories of Grandpa

Sadly, it's probably condos at this point, but this is how I remember it

Grandpa was a rancher - a handy man, the kind who could fix anything.  It might not look immaculate after he fixed it, and you probably didn't want to watch while he fixed it, but by god, it would work.  I remember Roger coming up out of the basement at Mom's house, sort of shaken - apparently, Grandpa had bashed the third prong off of an electrical cable since the outlet he was using only had two holes.  He asked what Grandpa had done for a living, I reminded him that Grandpa was a rancher, and he said "Oh.  Right."  I deliberately didn't tell him to count Grandpa's fingers (he had 7 and three halves due to an earlier disagreement with a jig saw).

For his girls, Grandpa was also the local equivalent of Triple A.  All of them had experience with calling Grandpa at various times of the night to come get their cars working again - Mom with her Rambler, Sherri with the International.  (Not sure if Sandy had the same experience - these are only ones that I was present for, but I imagine she probably did.)  But his last intervention is the one I'm the most grateful for.

Grandpa's funeral was an experience - I'm going to have to write about it later.  The entire service was done by his family - from the invocation to the benediction - and the hall had to be opened up as far as possible to try to fit all the people in.  After the service, Roger, Mom, Grandma and I all piled into our Hyundai Santa Fe to drive by the old ranch and show it off to Roger.  We stopped to get pictures of the barn, piled back in, drove about 20 feet and boom - lost the timing belt.

Ok, this doesn't sound like an intervention to you, but...  for one thing, the rest of the family was still there, so we could get Grandma a ride out of there quickly.  Second thing - cell service is often spotty down in the fields, but that day, it was clear as a bell.  Third thing - there are precisely 2 Hyundai dealerships in the entire state of Utah (and we had driven the entire length of the state to get down to Washington).  One in Salt Lake, one just 5 miles from where we broke down in St. George.  Although it was late afternoon on a Saturday, the dealership a) picked us up and towed us there; b) happened to be willing to take our old car in for trade on a new one; c) were able to arrange financing on the spot;  and d) were able to get us back on the road in time to head back to Ogden that night.  If that doesn't sound like Grandpa watching out for us from beyond, you just don't know the man well enough.