The "street" my grandfather grew up on was really a gravel country road outside of Lincoln, Nebraska. He grew up on a farm, located one half mile from the paved highway. At least it was better than the road that some of his neighbor's farms were located on, because they were dirt roads. When it rained, these dirt roads became very muddy and sometimes impassable. Once, when my grandfather was about seven years old, he was walking down the road to go to school, and there were puddles of water everywhere. A car came flying by, and sprayed water, gravel, and dirt all over him. It made my grandfather so mad he cried all the way back home to change his clothes and clean the dirt off his face and arms.
     The road past my grandfather’s home went up a long hill. During the wintertime, the ditches along the road would fill up with snow. One winter day, a drunk driver drove up the hill, and drove into the ditch. The first my grandfather knew of it was hearing the sound of a car motor racing as the driver tried unsuccessfully to get out of the ditch. My grandfather watched him with his mother and younger brother. His father was away at the time. They saw the driver get out of the car and walk around to the side of the car that was deepest in the ditch. He left that door open, and then went back to the driver’s side and tried to get in. The car was tilted at an angle, and he fell through the car and into the ditch full of snow. He apparently decided that he couldn’t get out without help, so he staggered down the road, weaving back and forth and falling down. He went into the neighbor’s yard, and up onto their porch. He tried to open the door, but his hand slipped, and he flipped over backwards over the rail and onto the ground below. Someone had called the police, and finally they came out to get the poor man. My grandfather remembers thinking then that he would never want to get drunk and make such a fool of himself like that man did.
     My grandfather had a lane up to his house from the road. Since his house sat on a hill, the lane had been cut through the hill, and it was bordered by two high banks on either side until it came up by the house. During the winter after a snowstorm, the lane would be filled with snow. The family had to watch the weather, and if it were going to snow, they would leave the car down at the bottom of the lane next to the road. Otherwise, they couldn’t get the car out. Sometimes the snowplow that cleaned the road of snow would do them a favor and plow out their lane. It was always fun for them to watch the snowplow at work.
     One of my grandfather’s favorite childhood memories is that of his Shetland pony, Prince. My grandfather’s great-uncle gave the pony to him. Prince was already about 22 years old when he was given to my grandfather, but he still had plenty of spunk. When they first brought him home, they put him in the corral with the much larger workhorses. All seemed to go well, so they went about their chores, milking the cows and feeding the other animals. All of a sudden, there was a terrible squealing, the sound of horses’ hoofs hitting the side of the barn and horses whinnying could be heard coming from inside. My grandfather first thought the big workhorses were killing poor little Prince. They ran to see what was happening. To my grandfather’s utter surprise and great relief, it was Prince who was driving all the big horses away from the hay manger. He was small, so when he kicked, his hoofs struck the tender under-belly of the large horses, and they were running away from him. From that time on, Prince was the ruler of the horses.
     My grandfather liked to ride Prince on the road to other neighboring farms where his friends Joanna, Mary, and John also had riding horses. They would ride all around the countryside, talking and having fun together. But he looked with envy on them, because they had saddles on their horses, and my grandfather did not, so he had to ride bareback. My grandfather always wished he had a saddle! As Prince got older, his backbone stood out more, so it was not always comfortable riding on him – especially when he was galloping. Their horses were much larger than this little Shetland pony, but my grandfather was proud of him, because he always kept up with the others.
     One of the people who were very influential in my grandfather’s young teen-age life was a pastor, Darrell Berg. He was a very funny person, and made my grandfather feel important. He liked to hear Darrel talk. He would come out to their farm, take off his shirt, and help them in their work. Once they were unloading a wagon full of wheat, and my grandfather loved to watch the muscles on this powerful man ripple as he took scoops of wheat and threw it into the grain bin. My grandfather saw that a person could have real faith in God, and at the same time, be a very real, genuine person. My grandfather’s church was a small little community church, and the pastor had to do various jobs. One was to provide activities for children and youth. He would take the kids swimming in the summer; organize games, and other exiting events. He made life fun and exciting. As my grandfather listened to him speak, and saw what kind of a person he was, my grandfather started to think that one day he would like to become a pastor as well.
     My grandpa’s father, Jay Magee, was also a very important person to him. He taught him responsibility and a work ethic both by example and simply by teaching him. For example, the family raised cattle on their farm. He encouraged my grandfather to become a member of a local 4-H Club, where they learned about how to purchase what were called Baby Beef calves, care for them, and them show them and sell them at the Nebraska State Fair. Jay helped my grandfather purchase his first white-faced Herford calf. It was really exciting for him to finally own his very own calf. His father taught him what to feed it, care for it and train it for showing. Jay would take my grandfather to the monthly 4-H Club meetings where they were taught the lessons on cattle and were encouraged to take good care of their animals. Then in the Fall, his father took him to the Fair. The Club had arranged for a tent on the Fair Grounds where the boys who belonged to it could stay during the week of the Fair. The first year my grandfather’s calf won a red ribbon, and the next year his new calf won a blue ribbon. At the end of the Fair his calf was sold at an auction. He took the money from the sale and bought his next calf, purchased the feed, and veterinary charges for vaccines. So he was taught about business methods and how to determine if he was making a profit or lost money. These lessons have stood him in good stead all his life.
     From a very early age, my grandfather wanted to be a pastor and maybe even a missionary. He went to college and seminary to prepare for this, and became a missionary for 25 years. During those years my grandfather lived in Brazil and Portugal. He learned so much about other cultures and how people in these countries live. This made my grandfather’s life so much richer. One of the things he learned is that through faith in God, people can overcome tremendous difficulties, and have peace and even joy in their otherwise bleak lives. For example, during some of those years, my grandfather worked in a church for people with leprosy (Hansen's Disease). He had never seen a person with leprosy, and was shocked the first time he saw them. Their noses were eaten away, many of them had no fingers or toes, and many were blind and crippled in other ways. My grandfather remembers one man who was blind, had leprosy-eaten ears, stubby fingers and had a horribly deformed face. This man said, "I thank God for leprosy, because it is here, in this place, that I have heard about Jesus Christ, and now He's my Savior, and I now have hope for all eternity." It was a challenge to my grandfather’s own faith, which felt so weak in comparison to his.
     After 25 years as a missionary in Brazil and Portugal my grandfather became a pastor in Ogden, Utah, where he served for 20 years. It was very exciting for him to see the church grow from about 140 in attendance to 1,200 people. As my grandfather looks back on his life at this point, he is very grateful to God for the wonderful friends he has in many places in the world. My grandfather feels that he has very much been able to spend his life helping to make a difference in people’s lives.

     Who are my parents? These wonderful people who have spent so much time and energy trying to raise me the way I need to become. Constantly growing, always changing, and never satisfied with the way I am at this moment. I am always trying to be better then I am now. My parents have always been there to help me figure out how to do just that. Every day I wake up, and as I come down for breakfast, it is already sitting on the table. My parents have already been up for nearly an hour, sitting in bed, talking, hoping and praying for all of us kids. Dad will have gotten tea for Mom, who will soon rise and start our breakfast. The day has started with a new beginning.
     What is it about these people that make them so good to us? Why do the spend so much of their time trying to help us long? There is something about their past that has formed them into who we see today. It may be their own parents, or what they believe in, but something drives them to be the best they can be. One fantastic way I can show you is simply by looking at my mother and her life.
     My mother grew up in Brazil, because her parents were missionaries. Her first year was spent in southern Brazil while her parents were in language school. When she was almost one, the family moved to northern Brazil to a city called Sao Luiz in the state of Maranhao, not too far from the mouth of the Amazon river, fairly close to the equator.
     My mother lived in two houses on the same street where she had grown up. The first one was a huge rambling home, drafty and with lots of rooms, and in fact had more than one missionary family would be living in it at a time. She has only a few memories of that home because she was still so young. One of them was realizing that the flying things in the house were bats. Another was lying on her bed, gazing at the wall above her head in fascination at a long snake-like trail under the paint. She reached up and broke the paint and out tumbled bugs. She asked her mom what they were and she told her they were termites. My mother doesn’t think grandma liked that house much…. One of her last memories of that house was when she was about four. She remembers her parents, especially her mom, were upset. She asked what the problem was and grandma said someone had eaten their pet baby doe while we were in the states. She seems to remember seeing the dead animal but this was probably due to an active imagination, though seeing dead animals was not unusual there.
     The mission sold the place, and it was turned into a hospital. My mother moved across the street to a smaller home. It had one bathroom, three bedrooms, a kitchen, a living room, and dining room. The inside walls were a foot or so shy of the ceiling to provide extra ventilation in the humid, stifling tropical heat. They lived in a place that had a lot of crime and so to enhance their own protection, there were high walls around the house with glass embedded on top. Their gate was tall, with spikes, the windows had louvered windows with bars, and they owned a German shepherd. All the homes in that area had similar protection. In fact, the wall between their neighbors to the right had the high wall with the glass. The barrier made it hard to be neighborly. My mother’s house may have been small, but it had a big yard. My grandpa planted a mango tree; there was a guava tree, banana trees and sugar cane. There was a tree in the front yard and my mother loved to climb and often when someone was looking for her, grandma would have him or her look in the tree.
     There was a lot of physical labor just to exist there. They had a maid or two and a gardener. Grandpa would leave very early on a Saturday morning and go down to the meat market before the flies were too thick and pick his side of meat. He would bring it home and the bones and gristle had to be removed. The meat would then to be cut into edible sizes, tenderized, ground. My mother never liked beef, as it was tough and lacked flavor. One day during dinner she looked out their front window and noticed the steers being driven to the market. She asked where they were going and upon being told, she proclaimed, “I can’t chew this cow down!”
     My grandfather raised chickens to supplement their diet, so there was a chicken coop outside. Whenever they wanted to eat chicken, it had to be slaughtered, plucked, cut up, and cooked. My mother remembers witnessing the odd sight of a chicken with its head freshly cut off get away and run around the yard squirting blood everywhere. It gave her a new meaning to the phrase, “Running around like a chicken with your head cut off”. My mother’s grandmother came to visit, and was cleaning the chicken on our back stoop. She went inside briefly and much to her dismay, when she came back, the ever-present vultures had carried the chicken away.
     To be able to have drinking water, it first had to be boiled for ten minutes, and then filtered. They were never allowed to drink the water out of the faucet, but they still got intestinal parasites and as a matter of course, every six months they would take worm medicine. My mother believes to protect us from other types of parasites, her mother warned her to wear sandals, which she hated, so she would go barefoot anyway. Of course she would pick up parasites, one of which would crawl up under her skin and leave a long red streak. More medicine. There was whooping cough, measles, mumps, chicken pox, and typhoid fever… The local nurse missionary would vaccinate everyone. She used disposable needles so they would not get hepatitis or any other diseases transmitted through needles used at the hospital, where their sterilizing practices left much to be desired. However, in-spite of all their precautions they would still get sick, but mostly just a mild case of whatever was going around killing people.
     The street in front of her house was dirt only, and dusty. The building across the street that used to be their house was now a hospital. Vultures loved to sit nearby and wait for someone from the hospital to throw out their refuse and they would swoop down and make short work of it. The street in back of her house was paved, and it was a busy street. There too the vultures would wait. One day a tired old overworked donkey keeled over and its owner left him there. The next day it was only bones. What would they do without those birds?!
     The family was often without running water, electricity or phone service. My mother asked her mom about this once, and her explanation was simply that the city had neglected to pay its bill, so certain services were cut off. They always had kerosene lanterns, their own well, and a generator. During one dark night she remembers sitting on her front porch where it was cooler, and listening to stories. Suddenly the night was pierced with wailings from the hospital across the street. She looked up into one of the windows where she could see flickering candlelight and a woman leaning out the window wailing. It was very creepy and made her afraid. Her mom told her someone must have just died and they were expressing their grief.
     The building to the left of their house was the church grandpa had helped build. It sat on a hill and all the members were very proud of it. The ceiling was high because they did not put in a drop ceiling, just left it open to the slant roof, probably to help with the heat. There were many windows on both sides and at least four doors. Grandma played the pump organ and accordion and led the choir. Grandpa preached. They both taught Sunday school. That left my mother and her two sisters to their own devices and when a stern look from grandma did not discourage them, she would take them outside for a spanking. They were not allowed to cry because with all the open doors and windows, people inside would hear them.
     Besides the German shepherd, they owned a monkey, a macaw, and a cat or two. Part of their “zoo” was a sloth and an armadillo. Grandpa bought a songbird that would sit on her arm and sing beautifully. That was when it was still legal to own one. The dog got along with all of their pets because grandpa had taught him not to touch them. However, if a stray animal came into the yard, he was free to chase them. My mother remembers the macaw perched on the dog’s head and the monkey grooming the dog. He loved all the attention. The dog and cats however just ignored each other.
     Living in the tropics so near the equator, they had two seasons, twelve-hour days all year, and no twilight. The seasons were simply rainy, or dry. When it would rain, it would pour buckets and they would go outside in their swimsuits and play, make mud pies, and try to catch frogs and worms. Sometimes the rain would come down in torrents with plenty of lightning and thunder. Their normally brave and protective German shepherd would cower in the corner and whine. One such night they were all over at the church and their drenched, cowering, shivering dog came slinking in and laid down under the bench. Nothing they could do would budge it from that spot until the storm abated.
     Some great lessons my mother learned while very young was that the world was big and filled with all manner of people, food and creatures. What was normal in one country was unacceptable, strange and probably illegal in another, such as shooting wild monkeys for food. What was taken for granted in one was never in another. She learned at an early age that she thought different than her peers. When she was in Brazil her mind would remember what she had seen in America with its supermarkets, clean running water, elevators and escalators and snow. Back in Brazil, her friends did not know what an apple, plum or peach was. How could she ever describe a fruit? A smell? When she was in America her memories would be filled with her pets and their antics. She missed running around barefoot and climbing trees. She missed her dark skinned friends and the games they would play. She missed mangoes, pineapple, coconut, papaya and the many kinds of bananas. Her American friends did not even know what these tropical fruits were except perhaps out of a can, and could not relate to any of her experiences. Knowing two languages fluently as a child also set her apart. Some words she never learned in English until she was in college. There was no need to, as they were part of her family vocabulary. Some words she learned had no English counterpart. She was at once a foreigner and a native in both cultures.
     The people that were important to my mother as a child were her family, as they provided continuity for her in an ever-changing world. Her family helped her deal with some of the changes and frightening experiences. They would go through culture shock together and laugh at some of the silly things they were not used to. They would speak Portuguese in America and English in Brazil if they wanted their conversations to be private. They would have instant friendships with those that had gone through similar experiences, like natives from a different world.
At a very young age my mother knew she wanted to be a mom. For her, part of being a mom involved showing us that the world was a big place; people thought differently than we do, others spoke something besides English. She told us stories and gave us books with stories from other countries. She showed us pictures and whenever possible had a foreigner in our home. She fixed Brazilian food and created in us a love for tropical fruit at a young age. She taught us some words in Portuguese and encouraged us to take a foreign language in school. She wanted to be the one to teach us these kinds of loves and appreciations for others.
     While one of her main goals, to take us to the places she had grown up, remains unfulfilled, she has seen us grow to love different kinds of food, not have prejudices against dark skin, and love learning another language. Maybe someday we can take ourselves to other countries and learn first hand some of the places she told us about when we were young and perhaps grow to love them as she did.