Anniversaries.

Ten years ago today, we were outside freezing at about this very time in the afternoon, getting our pictures taken near the temple. I can't believe it has been ten years-- not so many years really, but ten years that have just flown by. This is our fifth place (and hopefully last-- for a while at least) that we have lived in. The grass was not green at the temple and there were no flowers like this picture shows!! Our teeth were chattering and it was biting cold, but the sun came out briefly for some pictures.

We picked this date because Rich's parents were married on the same date. We thought it might be kind of neat. If his mother were still alive, it would have been their 35 year anniversary. It was one of the busiest days-- lots of people getting married the day after finals and before the holidays!

It ten more years, I will be my mom's age that she was when I was married! (That means you are still young, Mom!!) It has been a great ten years.




Yesterday marked 90 years to another family event. Rich's great uncle Hyrum Olsen died in France on December 17. A picture of Hyrum in his army uniform hangs in our front room near the piano-- and the eerie thing is, Rich looks so much like him. In this picture, Hyrum is playing "cowboy" with the chaps that we now have.

Hyrum fought in WWI. He was in the regiment that rescued the Lost Battalion. Hyrum made it through all of the fighting and then, after his family believed he was safe and ready to come home, he passed away of Typhoid. His father wrote a letter to him on December 24, believing that he would soon see his son. He says:

"We have killed the fatted ducks and if you were here it would be a time of rejoicing and a feast indeed but we rejoice that you have been preserved through the fighting that you have been through, for when we read some of the letters that some of the boys have wrote home describing what they have been through it is a wonder that there are as many come through as there are..."

He continues:

"Well Hyrum, I hope you are living a life of a Latter day Saint and trying to keep the commandments of the Lord, remember that if he had not been with you through your fighting you would not be where you are today but in some lone grave somewhere in France, don't forget to thank him for his kind care over you...I will close for this time, praying to God to bless and continue to watch over you in the future as he has in the past. Father and Mother."

I cannot imagine the devestation upon hearing the sad news of his death. They must have been so heartbroken after all their waiting and suspense, then relief at the end of the war, and then a sudden telegram of his passing. He truly had been preserved through the brutal fighting-- and in spite of the sad twist at the end, his family never lost their testimony of the Savior. I think someday it will be cool to meet Hyrum. He had red hair, and stood as tall as Rich. Rich's grandpa Olsen (Hyrum's younger brother) told Rich he looked just like his big brother Hyrum. I have no doubt they were probably friends before Rich's turn to come to earth. Someday it will be neat to meet him, and see the man in real life whose picture is hanging on our wall in a place of honor.

Now as if this blog isn't already long enough, here is a song I really love.