The Rabbit Trap

The Solon house came with a barn, a chicken coop, a pig pen, many fruit trees, and an acre for a garden. The garden had gone to weeds before we moved in. My dad and we four older boys had cleared many of the weeds, but near the woods there remained a stretch that we did not reclaim. When I was five or six years old the weeds on this part of the property were much taller than my little sister Alice Marie and me.

One day David said to Alice and me, "Hey, we made a rabbit trap. Would you like to see it?"

"Sure,” I said, "Let's go."

With David leading the way my three older brothers, Alice, and I went out to the tall weeds.

"Look, we found some old wire fencing and made a circle with it," said David. David, Richard and James were all standing around smiling. "A rabbit will push through this small opening in the trap to get the carrot we put in the middle. But then the rabbit will be too stupid to find its way out. Let's try it with Alice Marie."

They then picked up Alice and put her in the trap. Alice sat down in the middle and started to cry. "I can't get out!" she wailed. My heart hurt.

"Let's let her out," I said.

"She's more stupid than a rabbit, I guess," said one of my brothers. "I bet a rabbit could get out." They all laughed.

"Hey, I know. Let's leave her here and see if she ever gets out," said another brother.

"Don't leave me! I 'fraid. Don't leave me!" You could see the terror in her face, and I couldn't blame her. There were big rats around, and snakes, and I didn't know what. From the house you could neither see nor hear anyone our size in these weeds. My heart hurt worse than ever.

"I'm going to let her out," I said. I was trying to unfasten the wires when they dragged me away.

"If she's too stupid to figure out how to get out of there, then she deserves to stay there. You better not let her out, Tink, if you know what is good for you." So I had to leave with them.

"No! No!" Alice was nearly hysterical by now. I felt awful inside.

We left, but a minute later I managed to separate myself from my older brothers. "Hey, I just thought of something I better do or Mom will be mad." I started off for the house. As soon as I was out of sight I came back to the rabbit trap.

Boy, was Alice glad to see me. She stopped crying immediately. It took a little while to figure out how to get her out. I was too little to lift her out, and the small rabbit opening was jagged with rusty wire ends. Finally I got her out.

"Tink," she said, "you will always be my favorite brother." That day I learned a lesson in compassion, and earned a "favorite brother" status for the rest of my life.

A couple of weeks ago I attended a family reunion. As usual, many of my nieces and nephews played several games of Mafia. I generally play with them, even though I don’t especially enjoy being a player, especially a Mafia member. My only opportunity for playing Mafia is at family reunions. But it is fascinating to watch how my relatives play the game.

For those who don’t know how Mafia is played, let me explain it briefly. We take a deck of Rook cards and pull out two or three red cards, one or two yellow cards, and then enough green cards so that there are enough cards for every player to get exactly one card. The cards are shuffled and handed out to all players so that each player sees only his card. If you get a red card you are Mafia, a yellow card and you are a Detective, and if you get a green card you are an innocent Good Guy.

In a round of play everyone puts his head down and closes his eyes. The Moderator then asks the Mafia members to raise their heads. They silently select a victim by pointing to one of the Good Guys. The Moderator takes note of it. They then close their eyes and the Moderator asks the Detectives to raise their heads. They selected one person, and the Moderator nods his head “yes” if that person is Mafia. The Detectives then put their heads down.

The Moderator then has everyone raise his head and open his eyes. He announces, “Last night two (if there are two Mafia in the game, three if there are three Mafia) shots rang out, and (pointing to the person whom the Mafia selected as a victim) is dead.” He then opens up the group to a discussion. The dead are not allowed to say anything. The point of the discussion is to try to determine who the members of the Mafia are and eliminate them. The Mafia attempt to mislead the group without revealing their true identities. The Detectives attempt to make use of their limited knowledge of the one person they know who is or is not a Mafia member, but they try to do so without giving away that they are Detectives.

After some discussion the group has to select one member to lynch. Accusations are made, and eventually a vote is taken. Depending on how the Moderator handles it, a person may be lynched simply because more people voted for him than any one else. If there are many accusations there may be several rounds of voting and discussions to try to get a majority consensus. Some of my relatives don’t like the lying (or excuse me, "bluffing") involved in this game, and they don’t like the thought of killing one another or lynching folks. Those relatives don’t play the game. It is amusing to see who gets selected to be lynched, and why. It is often random at the beginning of the game because there is so little information to go on. Some of my nieces and nephews just look guilty all the time. Some looked stressed even if they aren’t guilty. Some are too quiet to suite the mob, and some are too talkative.

But if you pay attention you pick up some clues. Who was quick to jump on the bandwagon and pick on the first person accused? Who seems eager to lynch, and who is reluctant? If it turns out the lynched person WAS Mafia, you ask yourself who was defending that person, and who was against that person?

Knowing that the Good Guys are going to be watching for such clues, a Mafia member who is good at this game adds elements of deception. Suppose, for example, that someone is accused of being Mafia, and he is not Mafia. Rather than being eager to lynch the innocent person, the clever Mafia guy acts confused or uncertain. Sometimes the Mafia staunchly defends the innocent person. If that innocent person is not lynched he usually feels a strong sense of gratification and loyalty to the person who defended him. The Mafia can then count on a “useful idiot” for support later in the game. If it happens that the innocent person accused does get lynched, over the protests of the Mafia member, then the Mafia member appears to have been a Good Guy when it is later revealed that an innocent person was lynched.

After a person is lynched, the Moderator has everyone put his head down, and the cycle is repeated. Another victim is selected by the remaining Mafia. The Detectives learn whether or not another person is a Good Guy. When everyone puts his head back up the Moderator announces how many shots rang out, and who has been added to the dead. If the group had selected a Mafia to lynch in the previous round, then there will be one fewer shot. This tells the Good Guys that they were successful in lynching a Mafia in the last round. Now there is another round of discussion. The game continues until all the Mafia is lynched, or there are more Mafia members than Good Guys. When the Mafia members outnumber the Good Guys then the group no longer has the votes to lynch a Mafia member, and the Mafia wins.

So, I learn a lot about my relatives by watching how they play the game. One of my sisters likes to make useful friends. One of my daughters is good at dropping a teammate who becomes a liability. A couple of my brothers are good at deflecting attention away from themselves.

By playing the game I think you can also learn a lot about how politicians operate. You listen to what the players in the game are saying, but you don’t necessarily believe them. To the astute observer sooner or later every player reveals which side he or she is really on. The trick is to ignore their sophistry and clever words and posturing, and concentrate on the effect of their ACTIONS, or their LACK of actions. Watch for secret alliances, although the Mafia is not above sacrificing one of their own if it throws everyone off the truth. Sometimes the hidden knowledge of the Detectives can be mistaken for the hidden knowledge of the Mafia. Watch for players “buying” the support of other players, and examine the consequences. Whose actions stand the test of time?

Last night, before we had Family Home Evening, Rebecca and I did some collecting for her newspaper route. With the older children I had them do all the work by themselves, but with Rosie and Rebecca I’ve gone with them to collect. They appreciate not having to do this “scary” thing all by themselves. It gives me a little exercise, which I need, I get to know my neighbors better, and most importantly, it gives me time to talk with my daughters one on one. That’s a very good thing. I only wish I had done the same thing with my older children.

One woman on Rebecca’s route asked if Rebecca had thought about going to college after High School, and which college she would go to. Rebecca said that all six of her brothers and sisters had gone to BYU, and if she can get into the school she will go there also. The woman expressed some amazement at the large size of our family. After we left that house Rebecca told me that she likes the “large” size of her family. “The more the merrier.” She really likes all her brothers and sisters.

I told her that some people do limit the size of their family. Then they never know the wonderful spirits who might have been born into their family. She thought it would be sad to have been born into another family. It makes me wonder if there were any contingency plans. “Well, you will be sent down to earth to live with these folks, unless they decide not to have any more children, in which case you will go to live with these other folks.” I think God knew how we would use our agency, and planned accordingly.

The cigarette burn

From the time I was one, until I was three and a half, we lived in government wartime apartments, in Windham Ohio. It was an interesting place. We would often hear men and women arguing loudly with each other. Unemployed men loitered about, smoking and drinking. My neighborhood friends were dirty and ragged, just like my brothers and I. For toys I had clothespins that I cared around in a brown paper bag. Mother constantly told us that we didn't have money for this or that, money didn't grow on trees, and for goodness sakes don't waste anything. We usually had enough to eat, and we always had each other, and for the most part that was enough for me.

The two-story apartment buildings were arranged in a quadrangle, with a common "backyard" area crowded with clotheslines, beat up old trashcans, some sidewalk and dirt. When it rained there was a lot of mud. From the backyard you could see three or four rough concrete steps going from the sidewalk to each back door. I wondered why no one thought to patch the holes and broken siding incompletely covering the crawl spaces under the buildings. Maybe the rats, trash, and cold air could be kept out if they fixed it up. In the winter it was always cold, but in the summer the flies would sometimes eat you alive.

The trash in the crawl spaces was something of a fire hazard. I remember one particular time that Mom and Dad were not home. My oldest brother David was beating up on Richard, the next oldest. Richard ran out the front door, with David in hot pursuit. David was fast, but on this occasion Richard was faster. Richard ran around to the back door and locked it. Boy, was David ever mad!

"Open this door or I'll kill you!" No response. "If you don't open this door, I'm going to burn the house down!" No one dared to open the door. Richard locked the front door. David tried to sneak around to the front door, but he was too late again. Really mad now, David crawled under the house where he had some matches hidden. He struck a match and lit the trash. When the smoke from the burning trash got thick David was forced out from under the house, coughing and choking. Fortunately for us inside, the trash burnt out and the house did not catch fire. No one thought it was funny, and no one told my parents.

One warm summer day I went over to the back door of a friend of mine. My friend and his dad were sitting on the back steps; the dad was smoking a cigarette. I sat down to talk to my friend. We sat there talking for a minute when my keen powers of observation deduced that the dad was looking for something on the ground or on the steps. It certainly was a very hot day.

"I wonder where I put it," my friend's dad mumbled. "It got to be around here somewheres."

Suddenly I was simultaneously aware of four things: (1) My friend's dad was looking at me funny, (2) my friend's dad no longer had his cigarette, (3) the steps were much hotter than they should be, especially in one particular spot, and (4) I smelled burning cotton. I rocketed off the steps.

It made my friend and his dad laugh to see me running around in circles, trying to get away from the seat of my pants. I hooted and hollered and spanked myself until my friend's dad could stop laughing long enough to tell me, "Yer clothes ain't burning no more." Feeling humiliated I slunk off for my home.

"You did what?" demanded my mother. "Let me see that." Then after inspecting the damage she announced "Douglas Wayne _____ that was a perfectly good pair of pants. It was practically new when the lady at church gave them to David. And the underpants were new when we bought them for David. I guess we can put a patch on the seat. I think I have a patch that will match the patches on the knees. But the underpants you will have to keep wearing with the hole in them. Fortunately no one will see the hole. Maybe this will teach you to look where you are sitting."

My brothers thought it was hilarious. "How stupid can you get? Ha! Ha! Ha! To sit on a lit cigarette and not even notice it! You must be the stupidest person in the whole world. Ha! Ha! Ho! Ho!" I was not often the center of attention in my family, being an insignificant two-year-old with a baby sister. I was gratified that everyone thought I was important, but I would have preferred it to be for reasons other than being the stupidest person in the whole world.

My parents were greatly disappointed in me when I was born. For years they used to tell everyone. "Yes, we have four rowdy boys. We wanted so much to have a girl when Douglas was born. We told the doctors to send him back; we were waiting for a girl". They would all look at me, nod their heads understandingly, and laugh. After they read this story they said that they must have been only joking, but at the time it seemed only too true.

My parents also blamed me for being born on the second of January. "Why have you always been so slow? If you had been born one day earlier we might have won some valuable prizes." And my dad would add, "And if you had been born on December 31st you could have saved me some tax money." I took the criticism to heart. I guessed I always was a problem and not good for anything. I was too slow, and too stupid. I didn't learn until I was grown that I had actually been born ten days before I was due.

Now that Alice Marie was born, and I was no longer the baby in the family, I was truly insignificant. The long awaited girl was finally here. I was just a pain in the neck two-year-old who wanted some attention.

Nothing was said about the red blister on my bottom, so I figured I didn't need to go to the doctor. And anyway, doctors cost a lot of money. It was only many, many years later, when we had a lot more money, that my mother would learn to think of the child first, and the damage done to the clothes second. I wore that pair of underpants for a couple of years after we moved to Solon. It helped to remind me of my stupidity. It is funny now, more than fifty years after what remained of my underpants was finally thrown away, that I still think from time to time that I am wearing, though no one can see it, underwear with a stupid burn hole in it.

The Marble

It was a quiet morning. My big brothers were away at the Solon Elementary School. I was at home because I was only three or four years old. My baby sister Alice was asleep. Mother was busy, as always, doing housework. I was sitting on the floor in the living room, trying to get good playing marbles.

When you play marbles you use your thumb to flip a marble out of your hand and hit another marble. If your marble knocks the other marble out of a ring you get to keep the marble you knocked out the ring. You keep playing until you or your opponent has all the marbles. You would then get your own marbles back unless you were playing "keepsies". We weren't allowed to play "keepsies" because that was gambling. My older brothers did in fact play "keepsies" and tried to keep my mother from finding out about it. If they played "keepsies" with me I would always lose and usually cry to my mother about it. She would make them give me back my marbles. Marbles came in a variety of colors, with about three different sizes, so you could identify your own marbles and supposedly get them back at the end of the game. However, at the end of the game the bigger kids always seemed to identify the better marbles as their marbles.

So there I was with the reject marbles: a small bluish-gray marble and a few chipped ones. It was frustrating trying to flip a marble out of my tiny hand and get it to go in the direction I wanted. Finally I knocked the small marble out of the ring I had made. I popped my favorite marble in my mouth to hold it for awhile. The marble was supposed to just stay in my mouth until I wanted to use it. But somehow it slid past my tongue and got stuck in my throat. I can still remember the feel of it. I couldn't breathe, my throat hurt, and my eyes started to water. I opened my mouth to cry, but my cries were stuck in my throat. I didn't know what to do.

Fortunately my mother was close by and saw that I was gagging and choking. Seeing the other marbles on the floor she instantly realized what had happened. She pounded me frantically on the back. Nothing happened. She was beginning to panic; I was bewildered. I had no idea that I would die in minutes unless she could get the marble unstuck. But I could see that she was afraid, and that made me afraid also.

My mother ran to the telephone and picked up the receiver. Someone else was on the party line. I could see my mother waving her arms and stamping her feet impatiently.

"Get off the phone! My son has a marble stuck in his throat and can't breathe! I've got to call the doctor!"

Immediately my mother was calling the operator. "Get me the doctor!"

"Doctor, my son has a marble caught in his throat and can't breathe! What should I do?" Pause. "I already did that, now what!" Pause. "Okay. I'll turn him upside down."

She ran over to me, grabbed me around the waist, turned me upside down, and began to beat on my back. Still nothing. She ran back to the telephone.

"It's still stuck! What am I going to do?"

The light in the room seemed to grow dimmer and I collapsed to the floor. Suddenly the pain in my throat moved lower. I found myself sucking in a lung full of air. I lay there gulping in more air. Mother rushed over and held me.

"Oh thank Goodness, Tink, you are breathing again!"

A little while later the lady on the party line called my mother to ask what had happened to me. She had been really worried ever since she had gotten off the phone.

The doctor told my mother to look for the marble when it came out, but my mother and I never found it. And it was my favorite, unchipped marble, too. For many years after that I could not tolerate a doctor or nurse touching the back of my throat. I violently gagged involuntarily. I couldn’t even floss my teeth in the very back. Perhaps the marble is still inside of me … if not in my stomach, then in my brain.

Off to BYU

Yesterday my daughter Rosie left for BYU. It is early, but she needed to have some dental work done. Her uncle is a dentist in Saint George, and Saint George is a convenient stop along the way from Southern California to Provo, Utah. After a few days of dental work she will take some leadership training at BYU, and then go to Freshman Orientation.

So, before she left, we stood around for a few minutes, getting last minute things, and giving one another hugs over and over again. I blinked back the tears, and kept tight control of my voice. There was a lump in my throat, and an ache in my heart. Hoping to provoke a little laugh I said with over-the-top sincerity, “Why does everyone always have to go away?”

“You sound like Mr. Woodhouse, Papa” Rosie remarked, smiling broadly. I’m sure I looked puzzled. “You know, Emma’s father in the Jane Austen novel.” We talked about that for a moment. Rosie convinced me that Mr. Woodhouse was not a bad sort of person after all.

Rebecca, my fifteen year old daughter, added her view, “I was thinking you sounded something like Beth in Little Women.”

Mr. Woodhouse, or Beth - they both seemed like possible examples for the way I felt. Rosie is my sixth child to go away to BYU. It doesn’t get any easier as we go down the line,”losing them out the top,” as someone once put it. In two years Rebecca will have to go away to school, and I have no doubt that she will choose BYU. My children come back to visit for Christmas, and sometimes they stay a whole summer. But it is never the same again. Something is gained, and something is lost. And that makes me happy, and sad.

Rubber Knife

Several years ago I wrote everything I could remember from my childhood, ages two to seven years old (1949 to 1954). I wanted to clarify for myself the influences my childhood had on my later life. It was a liberating feeling.

Occasionally I will share these stories of my childhood in this blog. Hopefully someone will find them interesting. I had an ordinary childhood in many respects, but in a way I think every childhood is unique and revealing about what a person will become.

I may try to publish my stories some day. If you have any comments which would help make my stories better I would greatly appreciate hearing from you.

We were living in Solon, Ohio. I had a little rubber knife that I loved to play with. I would carry it around with me, stuck in my belt like a pirate. Sometimes I would pretend to stab something with it. Often I would just throw it up in the air to see if I could catch it by the handle. I would throw it, and make it spin a few times. My mother didn't seem to care how I played with my knife, as long as I didn't throw it in the house. She would often yell at me, "Stop throwing that knife in the house. If you have to throw that knife around, go outside to do it." I would stop for a while, but then I'd go back to throwing my knife up into the air. After a while I started to hear things like, "If I see you throwing that knife again, I'm going to have to take it away from you." So I stopped throwing the knife around -- where my mother could see me.

A day or two later I was in the dining room throwing the knife in the air when the knife got caught in the ceiling light fixture. Being only about five years old, I couldn't quite reach the light fixture. I could see my knife up there, right next to the light bulb. I stood on a chair and tried to reach it. I was still too short. The thought crossed my mind that I ought to ask my mother to help me. But I just knew what she would say, "I thought I told you not to throw that knife around in the house. And this is what happens when you do. I'm just going to have to take that knife away from you. And you'll have to sit on a chair until you are an old man. And when your father gets home he is really going to punish you." I decided to think about this a little longer.

My mother turned on the lights about a half-hour before my Dad got home. The first thing Dad said when he walked into the house was "What's burning. It smells like a burning tire. There is definitely burning rubber around here. Focha, where is that smell coming from?" I knew it was my rubber knife that was smoking, but I kept very quiet and tried to look like I hadn't heard a word that was said. Dad located the source of the melting rubber, got a chair, and fished out the knife. I could see black smudges still on the light bulb. Dad looked at the knife, he looked at me, but he didn't say anything. This was an ominous sign. I think Dad had to replace the light bulb before the generation of smoke could be stopped.

When we sat down to dinner I was very tense. I knew Dad wasn't going to forget about the rubber knife. I can remember the aluminum glasses we drank from, each of us had our own glass which we identified by the color. I spent a lot of time looking into my glass that night. It seemed as though the room was dark, except for one bright glaring light over the dining room table.

"I want to know, who threw a rubber knife in the light fixture," Dad said with the air of a man who is judge, jury, and executioner. There was a flurry of denials; I kept my fearful silence. "All right," said my Dad in a low and even voice, "I am going to go around the table and ask each one of you in turn, starting with David." That meant I would be last! "David did you do it?"

"No, I didn't do it," said David. The suspense was beginning to mount in me. What should I say? No one had seen me throw the knife in the air. Maybe I could get away with it. Just insist on my innocence. Little did I realize how obvious it must have been to my parents. I was beginning to sweat. What would they do to me if I confessed? Make me go without eating for a week? Take away my few earthly possessions? What would they do to me for lying? I knew I shouldn't lie, but maybe God would understand.

"Richard, did you do it?"

"No, I didn't do it."

My throat was dry. I looked in my glass. It was empty. I had to think. Think! What was I going to say?

"James, did you do it?"

"Not me!"

Finally it was my turn. The room was hushed. I took a deep breath.

"Dougie, did you do it?"

I bowed my head. "Yes, I did it." There, I said it, and I was glad, come what may.

"Well, Dougie told us the truth, and I think that is wonderful. I think this boy deserves a reward. Focha, do you suppose you could get this boy a bowl of ice cream?"

I couldn't believe my ears. I was in a daze. What was happening? I was vaguely aware of other voices around me.

"It had to be him. Everyone else denied doing it."

"I wish it were true that if everyone else denied it then they really didn't do it. But unfortunately that is not always the case."

"But all the rest of us told the truth also. We should also get some ice cream."

Dad laughed. "But only for Dougie was it hard to tell the truth, and for this he should get the reward."

"Then I'm going to do something bad and tell the truth about it and get the reward."

Dad thought about this for a moment, then he turned to me. "Do you suppose you would mind sharing your reward with the rest of us, by letting each of us have a bowl of ice cream." I was feeling magnanimous at this time. Besides, I had three rather upset-looking bigger brothers glaring at me.

"Sure, everybody can have some ice cream."

I thought I would begin my first blog with an explanation of why I picked the name GreenVisor. It has to do with something that happened in December, 2000.

During a stake presidency meeting the Stake President turned to me and said, “I thought it would be cool to buy you a green visor.” When I looked puzzled he chuckled and said, “I just read an interesting article in the Ensign about the role of the stake clerk. You should check it out, if you haven’t already read it.”

When I got home I read the article (Ensign, “Clerks, Leaders, and Members: Working Together”, Dec 2000, p 27). Here is what it says in the first two paragraphs.

“When I was serving as a stake clerk, I presented some statistical information for the stake presidency to consider, and I recommended a course of action,” recalls Wayne H. Ethington of the Oquirrh First Ward, Riverton Utah Stake. “The stake president was amazed. He later told me he thought the clerk was supposed to sit in the corner, wear a green visor, say nothing, and take notes. His whole idea of the clerk’s role changed, and he discovered a huge resource for help in his calling.”

Brother Ethington’s experience reflects the important role of clerks in the Church today. “Clerks today are so much more than record keepers,” says Robert R. Hill, manager of member services at Church headquarters. “They are key team members to help bishoprics and presidencies, they provide helpful information for auxiliaries, and they assist the Church as a whole in anticipating members’ future needs.”

I’ve thought about that green visor from time to time. How often do we ignore those around us, disregarding them as merely those who are supposed to sit quietly in a corner? How often do we ignore the experience and wisdom of our “ordinary” fellow men? I’d like to talk about that in this blog.

I’ve been a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints all my life. I served a two and a half year mission in Italy, and a two year stake mission in California. I’ve been a Sunday school teacher, deacon’s quorum instructor, teacher development director, Sunday school president, counselor in Elder’s quorum presidencies, high priest group leader, and ward clerk. I’ve served as a high councilman on two high councils for a total of about eight years, and I’ve been a counselor in three different bishoprics.

I was the stake clerk for almost the entire nine years one stake president served, and for nine months of the next stake president. During those nine and a half years I’ve been a part of the process to replace all the bishops in the stake at least once, and all of the High Council. It has been a wonderful experience to get to know the members of my stake, to train clerks throughout the stake, to rub shoulders with some great spiritual men, and to be tutored in the ways the Lord works through his servants. Two days ago I was released from my calling.

It is a hard thing to let go of something that brings a person so many blessings. I’ve joked with some friends that I have mixed feelings about my release – feelings of joy, mingled with feelings of happiness. The truth is I’m sad. And there is some regret. There was much that I was hoping to do better in the future. Now, the time is past, my opportunity is gone, and I am left with the thought from John Greenleaf Whittier, “For all sad words of tongue and pen, the saddest are these, ‘It might have been.’”

I thank my stake presidents for letting me be something more than someone who sits in the corner, wears a green visor, says nothing, and takes notes. I believe that in each one of you there is much more than meets the eye. Much more than an anonymous person under a green visor.