I'm a mom. I have boys. Four boys to be exact. As the mom, I "get" to go on field trips until such time as my kids "age out" and I am no longer "cool" to have around, but rather a complete and total badge of adolescent shame. The 14 year-old wants me as far away as humanly possible from his life and surroundings. The 9 year-old ... I'm still awesome. With this much awesome screaming through my veins, I got a recent invite to the third grade Utah curriculum field trip to ... hold your breath ... "This is the Place Heritage Park, Utah".
If you grew up in Utah the phrase, "this is the place" is as common as, "pass the salt". From infancy, perhaps in utero, Utah children are raised to know the phrase, "this is the place" to embody the miracle that is all that surrounds them. Utah, their home, the "bubble" of sorts wherein Diet Coke consumption is akin to a felony, and the inability to bake bread assures you will die a virgin. Despite it's wackadiddy persona, the landscape of Utah is beautiful. However, any Utah child will tell you this beauty is only the result of an incredible amount of sacrifice at the hands of early Mormon pioneers ... who's mass exodus fleeing religious persecution had thousands of early settlers following the Mormon prophet, Brigham Young, across the wilderness into the unknown. These early Mormon pioneers followed their prophet without really "knowing" what the end game was, as in "where" in the mid 1800's.
After having endured an incredible amount of trial and tribulation crossing the plains, enduring the elements, staring down and succumbing to death, and any other number of other tragedies, the pioneers finally came into what we now call modern day Utah. Brigham, it is said, looked down into the valley and uttered the phrase now a state park, "This is the Place ..." The pioneers finally found their end game.
A lake full of salt, a valley that was a desert ... personally, I lack the faith. This is why God, in His wisdom, knew that placing me on the earth and requesting mass exodus, plural marriage, and living with sister wives was a very, very bad idea for ME. Utah would not be here. I would have organized a revolt. "So, first I leave
everything behind because you want me hauling a handcart across the plains, pregnant, THEN you think I'm jumping on board this whole plural wives situation with the end game being some wooden shanty resembling the crafty nest work of a pile of blue jays (think mud, hair, feathers, and craptastic) to raise my children, live with sister wives, and raise their 47 children as one? No, Nada, not happening ... ladies? Who's with me?" And thereby history would be rewritten, the menfolk having left me and the feminine rebellion back east.
BUT, I grew up in Utah with all the visions of my sacrificing ancestry (yep, it's true, I, folks, am some version of Mormon royalty because my ancestry came rolling in with one of those first handcart companies), and the phrase "this is the place" representing all the faith, love, and present day beauty I grew to call home, Utah. I left Utah 17 years ago, when I married. I moved to Japan. Japan was not "this is the place", nor was Washington D.C. the Azores Islands, Las Vegas, New Hampshire or Colorado. It took 17 years to return to "this is the place", and come full circle with my third grader at a relatively new state park entitled, "this is the place." Hmmmm.
"This is the Place" ... think pioneer town. People dress in period clothing, they ride horses, they talk (because I am sure they believe) like they are from pioneer town. It's like a cheap Disneyland complete with characters. There are places the kids can "experience" pioneer life. Rub down clothes on a washboard, wack corn kernels with rocks and grind them into corn flour, (stay tuned), pan for gold, buy penny candy at
the "country stores".
There are homes, buildings, etc. that have actually been MOVED from miles away and put back together on the site of this park land. Homes of prophets, old homesteads (these are the tiny bird nests I refer to, mud, dirt, hair, craptastic) where families of 17 (not kidding) lived, sister wives and all. It's "interesting" ... I love history ... I see it for the historic factor and try to ignore phrases like, "and this was Brigham Young's 19th wives' home ..." Block it out, Cortney, block it out, this is history.
School children who "field trip" at "this is the place" are divided by grade into particular aspects of the time period. The third graders learn about "Indian heritage" (again, block it out, block it out, wack the corn, make the corn flour, imagine happy Indians giving up their land to the white man) in relationship to early settlers of Utah. To begin, the day was cold. It was the end of April, the whole week was GORGEOUS and the ONE DAY that week we have the field trip some weird cold snap hits. I was in charge of 6 munchkins ... 3 of which apparently didn't get the "it's cold as hell" memo and wore no coats opting for flimsy t-shirts.
I won the lottery and didn't have to ride the bus down to the park (an hour drive) opting for the comfortable and QUIET climate of a fellow mom's SUV. My luck ran out when we got there and I realized we would be "dining" on our sack lunches in the outdoor pavilion. Think large bird nest craptastic with wooden tables, a bone chilling breeze, kids with no coats, and one special whiner in MY group.
First, a train ride. A train ride that circled the park with our tour guide pointing out specific landmarks, "and here is our Indian village ... wave to the pioneers, kids! And here is this person's house, and that one room home (it was not a home, it was a craptastic bird nest) had a family of 17 living in it! 4 wives, their children, and (whoever his name was)! (block it out, block it out ...)!" I did find out there are trees on that place that grow 1 lb apples. 2 apples = 1 pie. Gotta get me that tree.
I also found out, sans stupid tour guide, that the giant statue in the park had three figures, Brigham Young (ok), Heber C. Kimball (okay, Mormon royalty, go on ...) and Abraham Lincoln (what, stop, slow down this train, repeat, WTF does Abraham Lincoln have to do with all of this, when was he President, why is he on this giant statue, this makes no sense at all!). I spent the rest of the train ride imagining one lb apples and trying to make sense of the whole Abraham Lincoln situation (only to find out three days later it is NOT Abraham Lincoln, the tour guide was a moron).
Train ride over, my brain is spinning with this Lincoln situation, and TIME FOR LUNCH in the craptastic outdoor pavilion. It was about 40 degrees, who wouldn't want a lovely outdoor lunch? The self appointed whiner of my group of 6 munchkins started to cry because she was "cold". Duh, I'd be cold to if I didn't have a coat. Someone had loaned her one of their extra sweatshirts, she was still crying. I had tried to gently talk her off the ledge earlier in the train ride, but now my brain had Lincoln and craptastic bird nests filled with families of 17 on the brain and I didn't have time for the whine. So... I informed whiner of the following, "look, it's cold. we're all cold. I don't think we are at this is the place, I think we are in winter quarters (look up famous locale where massive devastation and lives were lost in that early pioneer pilgrimage across the nation to this is the place). All that being the case, you have to stop crying ... (pause) ... stop it, now. You are a girl. One day you will be a woman. It's a noted fact women are tougher than men, that's why women have the babies, men would die with the first hint of labor. Be a girl. Stop crying. One day you'll have babies." She stopped crying. Tough love with a hefty dose of reality. I wanted to tell her one day she might live with sister wives because she is from Utah County and who knows, she could be a polyglit and I didn't know it ... but that would just be wrong. We'll leave it with "stop crying, girls have babies, not boys." I had to rinse and repeat that phrase about 47 more times with her that day.
After our delicious lunch was completed and frostbite was setting in, we were off scrambling up the hill to experience our first "Indian" adventure... wackacorn. I call it wackacorn because that's what it was. The pioneer woman, who was convinced she WAS a pioneer, divided the kids into groups, had them sit around flat rocks, surrounded by smaller rocks, and gave each group some dried corn kernels. She then told them they had to make, "corn flour". How? Wackacorn. Wack the corn, rub the corn into the stone, wala, flour.
I sat there watching the kids earnestly trying to make wackacorn work out into some corn flour something or another. I was still wrestling with the whole Abraham Lincoln debacle, staring up the hill at Brigham Young's "19th wives house" wondering how that whole situation panned out, and I left all of this thought for a moment as I started a visual scan in my brain of making bread. Yep, I can make bread. I grew up in Utah, remember? I didn't want to die a virgin, so I can make bread. But BREAD takes flour... block it out .. I can't block it out! It takes ALOT of flour.
What was this "corn flour"? After 10 minutes of wackacorn, my group had produced about a 1/4 ounce of flour. Bread takes CUPS of flour. My filter dissolved as I said to pioneer woman, "uh, doesn't bread take CUPS of flour, how long did it take the pioneers?" (In my head I am now frantically picturing my ancestry playing wackacorn for hours or possibly days on end to produce a cup of flour) She informed me the "corn flour" was to make a "mush" or "bread". I pointed out my concerns that wackacorn seemed to be producing about 4 ounces of flour after 10 minutes and 30 kids involved. She said, "oh no, see up there on the hill, that's the mill. The pioneers would take their grain to the mill for flour, this is mostly only what the Indians did for flour." Huh, well then. Crafty little pioneers. Why were we playing wackacorn, haul that corn up to the mill for heaven's sake!
Next up ... we were going INSIDE. Finally, my toes could regain feeling and my lips were regaining their pink from blue pallor. It was a big building, a store of some sort I suppose. I noted to one of my fellow mom chaperones considering 17 people lived in the one room craptastic bird houses, this building must have held at least 100 people. We were escorted to the upper "loft". As I got nearer to the top of the stairs I noticed animal pelts ...of every size, shape, and color ... gracing the walls and a giant clothesline of sorts. Pioneer women, now dressed as pioneer sort of man woman sort of thing, started draping herself with assorted animal pelts and asking the kids about, "and what does this animal belong to?" Uh, PETA would be spray painting that whole debacle, this was like a vegan horror show.
Pioneer sort of man woman continued to drape herself with furs and I sat there quite uncomfortable. Meat comes from a store, in a package. It never roamed, it never clucked, it never moo'd, or whinnied. This is how my reality town works. This was gross. But we were just getting started ... In a sing song voice reminiscent of my childhood days of primary/Sunday school, the PWMP (pioneer women man person) asked the kids. "Who killed the animals?" The kids squealed, "the MEN!" "That's right boys and girls, and who brought the animals back home?" "The MEN!!" "Well, actually, often times the men would kill the animal and then come home and tell the women where the animal was. Then it was the women's responsibility to go out, retrieve the animal, and bring it back to camp." WTF?! Are you kidding me. I whispered to the mom next to me, "and what, give birth on the way out to bringing the animal back to camp? Are you kidding me?" She agreed. This was not how we imagined this whole situation.
"So, boys and girls, what would pioneers do with the animal?" "Eat it!" (sick) "That's right, they would eat the meat, and what would they do with the rest of the animal?" Stunned silence. It was then that PWMP pulled a piece of animal skin leather looking something or another from her clothesline of carnage. "This is an animal skin, see how soft it is ... but this took a long time to get this (as she draped herself with another poor, humiliated animal skin) into this (draped herself with the leather skin thing)." It was then that PWMP began explaining the process of making an animal into wearable whatever.
"First, boys and girls, pioneers made really nice baskets. (What the hell does this have to do with the animals draped over your shoulders?) They learned from the Indians to line the baskets with tree sap so they were water proof (wrap it up lady, where is this all going?). This was important because the pioneer women needed to remove the fur from the skin (and we're off). They would take the animal, scrape out the meat, then put it into these baskets and submerse it into the river or lake." Um, okay. "After a day, they discovered that part of the hair was missing from the animal skin, so they thought, let's give it two days ... and then even MORE fur was gone from the skin, so they thought, let's give it three days." Uh, sick. "The problem, boys and girls, is that after three days it started to smell. So they took it out of the water and used the bones from the animals to scratch off the remaining hair." Sick.
"Now, boys and girls, the problem was ..." she gathered more visual aids from the clothesline of carnage, "the skin is still not like this skin (she rubbed said animal skin on her face caressing it, puking a little in my mouth now) ... it was tough and you can't make clothes with this. But the pioneers learned ..." If you have a weak stomach, take a tums, pepto, or pepcid before reading on. " ... from the Indians, it takes the brain (points to her head) of the size (makes a motion of size with her hands) to tan the skin (rubs the back of her hand)." PWMP then tells the kids to rub the backs of their chubby little hands. "See, this is skin, it's soft, it wouldn't make very good fabric would it because it is filled with bones and flesh?" WTH? Are you kidding me? Have we just entered the lair of Silence of the Lambs?
The kids all dutifully rubbed the back of their hands. I was slack jawed staring at the kids, 8 and 9 year-olds mind you, preparing myself for her next imparting of wisdom. "So say it with me boys and girls ... it takes a brain, the size of the animal, to tan the skin." This phrase was said three times, accompanied with hand gestures I can only imagine from the book of American Sign Carnage Language. "How big is the brain of a mouse?" (Drapes herself with a mouse fur.) "How big is the brain of a buffalo?!" (Points out the buffalo skin draping the stairs.) "To get the skin soft the pioneers would take the brain of the animal, grind it in a bowl (she makes grinding motion), and rub it into the skin of the animal. This was the women's job (of course it was, man kills, you retrieve, remove the fur, now women are grinding the brains into the skin, of course) to do. But the brains were very stinky (uh, now we're using a third grade word, stinky?) so they would grind them into the skin, fold up the skin, and bury it in the dirt so it would stop smelling."
Let's review. Man kills animal and comes back to the homestead. "Woman, I killed an animal, it's 40 paces out, go get it." Woman, "okay." Women then skins it, cleans it, de-furs it, grinds it's brains, rubs it's brains into it, buries it in the dirt. You with me? You puking yet? You a vegan yet? I'm considering complete veganism at this point. I looked at the mom next to me and she whispered, "I could have gone my whole life and not known this." I whispered back, "just get through it, this can't be much longer." PWMP then detailed out the "final" process.
After a YEAR, not a typo, a YEAR, remove the nasty smelly mess from the ground. Clean it. Is it cloth yet? Nope. It's at this point it's still "not flexible". PWMP explained to the kids the skin had to be "worked" to become pliable. If they were Eskimos, she explained, the women Eskimos would then put this filthy mess in their mouth and chew it into submission and pliability thus explaining the national geographic photos of elderly Eskimo women with nubby stubs where teeth had been. All that skin chewing takes a toll on the teeth. Sick.
BUT, the pioneers were a sophisticated crew (I am now thinking about my leather couch at home and picturing a bunch of Eskimo women chewing into it and rethinking my whole sofa purchase) and they found a way to sharpen a tree stub, wash, dry, wash, dry, rub into the tree stump, rinse, repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat ... and wala. PWMP then grabs the finished "soft" skin from her clothesline of carnage, caresses her cheek with it, holds it up and declares, "this will make a nice pair of pants!" AUGH!!!!!!
PWMP then explained what skin was formerly attached to which "native Utah" animals from her clothesline of carnage. We then played a resounding game of "name that animal skin" (ugh, can this be over now?). She let the kids touch the skins, she draped herself a few more times with each skin, then pulled out the finale ... the wolf.
"Boys and girls, do you know what this is?" There were a few guesses until one of them hollered "a WOLF!" "That's right boys and girls, a wolf. Do you know wolves would follow the pioneers closely as they were coming across the plains to Utah (wait for it ...) because if you were sick, elderly, or unable to keep up with the wagon party the wolves, who travel in packs, would eat you. They also would stay close to the wagon parties because many people died on the trek west and when the pioneers would bury the bodies the wolves would wait for them to leave and unbury the body and eat it." I sat there in utter horror staring around the room surrounded by third graders. Was she kidding me? Are you kidding me PWMP? The mom next to me was now questionably toying with the idea of a weekender trip to the local psych ward to ward off what we had just heard. The kids ... they didn't skip a beat as she passed old Wolfy skin around and let them all caress the former relative of a bygone past that most likely ate or disturbed their ancestry. Sick.
I tried to fill my brain with other things. Soon it was crowded back with the old Abraham Lincoln question, the 19th wife, the craptastic bird sheds holding 17 people, wackacorn, it was all to much. Fortunately the day was almost complete. The kids had a great time, whiner continued and I gave her a hearty, "stop it, women have the babies, be a girl" before escorting her and my 5 other little charges onto the bus. I left "This is the Place" confused, perhaps traumatized, definitely considering a vegan existence free of corn in any form. I'm sticking to Mickey Mouse for future park visits of any kind.
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