November 6, 2011
This week was an incredible blast from the past. Yesterday I visited with two older gentlemen who claim to be part of my Scottsdale High school history. They can’t possibly be because they said it was fifty years ago that I graduated and there is no way that is true. Do the simple math and you will see that I would need to be 68 years old, that I graduated in 1961, taught for forty years, spent four years in the US Navy, married over 46 years ago, and have six children and twenty six grandchildren. Add to that an incredible woman who has stood by my side all these years through feast and famine, three degrees, numerous foster children, nieces and nephews, strays, businesses of all sorts, and physical ailments of all types and you get someone else. Seriously, Doug Austin and Joe Richardson really were a significant part of my teen years. They are part of the P.L. Lawrence and (can’t remember the first name) Montana, blue 50 Ford made into a Baja buggy era. Most of our lives have been lived between the book ends of 1961 and Scottsdale Beavers and today. Add to that group, Ted Day, another high school friend, now living in Tennineo, Washington and one could tell stories all day about lives, challenges, mistakes, opportunities, and blessings.
Time flies so make the very best of every day. I have been trying to fill my mind with positive, spiritual thoughts to help erase, or at least dim some of the disturbing things that I have put in it over the last 68 years. If I get to sounding preachy it is because that is exactly what I mean to do. If I can save one person from repeating one of the dumb things I did, I will feel justified.
Here is an example of what not to do. This was back in the Scottsdale era. Several of us found a way to enter the old Scottsdale church through an open vent up on the roof. We thought this was so cool because we were able to go undetected on several such excursions. I am not sure what was so spectacular about being up there except that it was against the rules. The last time we went in, one of us (I recall that it was me) slipped and put a hole in the ceiling. It didn’t take long for the bishopric to figure out who had done it and soon enough they were knocking at my door and I was down at the church helping to fix the problem. That goofy stunt could have cost me my life and for what? Just to prove that we were nutty kids egging each other on to do things which were against the rules.
When you want to sass your mother, watch a tv show that has lots of violence and swearing in it, play video games that make a game of killing other humans, pocketing something from a store that isn’t yours, remember that these things will be in your mind long after you have garnished any miniscule pleasure from the act.
God bless you in your efforts to be strong in your commitment to live Christ-centered lives and share your blessings with others.
GPA Duane Jacobs, friend, uncle, grandfather, popsa, cousin
Note: Two blogs that I am aware of include my own – Grandpa Duane Jacobs; and John and Sue Laing – 2 Laings (John and Sue Laing are contemporaries, now serving an LDS mission in the Freburg LDS Temple. Also, Stu Morris (another Scottsdale 1st ward friend) and his wife just left for their mission.