A Journey of Discovery: ‘We Are, Indeed, a Family’

My wife and I have just survived a week in a condominium in Park City, Utah, with our two sons and daughters-in-law.

It was a test of our “family values,” which seem to be in vogue this season, and it was a great success.

We ate and drank and explored and talked and discovered that we are, indeed, a family.

It was my wife’s idea. She tends to go overboard at silent auctions for charity, and she made the high bid for the condo. I had never heard of Park City and had no desire to go there.

The condo slept six, and it was her idea to invite “the kids,” as we call them. Incredibly, they agreed, though Curt and Gail and Doug and Jackie are all employed and very busy people.

My wife bought tickets for all of us to fly to Salt Lake City together, but Jackie demurred. She pointed out that if the plane crashed her (and Doug’s) two children and Curt and Gail’s three would all be orphaned.

She suggested that she take a separate flight. I agreed with her plan in principle but suggested that I be the lone flier, pointing out that I was older and more experienced and would make a better foster parent.

She patted me on the head and told me sweetly, “Mr. Smith, your life expectancy is too short.”

As it turned out, Doug was selected as the lone flier. We flew up on a Saturday, rented a van, and Curt drove back to the airport to pick him up on Sunday.

Gail pointed out that we were just as likely to be exterminated in the van as on an airplane, a thought that diminished the importance of my short life expectancy.

Park City is an old mining town about 30 miles east of Salt Lake City, 6,900 feet up in the Wasatch Mountains. The mountains were colored like an artist’s palette with patches of green, vermilion, russet and mauve. Forests of yellow aspen quaked in the sun.

Park City sprang to life about 1870 when silver was discovered. The Ontario claim, bought for $27,000 by George Hearst (William Randolph Hearst’s father) yielded $50 million in silver.

Our condo was one of thousands of look-alike condos spread all around the slopes. The architecture seems to be derived from the old mining structures, made of dark wood siding with steep roofs and big windows.

The heart of the town is Main Street, a long block lined with cafes, gift and antique shops, clothing stores and similar establishments, all with cutesy names such as the Great Garb (women’s fashions), the Irish Camel (a Mexican restaurant), It’s About Time (a watch and clock shop), the Shirt Off My Back (a shirt shop), and the Barking Frog, a restaurant.

When the town burned down in the fire of 1898, 27 saloons and 17 bordellos were destroyed. The first building to be rebuilt was a saloon.

The state liquor store is a dungeon reached by a steep stairway. Because of the state’s peculiar liquor laws, it is one of only two stores in town that sell wine and spirits--never on Sunday. It was here that we bought the two bottles of wine we drank every evening. Since Gail doesn’t drink, I figure that provided us with two-fifths of a bottle for each person every day. It made for happy evenings, along with the gourmet meals prepared by Gail and Jackie. One night Jackie (nee Joyeux) cooked beef stroganoff, and the next, Gail (nee Paolucci) cooked marinated chicken with noodles and pesto sauce. We were living.

One morning we drove down to Bridal Veil Falls, where we rode a gondola 1,200 feet up the sheer stone face of a mountain. The gondola held exactly six, and as we soared in its embrace we were truly a family together. But I wondered if one of us should have stayed behind, just in case.

We drove on to Provo, the squeaky clean home of Brigham Young University, and down its six-lane main street, lined with every convenience known to contemporary civilization. Its neighborhoods looked prosperous and antiseptic, with well-kept homes and unlittered streets. Its clean sky was pierced by the steeple on the Mormon temple.

One afternoon a cat appeared at our screen door. He was white with sort of a beige undercoat. Gail and Jackie melted. They showered him with affectionate coos. They went to the store to get him cat food. The next day, when he reappeared, they were delighted. They talked of taking him home.

I was shocked. “On the airplane? “ I asked. They said if we left him behind he’d starve. “How the hell,” I wanted to know, “do you think he survived before we came along?” They were unmoved.

(To be continued next Monday.)