Why I Did It

It has always been my dream to have a farm. Not a "let's get up at 4:30 in the morning and milk the cows" farm, but an "isn't this a beautiful sunset from the front porch" farm. I have never wanted to actually live on a farm...but to own a piece of mother earth to call my own. A place where mom and I could go occasionally on weekends and in the summer to entertain the grandchildren.
I've had visions of them coming a few at a time. Their "turn" to be with Mo and Papa on the farm. Running in the fields, fishing in the pond, playing with the dog, finding the newly-born litter of kittens in the barn...and, of course, going out in the morning with papa to gather the freshly-laid eggs that would be part of a country breakfast. A fun time for the kids. A chance for them to see and be in nature. A time to build memories of grandparents who love and cherish them, but will not always be around to celebrate all they will accomplish in their lives.
Far West, Missouri always seemed an appropriate place for the farm. After all, it could not have been by chance that mom and I met on the temple site there. The Knights and Stringhams and many others had been planted there with a promise. A promise they would not see fulfilled, but could be by their posterity. A piece of land. A sacred family place. Zion.
So what has this to do with my new Salsa Red Pearl Toyota 4Runner? I guess it's the closest I'll get to that farm. So come on, kids, let's go for a ride! It won't take us to Zion, but it will take us up into the mountains where we can cook (or buy) a country breakfast, have fun, see nature and get to know mo and papa better. My grandpa Brown, a devoted and life-long farmer once held a piece of his Idaho farm in his hand and told my mother, "Vera, this is God's gift to man." Perhaps a Toyota 4Runner is the Japanese' gift to Americans who will never own a farm.
Anyone want to go for a ride?