cc: file, Tony Hafen, Pauline Nelson via mail, Sara and Des Penny, and Maxine Shirts
"Sunday morning started early. Much earlier for Audrey and Rachel, who got up at 3:00 AM to drive to go to Conference with us from Cedar City. They arrived at Randy and Kathryn's house at 7:00 AM, just as we were finishing breakfast. It was good to see you guys, and to have a nice hug from each of you.
Matt rode with the girls, and Andrea and I drove from Provo to Salt Lake in the rental car. We parked at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building, what I remember as the Hotel Utah. As we walked up the stairs I recalled all of the times we had visited the Hotel Utah Coffee Shop when I was a child, and I recalled when we went to the restaurant how a friend of Mom and Dad's would come and draw cartoons on my placemat. Later in the week I was watching a video on Cedar City in the 1950's and realized it was Uncle Rosco, the manager of KSUB when it was in The Escalante Hotel, who did those drawings. Of couse, as soon as we got out on the street betwen the Joseph Smith Memorial Building and the Temple, I realized those days were long gone. The fountains and mirror ponds, the walkways and music. It is much different that when I was a child.
Audrey stopped to pick up two friends, and so we arrived first. Andrea and I went into The Conference Center and found our seats. We sat next to Mike and Marion Pickard, our Stake President, and one of Andrea's counsellors when she was Young Women's President. Rachel had a ticket to sit by us, and found her way to us via cell phone conversations. As she sat down and looked around, she turned to me and said, `This is really big.'
She took the words right out of my mouth. It was my first time in The Conference Center, and the television images do not do it justice. They are 2-D and do not share the beauty nor the spaciousness of the room. To see 25,000 people in one room is a real experience. I was sitting between Rachel and a young girl about her age who it seemed like didn't want to be there. There was a real difference in the vibes coming from my left side and from my right side. It was interesting to see how much this young girl loosened up as the meeting progressed and some of the talks were given.
Kathryn had helped us prepare a picnic lunch (Andrea and she had gone to the store after we got home after Priesthood Meeting on Saturday night). After the 2 hour session we went out by the reflecting pool, and I went to the car and got the coolers with Halloween Candy, sandwiches, and drinks in. Audrey and Rachel didn't eat much because they were going to have lunch with their real Dad. Matt wanted to go with them, and there wasn't enough time to drive him to American Fork, visit, and get back to the airport to catch his plane. My heart ached for him.
After the girls left, Andrea and I went over to the Salt Palace and registered for the SEG. There was some hassle, because my on-line registration had not worked. We finally got it all done. We drove up around the University of Utah, and I showed Andrea and Matt the places where I lived when going to school. Then we took Matt to the airport. They only let one of us go to the gate with him, and he wanted me to go with him. Brother Gillespie, 1st Counselor in the Stake Presidency and former Stake Young Men's President was on the same flight, and so Matt had someone to talk to. We called Floyd Lunt, one of our Home Teacher's and confirmed he was going to pick up Matt at the airport and give him a ride to the house. And so Matt had his first flight across the U.S. sort of alone and at 15. Reminds me of when I was that age and would fly Hughes Airwest from Cedar City to Salt Lake to see the allergy specialist or the zit specialist, who bombed my face with x-rays. I remember calling and making my own flight arrangements, getting to know one of the reservation ladies by name, and sometimes calling her just to talk for a while. I think she lived in Portland.
Andrea and I drove back into Salt Lake and went directly to the Honor's and Award's Meeting. It was in a new hotel across from Little America called The Grand America. What a hotel! It is really big! And it is really fancy! Norman Niedel said to me, `I can not get over this hotel. This is the nicest hotel I have ever seen. It is just amazing.' And over the week, as we went to different functions in The Grand America, I came to the same awe.
As we were leaving, Amos Nur came out, and we ended up talking to him for a couple of hours. Amos is a professor at Stanford and an entrepreneur. I have referred to his talk on gas hydrates a couple of times (../9908.html and ../0124.html), his work tieing earthquakes and middle east archaeology (0213.html), and the fact he is a co-owner of VRMT and Emerald and on the Board of Directors of Emerald (0228.html and 0229.html). As I described how big the traps are in OPL-229, he said `That's really big! That's too big! People get assassinated for oil fields that big.' And his words rang true. It will be really interesting to see how this whole thing plays out over the next few years. Hopefully all of our wells won't be dry holes. It was a very interesting and a very exciting conversation. He had to catch a plane, and so we went back to the convention center and to the ice breaker.
The SEG Convention was similar to other SEG Conventions, which I have written about. The key difference was it was in Salt Lake City. Almost everyone I know made some mention about this being `my town' and it was interesting to hear their reactions to being in Salt Lake City. Of course, I did not have a booth to tend after. So most of my time was spent walking the floor of the SEG. And because I have been involved in the SEG for so many years, I can seldom walk four or five steps before someone comes up and starts to talk to me. These conversations started as soon as we got to the ice breaker. The registration folks had messed up Andrea's name badge and it read `Andrea/Roice' instead of `Andrea Nelson.' So instead of having them reprint it, she changed the nametag to read `Andrea/Roice's Wife.' Everyone she pointed this out to got a kick out of it.
We were in the midst of a conversation with Wulf and Georgeanne Massell and Kwame Owasu (a Ph.D. geophysicist from Nigeria I worked with at Mobil and with Wulf) and a lady from Norsk Hydro Kwame had worked with when Sara Ellyn called. Thanks for calling Sara. I really do appreciate your efforts to keep in touch and the interest you express in my life. I am very much looking forward to coming to Austin on November 1st and spending some time with you. And, of course, I am looking forward to our camping trip sometime later this year. Hopefully it will be the first of many family camping trips. I am sorry I didn't take you camping when you were growing up. I was told girls didn't like to camp, and I mistakenly believed those words. It was fun to call last night and interrupt your laughter and the fun you were having with your roommates. You are very special to me.
Ben also called during the SEG Ice Breaker with new cell numbers for him and Sarah. It was too late to call back by the time I realized I had missed the call. Sometimes when traveling the phone goes right to messages, and I never hear it ring. I expect celluar telephone technology to get better and better each year for the next decade. Within a few years the cell phone will become an extension of my body that is only not available when I do something like take my glasses off. Ben, thanks for your efforts to keep in contact. I mentioned a few weeks ago (0232.html), it seems easier for me to tell Daniel Yergin, someone I don't really know, in an e-mail, how proud I am of you and how well you are doing, than it is to tell you. I don't know how to describe the joy in my heart as I listened to Ethan say his first sentances to me last night. I just hope to get my finances in order and to find more time to come and visit more regularly, so there are not the big discontinuities in keeping up with you and yours.
I've missed talking to Roice the last couple of weeks. When we have talked he also seems preoccuppied with getting his finances in order. I guess I have passed on more than just genes. I realize Roice doesn't read these Thoughtlets right now, and yet I believe in my heart I am still writing them to him as well as to Matt and the rest of you. Matt doesn't read them either, and that's OK. They are available if there ever is a desire to read them, and hopefully before too much longer there will be a search engine and indexing tied to the on-line thoughtlets which will allow you to ask questions and get my suggestions based on lessons learned in my life. When I do get to talk to Roice, he seems happy, and to be enjoying his work. He is so intelligent it is somewhat intimidating to me. And he is so kind and gentle in all of his conversations and interactions I see. These characteristics make me proud to have him carry my father's and my name.
I have missed talking to Rob for the last couple of years. It was really good to see him at Ethan's party. I was dissappointed to learn after the fact, when Melanie and Jared visited this weekend he was interested in going to a movie with us. Oh well! I don't know what to do to help Rob and his anger. On Monday morning, shortly after I arrived at the convention, I was cornered by a venture capitalist from Salt Lake who was looking for someone to do some due diligence on a possible investment. He was a dentist before making a nest egg with rental property, and we had a good time talking about our mutual interests. His philosophy of `More good is better!' is very similar to my vision statement: `Continuing to make a positive difference!' He has been involved with electric cars, improving schools and education, and drugs and alcohol detoxification. As I listened to his comments and experiences, I couldn't help but feel there are multiple, holographic if you will, reasons why we were introduced to each other. Maybe as I learn more about his programs, there will be things that will be of interest and of help to Rob and others that I know and care about. Rob has such a good heart, can be so kind and caring about others, and it hurts so much for a father to see him struggle so, and not want any contact nor help. Time will tell, and hopefully it will show how much I care and that I was of help and a real Dad for Rob.
I spent Monday and Tuesday at the convention, making contacts, talking about the work I have been doing at Dynamic and when appropriate the work I have doing with Emerald. For instance, Blaine Taylor is interested in supporting the Knowledge Backbone(SM) at Emerald. There were several meetings with Xu Wenrong, President of BGP (the Bureau of Geophysical Prospecting, see 0225.html). The BGP had one of the largest booths at the SEG. It will be very interesting to see how effectively the BGP is at competing with Schlumberger and Halliburton over the next few decades. He was particularly interested in Grid Computing, as provided by Tom Eliseuson's company DataSynapse. Tom is typical, and yet a typical in his impact on my life, of my SEG contacts. We have been friends since the Seismic Accoustic's lab days at the University of Houston. We have worked on several projects together. He brought me to Minneapolis each summer for several years to speak at the CDC Executive Seminars (Control Data Corporation). He got Control Data Capital Corporation to invest in Landmark (../9745.html), two of his co-workers were on the top floor of the World Trade Center when it collapsed, and he was supposed to be there (../0138.html and ../0150.html), and there is always a lot to catch up on when we get together. I won't bore you with call reports on all of the contacts and discussions at the SEG. I am at home with these folks, and I wish I had done a better job of bringing this really big part of my life into each of your lives. Oh well!
Monday evening, Andrea and I visited Bridget and Jason in their apartment. Other than the scary no light hallway by which we entered, it is a really neat place. Bridget asked about each of you, and I'm sure she would like to get an e-mail talking about what each of you are up to every once in a while. Some of this is covered in the Thoughtlets, and probaby not enough of what you are doing. She was very excited about Melanie's scrapbooking business. We took them to the Landmark SEG party with us. It reminded me of the Cray SEG parties, just before Cray imploded. It was at Port-of-Call, the Olympic Party Bar. It was loud and noisy and lots of alcohol and good food. What a way to spend Family Home Evening. I was glad to leave, even though it was good to see friends and co-workers.
Later, as Andrea and I were driving back to Provo, the cell phone rang. It was President Pickerd. He wanted to talk to both of us on a land line at our earliest convenience. Andrea gave him Randy's number, and he called about 11:00 Utah time. Andrea and I joked as we travelled to Provo, he should have called a half our earlier when we were at Port-of-Call with the loud band playing, and I could have asked him to wait for me to step out of the bar so I could hear him. He told us David Moore was coming home from the Missionary Training Center for a few months, and since his parents are in Indonesia he had asked if he could stay with his Home Teacher in Houston. So this is how we found out we have a new son for the next little while. Matt is very excited about this change in having David around.
Andrea had some very special missionary experiences with some of the wives of folks I have known for years. It will be interesting to see where all of this goes. I could write another epistle about all of the things that happened in Salt Lake, and I won't. At least at this time. I expect there will be really big events down the road, which will justify writing about their seeds and keeping them all in context. So I will wait until then to describe all that happened. I will simply say she took a couple of ladies to temple square, met several at the the spouses luncheon, visited Park City and the olympic venue, and visited with others at the President's Reception, the Saudi Aramco Reception, at the President's open house, and when listening to Peter Duncan and friends playing guitars.
When we left for Cedar City and La Verkin on Wednesday morning we had a lot of stuff to think about. It was good to see Mom. Both Andrea and I thoroughly enjoyed watching the video tape of the television special about Cedar City in the 1950's. Hopefully we can get a copy and everyone can watch it when you are all here at Christmas. It was too quick of a visit, and hopefully I can go to Southern Utah and spend a few days visiting with Mom. Andrea stopped in Washington to see her friend Carole. They are funny together. We stopped and saw Steve Shirts and his family. We had a nice family dinner at Milt's with Heather, Audrey, Rachel, Brian, Sara, Des, Grandma Shirts, Andrea, and myself. Thursday we got to stop in Provo and take some digital photos of Grant. And we were back in our house late Thursday evening. It seems Matt did really good without us. Maybe he is becoming too independent.
Friday morning was catch-up. I spent the afternoon with Jude, Emmanuel, Vince, Roger Anderson, and Albert Boulanger. What a neat team. It will be interesting to see where all of this goes. Jude's trip to the Middle East went well, and he hopes to see cash by the first quarter of next year. Friday afternoon David Moore moved in to Rachel's old room. Friday evening Andrea and I went to a `Brother's Hobby Dinner Group' at Bishop Camp's with the Gebauers, Salts, and Schultzes. Fun evening, and time limits my comments.
Saturday Melanie, Jared, and Colby Cade came to stay with us. We went to Matt's soccer game and see `Four Feather's' in the evening. I'm not exactly sure why, and it was really nice to have family come to church with us. I was substituting for Sister Peterson, and so was not able to go to Gospel Doctrine with Melanie and Jared.
I would like to close this Thoughtlet with comments by Jeff Jurinak in priesthood opening exercises. He described taking Jarard to General Priestood Meeting the Saturday before (0240.html). He pointed out how this was his first time to go to a live conference session, and how the conference center is really big. He pointed out how two- dimensional the television view of events are. For instance, when we see a building on fire, or a car explode we do not feel any of the heat or the pressure we would feel if we were standing at the same place as the camera taking the pictures was at. He and Jarad were sitting about 8 rows from the podium. As he described the power eminating from the Brethren as they called the Priesthood to repentance as real, tangible, a confirmation that this is the power by which the worlds were and are made, I knew in my mind and in my heart that his words were important and describing something important and really big."