This blog is going to become the repository of whatever recollection I have about my life that I want to record, whatever philosophic statement or observation I want to record, etc. It will be a resource for an eventual memoir.

I have been living at the home of Shara Mitchell nee McConkie, my younger sister who was born Oct. 1, 1974. She is married to James Mitchell, born three years to the day after me, on Oct. 13, 1971. I came down here on the evening of Thursday, Feb. 16, 2012, to finish recuperating from brain surgery and to work on some sort of book or other writing project with Shara's aid.

I have a hard time starting a memoir because I can't imagine actually telling my whole life story and trying to publish it. Also, I need to gather material. I can't get a satisfactory start on a fiction piece because I still suffer from imploding motivation (otherwise known as writer's block). I get what I consider excellent ideas but I don't get far with them.

I'm enjoying my time with my nephews Parker, Braden and Alex, and niece Sarah. They are ages 6 through 15 or so and all brilliant; I am particularly enjoying Parker and Braden because they are the more talkative ones, and their IQs are phenomenal and they aren't frivolous. Parker is deeply interested in astronomy, space travel and physics; Braden and I share deep interests in knives, guns and politics. Braden is a prodigy who started making his own knives from rebar on a home-made charcoal forge he designed himself last year at age 12. Earlier this week I helped him polish and sharpen a spectacular curved knife he'd made and we were both delighted, though he most of all.

I have engrossing conversations with these lads, and also with Shara and occasionally James when he isn't working (he's an accountant who owns a bookkeeping company in St. George and this is tax season).

The boys are so intelligent, with such retentive memories and inquisitive minds, that I actually find myself forgetting that they haven't had time to learn as much as I have. Well, not exactly, but I occasionally assume they know things they don't, just because for so long they've been bowling me over with how much they do know that I've started assuming they know almost everything. I can have great conversations with them without having to start from the absolute basics; they know the lingo and the background of so many things. And they listen. They're interested. And when they talk they're fascinating.

All this may sound excessive. But one of the great joys of my life this last year, second to being reunited with my children, has been getting to really know the children of my older sister Charlotte and now Shara. This family is blessed with the most intelligent and interesting people. I didn't realize when I was young that all my siblings were exceptionally bright; I just thought most people were exceptionally stupid, partly because I was the more verbal of the original three kids -- Charlotte, me, Anthon -- and Shara's verbal gifts didn't manifest until I was a teenager who didn't care because she was a precocious sister who I mostly found a pest. Only after I returned from my military service did I find how delightful and bright she was.

The last two additions to my mother's brood, Petrice and Andrew -- her offspring span 22 years --  were still very young while I was around after military and mission, and not until the last couple of years did my youngest brother, Andrew -- born the day before my 20th birthday -- start talking much. Then I discovered that he is also incredibly bright. Petrice was never reticent and I realized some time ago she was not only remarkably outgoing, charming and uplifting, but intellectually gifted.

It's not boasting because it's not my possession to boast of, it's only my great fortune to acknowledge and be grateful for. What a blessing it is to have brothers and sisters, nephews and nieces, who are so bright and fun to be around. My oldest niece, Story, is the first of the rising generation to marry, and she selected a man of no less gifts than herself, Oscar Mendez, one of the world's truly delightful and sharp-witted men.

OK, I will end here. I will not worry that individual entries are incomplete and fragmentary. The purpose is to record data and impressions as they occur to me, and at some unknown time use them as a resource for an organized memoir.

Cheers,

D. Preston McConkie