Back again! This road has changed.
No longer lay the marks
On open country lanes
That once spoke the story of an accident

Familiar streets invite me to turn
I heed & see places I know
Memories long lost surface & surprise
Forgotten scenes play like ten thousand movie reels cut, scattered & taped again

Long furrows carry life to fields of alfalfa
Fed from ditches that form the roads’ edge
Little league soccer conjures my own years on that grass
And a runner passes by…Yes. Yes, I remember those times!

The old school grounds – I walk, I jog, I sprint
One place I pass triggers names. A nearby mule brays
The next moment floods with faces. Two crows call unafraid
Here I am, the future, as a ghost, revisiting my past

So much built me, and this places is but one
Teacher, one time, one lesson, one story
Can I go back? No, it is never for us to do.
But forward I’m propelled by the thrust of these days

It was then that I began to live
And my inclination was to remain
But times changed & experience remained
As I stepped up to higher grounds

So, far away images now scatter my mind –
Pieces of the past, of me, oft unseen.
But I don’t look back for long
I keep moving forward

~ Ryan Mendenhall

May 15, 2010

Here’s how it all went down:

I went to see a friend run the Ogden Marathon and ended up traveling some familiar roads to familiar places. I drove into Plain City where I went one year to high school and played soccer. I didn’t know where I was, but one road seemed vaguely familiar and took me past an old friend’s house and to a field where I used to have soccer practice. As I watched the little kids play I recalled a scene there sitting on the grass with some friends. I sat reflecting I my car and a runner with a Fremont shirt passed by…my mind rushed with memories of the runs in high school on those same roads.

I drove away to find the school and traveled for a while on long country roads with a house ever so often and where the roads often turned for no other reason than to follow the ditch. I finally broke down and aided my intuition/memory with a small dose of technology. I texted Google for the address of the school. I was close, had driven right by it and not known. When I came upon it I smiled with a giddiness that I’m sure only made sense to me. I had decided to run that day up in that area…here it was to be, in the same place I had run perhaps a hundred times before. After driving slowly close to  the school to take it all in I parked in the drivers ed area just to the West of the stadium where I had run track as a Silverwolf. I took to that old raceway and remembered the uniforms, the relays, the cheering, the crushes.

I ran off and onto the soccer field, again memories flooded my mind. Sprinting the field the name Rodney Frojker popped into my head, I could see him playing with his knee brace. Tyson Craythorne. Micah Marsden (a name that came later, but I recalled him too). At another point on the grass a scene of a rainy game day flooded my memory as well as getting asked to a dance with Easter Eggs. I had to chuckle when I heard the mule bray. We had a mule when I lived in Hooper, Frank. I then ran over behind the school and along the path that we took to go to the institute.

I then ran out into the neighborhood behind. A hot day. Fields of alfalfa. People mowing, digging in their gardens, watering them. I waved to them, complimented them, etc All were nice. I felt like an apparition, touching, but not affecting their lives. It had been 15 years since I was there before. Amazing! I grabbed my soccer ball and played around a bit then sat on the football field and wrote the above poem. The school was abandoned. It didn’t click at first, but then when I wondered why students weren’t at sports practices I figured school had just gotten out for the year.

When I was done I packed up and headed South on the long road towards Hooper. I remember it being long, but it seemed longer this time. Hitting the T I turned out West. I was already so far west, but Hooper was further. The small country signs, green, white words & border approached and went. I passed Rocky Mountain Jr. High and curved around the road that took me south again. The road numbers started looking familiar and names of kids I used to know popped into my head as I drove by houses, Bingham, Greenwood, then a familiar corner appeared. I wasn’t sure it was my old one, but when I saw the old silos I knew it was the right place.

Miles, Christopherson, Strong. I turned North, that road seemed much smaller. Brody, Coroles, Paulsen the road ended & I went back to go down my old street. Kelso, Gray, OUR HOUSE! Well, I can say that I’m glad it was no longer purple, but it WAS different. The front ditch had been filled in, the tree in which our triangle tree house was no longer there, of course I could see that one coming since I had burnt it down by putting firecrackers in it :). We had a circular driveway and it now only had the west side curve, the other now grass. There were no more stairs, but rather an incline up to the front door, perhaps for a wheelchair? The back yard was fenced off so I couldn’t peek into the backyard filled with memories of the trampoline, Chinese stars at the barn, Shadow, diggin up horse poop, etc

I drove past it slowly as I did the school so I could let it sink in. Harames, Paulsen, the farm where we used to snag boxes of old doughnuts, find tunnels in & play in the big bails of hay, the slew that cut through our block which now seemed but a stream. My how things look different grown up.

I turned around and came back for one more look then turned south at the corner…the roads seem much smaller than they did when I was a kid. I remembered to go around the block was a real commitment! On the next corner I saw our second Hooper house which had also changed colors, no longer blue, but gray, a shade darker than the first house’s color. I turned there to eyeball it too, but there was someone out front mowing so I didn’t get all creepy on her. Byington…I turned around, I didn’t know anyone past that. Again, one more look at the house I kicked a soccer ball through the front window, found out that my sister was diabetic and stayed up all night to complete the school project of building a bridge out of small pieces of balsa wood.

I was now heading east, the direction I often stopped to look while in my front yard juggling the soccer ball because I hadn’t made the team. I got pretty good there. I guess practice does that…420 times I think my top was. I remember breaking 40 in the parking lot of some place in Hooper. But anyhow, I’d watch the mountains change to pink, purple, gold and crimson as the sun set out over the lake in the other direction. It was there I might just have learned to slow down & think, to reflect.

And something random – check out Homestarrunner for a fun high school experience.