Loose Cannons Memoir

….Just one fun fact about my childhood 🫣🫠😬!

On this PioneerDay, I am grounded to Mother Earth, connected my ancestors who bravely settled this beautiful valley, to my progeny, and most importantly to myself! ❤️

Considering Loose Cannons for a Book Club read? Consider how happy I am to join you! This group was so fun: smart, tough questions, shared stories, and lots of laughs. Let me know if if you’re interested in a gathering (in person or by Zoom) via the link in my bio.
📸 Thank you to my host, Brenda Moss, and this smart crew.

I haven’t been on Amazon in a minute—and to quote the reviewer above—JUST WOW!🤩 Loose Cannons has received 121 reviews already, with an average rating of 4.3/5 (a few disgruntled church members have had their say😏). It’s on sale right now, so if you haven’t read it yet or you’d like to share with someone, now’s a great time. Link in comments & bio to purchase.
🥰Thank you from the bottom, top, and middle of my heart.

Love these grandkids of mine + long, sunny days... Nothing says summer like standing in dripping wet swim trunks while contemplating whether to have a Drumstick or a PushPop😋
What is your favorite nostalgic frozen treat?

Happier times in Salina, UT: horses, cows and chickens replaced the vibrant big city residents I was used to in Salt Lake City. My life became filled with 4H, camping trips, and watching the girls barrel race in the local rodeo. My husband Ken taught Scott how to hunt and fish, and I was thrilled we had all bonded as a family. We all dove in and tried to adapt the best we could, eventually enjoying small-town life for what it was.

I’m taking a poll over on Instagram—so wild how much has happened since I submitted this proposal!
Which cover is your fave?

With Father’s Day just around the corner I’m reflecting upon my dad and his good moments. This picture on my wedding day is so sweet (but then I can’t help but think maybe he’s smiling here because I was one less kid to feed/worry about! 😅).
I remember there being a lot of chaos and anxiety around whether my mom would show up or not. She did, and it was super awkward, and as you can see in the second picture not only was she not included in the bridal party photo, my dad and stepmother (aunt) are the one’s centered, not the bride and groom. This speaks volumes to the omnipresent, patriarchal order in our family.
Father’s Day became more difficult to navigate after I found out at age 34 that my biological father was our New Mexico neighbor. 😥
This weekend I choose to focus on the terrific fathers in my life, including my son who I am so proud of. He has fulfilled his dream of being a husband and father and it has been inspiring to watch him grow through parenting his two beautiful boys (my precious grandsons).

Tune in Saturday at 8 am Mountain time for my conversation with Gary Calligas!

http://thebestoftimesnews.com/

Reviews give me such interesting and new perspectives, like this one which calls me a “child bride.” At the time it was considered normal to wed at 19, handed over from father to husband…but I was truly too young to know what I was doing. Thank goodness times have changed!
And thank goodness for those of you who have left reviews on Amazon, they are so valuable to authors (link in my bio 😉).

I am always so grateful when I can share my story with others, especially those who might be struggling as well. To have it featured in the Huffington Post is gratitude beyond measure!
📰 Direct link to the essay is in my bio.

Opening Day at/in the Wild!
🌼⛳️☔️

A FBF for my new followers…
💕

Does your family have any unique secrets? That you know of, anyway…

This photo was taken in January 1950, just after my mother and father were married. Their parents swept them off to Burley, Idaho for a secret “shotgun” wedding.
Mom was pregnant, so they conned the judge into to back-dating the wedding date from the actual date—January 30th—to January 3rd.

(And this wasn’t even the biggest secret they carried.)

~I ❤️ my readers~

My radio interview with Dr. Allen Lycka of “How to Live A Fantastic Life” is available!
Take a listen this weekend if you want to learn a little bit more about why I wrote Loose Cannons and how that journey has led me to a more joyous and happy life.

www.drallenlycka.com/184-find-what-gives-you-joy-and-happiness/

Sharing more of my painting process with this one of my parents, Ted and Joyce:
My only reference was this old black and white photograph when my mother was five months pregnant with me (I think one of my grandparents must have taken it). I painted the wallpaper from memory. It was hard not to take in their depressive moods while painting this! But the process really helped me unlock core memories while I was preparing to write Loose Cannons.

Now that I understand what they were going through at the time, I marvel at the fact that none of us were seriously hurt during the chaos (physically that is, emotionally we all carry scars).

🚬 Note the smoke rising from an ashtray on my mother’s armrest.🤰🏻😬

I wish I’d had a crystal ball when I was compiling my memoir…to be able to read even one of the many thoughtful reviews that were awaiting me would have been such a balm during the darker moments of reflection.
🔮💜
I so appreciate my readers.

The same Second Avenue house, painted by me in 2019 (ish). I hoped that by by revisiting the streets of my old neighborhood it would help spark memories of my childhood there, circa 1959-1967. A flood of memories (good and bad) came back to me and I immediately recorded them on my phone for my memoir. The process of then painting images from my childhood—each stroke a slow and deliberate action—was a challenging and cathartic deep dive.
Last month I cleaned out our storage room and started setting up my paint and brushes again. I wonder where they’ll take me this time?
Swipe to see current, happier times in the studio🎨….

An extraordinary setting and such a fun group in St. George this weekend for a book discussion. I would love to visit your book club, in-person or over Zoom. Link in my bio for more information or feel free to message me here.

My first review and one of my most meaningful. Warren Driggs’ memoir about growing up Mormon was instrumental in my journey writing mine. “Mormon Boy,” and his historical fiction on the life of Joseph Smith, “Swimming in Deep Water,” are fascinating micro- and macro- level investigations and reflections on LDS life.
📚

That feeling when your own book is recommended to you! 😂😍

Your reviews keep coming in and I continue to be so moved!
I plan to share some with you here as the first anniversary of Loose Cannons approaches…

Enough said! ❄️☃️🥶

It’s a long and winding road from temple garments to Victoria’s Secret…😉

The once deeply-guarded Mormon temple ritual “secrets” are now shared widely on the internet. In Loose Cannons I write at length about my personal pre-marital “endowment ceremony” experience at the LDS temple in Salt Lake City, including my struggle with “angel chaps” (the requisite LDS undergarments) and the bizarre, disturbing experience I had that day as a young bride-to-be. It didn’t bring me closer to the church~on the contrary I found it perverted and nonsensical, sentiments I was afraid to share with anyone. “I was so confused—people I cared about were getting deeper and deeper into this religion. I didn’t want to be isolated from everyone else and I didn’t need to be different, but I just wasn’t buying it. I tried to push my doubt aside, to pretend to be devoted and do what was expected of me, but I couldn’t shake away a new thought that had entered my brain: I was just a garment-wearing pawn in the grand theatrics of this absurd religion.”
✨
Read more in Loose Cannons and follow me on ~ link in bio.

My mother wrote constantly, throughout her life: journal entries, letters (some never sent), and poetry. It was likely her lifeline and a means of making sense of it all, as well as making amends, at least in her mind. I appreciate the bravery it took to let me read everything. Yesterday was her birthday, she would be 91.

This poem is from 2012:

MINE IS A LIFE

MINE IS ALIFE
LIVED FULL AND DEEP AND HARD.
IF I EVER SAW AN EASY WAY
I DIDN’T RECOGNIZE IT.
MAKING AMENDS BECAME
A DAILY MODE OF BEING,
SELF RESPECT,
A DISTANT GOAL.

SURVIVING TOOK
EVERYTHING I HAD
AND SOMETIMES MORE.
DRAGGING SEVERAL RUINED
LIFETIMES BEHIND ME,
I PLODDED—ONE FOOT THEN THE OTHER—
THROUGH WHATEVER
THE YEARS THREW IN FRONT OF ME.

IMAGINE MY SURPRISE
TO FIND, SOMEWHERE
IN THE THICK AND THIN OF IT,
AND WITHOUT EVER MEANING TO,
I BECAME AN OLD WOMAN
I RATHER ADMIRE.

-Joyce Cannon

How great! Wish they had this when my three were little:

Kids can bring their favorite stuffed animal for a tea party with hot cocoa and treats at the Sprague Branch. We'll play bingo and other games for a fun and relaxing winter afternoon. Registration is required. Parents and caregivers are welcome to join the fun! Sat, Feb 18 · 11am-12pm

https://events.slcpl.org/event/7591515