Once Upon a Time in 1984, I met this boy. He was in my family home evening group, infact I think he was the Dad. He was funny, nice, smart, a good listener, kind, thoughtful, rode a motorcycle, cool, older than me, silly, strong, helpful, easy to be around and nice to look at. Through my last year of college in Provo, I got to know this boy or young man and he became a friend.
Somehow, Linde, my room-mate was able to talk him in to going to Preference with me in the fall of 1984; I'm still not sure how many cookies or pies she had to make him as payment, but I'm sure there must have been some sort of payoff to get him to go with me. See, I was not very confident, didn't date much at all, always carried around extra weight, wore big glasses and had skin that was either broken out with pimples or blotchy because of being extra sensitive. So I really couldn't compete with all the "BEAUTY" that was on the BYU campus and elsewhere in Provo. However, I always had a dream that someone might come along that would look beyond the surface and find something to be attracted to. (Someone did..but that would be 10 years later!) So, when Linde told me that Butch said he'd go with me to preference, I was in shock! Actually, I was so nervous I thought I might throw up. To be that close to someone that good looking for a whole evening, I wasn't sure I could even stand up. I'd probably known Butch for a few months and I'm sure he was very kind, but I honestly don't remember much up until that particular moment when Linde gave me the news.
I wish I could tell you that it was a magical evening, in which we danced all night and I lost my glass slipper at the stroke of midnight, he found it and searched the campus for me, found me, the shoe fit and we lived happily ever after...but that would not be true, or my life story. I don't have the best memory. I do however, remember wearing a purple jumpsuit. Sitting in the front seat of Dallas's car with Linde and Dallas; while Butch sat in the back seat with Lisa and Steve. I can say that I remember Butch and I danced most of the time we were at the place we went..which was called Xenons (LOL). I can say Butch was a pretty good dancer and I am sure I had a good time, because I have a ward bulletin that Lisa and I wrote notes on to each other the day after the event, and the things we wrote indicated that it appeared to be a success. To my knowledge that was the only time I ever did anything that would be considered a date with Butch. I do not have any pictures of that event. It is the only Preference I don't have pictures of. I didn't really even write much about it in my trusty journal. I said I had a good time, and that I'd write more about it later..but later didn't happen. I went on to have a few days worth of a crush on Butch and then soon someone else came in to my view and I set my sites on him.
I can say that Butch did accept invitations to be my "guest" for dinner from time to time, and I always appreciated that. I can also say, that Butch and I became better friends as the school year went on. He was my brother, but not really, cause I did always kind of have this attraction to him that I don't really feel for my brothers.
I left Provo in the Spring of 1985 to return to Las Vegas and work. Below is a picture that was taken the day I left. Mike, another FHE brother and friend, on my right and Butch, on my left. Yes, I had a ,RED, BYU shirt. I can remember that Butch gave me a ride on his motorcycle that day and I cried when I said goodbye to him. I honestly thought I'd never see him again. I had hopes that we'd keep in touch, but I wasn't going to expect that.
Well, one year later, in the summer of 1986 I returned to Provo. I was able to get back in touch with Butch. Actually, I don't think we really lost touch that year. I think we talked on the phone a few times and Bev and I visited him on a trip we made during that year. We would see each other from time to time during the next 2 years and again, he'd come to dinner when he could.
Below is a dinner in which room-mates were inviting guys they wanted to get to know better or were interested in and I invited Butch to be my "guest"
Bev, Ken Nealy, Julie Hopkin (Nealy)..yep, they got married! Butch and I. The pic. is old and dark, so I lightened it a bit on the computer. I think this is one of my favorite pictures that we are in together, probably because I actually got to sit by him.
In this pic. Bev is sitting by Bill, the guy she wanted to get to know better!
I think this was on a visit Bev and I made to Provo before moving back in 1986. As you can see Butch liked motorcycles and I wore BIG glasses.
In 1988 I left Provo again. This time for good. My sister, Bev, remained in Provo going to school. At some point she lived in the same apartment complex as Butch, so we still kept in touch. That summer Butch agreed to come to Fairview, Utah and hang out with our family for the 24th of July. We went to a rodeo and camping and fishing. It was then that I noticed that I had a different kind of feeling when I was around him than I'd had before. I was single, he was single, we'd known each other for a whole whoppin 4 years. But, alas, I was living in Las Vegas and he was living in Provo for the time being. Plus, to my knowledge he wasn't having that same feeling. Soon I found out that he had made the decision to enlist in the Army. I was interested in that decision and at a later dinner at Bev's apartment, I listened to him tell his reasons for going in to the army. I do have that written in my journal and it's Butch's story, not mine, so I'll leave that out. However, when I found out that he was going in to the army, I had this distinct impression that I wanted to do something that would keep us connected. So, at the time friendship bracelets were in style and I learned how to make one. I made two, one for Butch and one for me. They were blue, grey, green and maroon. I don't have a picture of them. I just didn't take many pictures back then, I'm not even sure I had a camera. I do remember giving it to him and how it felt and recently he told me he wore it for quite awhile. I wore mine for a few years and one day took it off. I thought I put in away in a jewelry box, but I've not found it. I talked to Butch before he left to go to basic training in 1988 and I wrote in my journal that we both told each other that we loved each other. That was the last time I would speak to him or hear from him until the beginning of the year 2000. That was the year we bought our first computer and I was introduced to the internet and email. One evening Eric was looking on a website that had information about the area he had served his mission. He showed me how he'd found some old mission companions. I really don't know how...but somehow I remembered which mission Butch went to and I looked for him, and still to this day I am so surprised that I found him and that he responded to my email. Well, over the last 10 years we have corresponded with hundreds of emails and instant messages, talked on the phone and gotten together for "meals" with other old friends, he even agreed to attend a Rick Springfield concert with me, Lisa, Linde, my sisters and their spouses (It's okay, Eric would have gone if he could have, but he was getting his Master's degree at the time). Butch has spent time with my family, my parents, siblings and really we feel like Butch is just another "Sanders".
I won't tell you Butch's story, because this is my story, but I will tell you that life has not been easy for my friend. These days, I find him to be funny, smart, kind, a good listener, interesting, easy to be around, thoughtful, generous, cool, strong, supportive, patient, a loving father, charitable, cautious, someone I confide in and trust, someone I share off the wall things with, he's well read, long-suffering, still riding motorcycles when he can, contemplative, older than me, spiritual, charismatic, hard working, still nice to look at and one of my best friends.
Just last night he came to dinner as our "guest". (And yes, I forgot to take pictures) I don't get to see him as often as I'd like, but I truly value each time I do get to be around him. I enjoyed listening to Eric and Butch conversing with each other. I told Butch I wanted to make him a survival bracelet. I'd learned how for a relief society retreat, I had to learn how and teach other women how to make them. From the first time I actually made one, the memory of that friendship bracelet, the only one I ever made, came back to me and I wanted to make a survival bracelet for Butch. When I told him about it, he wasn't put off by it, he didn't tell me to go jump in the lake or pond, he said he was excited and he'd wear it. So I made one for him and I know it has it's purpose, ways that can help a person survive if need be out in the wilderness. However, when I helped him fasten it on, for me it became a full circle moment. A symbol of being connected, another friendship bracelet. I know a bracelet, ring, jewelry or any other outward symbol does not keep two people connected. It's actually years and years of working at it, of wanting to be connected, of prayer, of not giving up even when disappointments come, forgiveness, acceptance, saying "I love you" over and over and over again and meaning it every time, listening to the person as well as to promptings that come from a higher source, and realizing the worth of a beautiful human soul. As I made that orange and black survival bracelet it reminded me that we are given friends as gifts to help us survive this wilderness called our earthly life. Friends make it more bearable on the hard days, happier on the good days and sweeter as we say goodbye to our youthful days. I hope and pray that friendship will go on in to the eternities, that the connections made here will continue after this life. I know what it's like to be disconnected from my friend, Butch, and I prefer being connected.
(This is the Reader's Digest version of "A Story", someday I might just write the intricate details in a book, but only if Butch will let me.)
