Never Learning Cursive

This story is about the profound influence an individual has had on my life who I have never met - well at least we never met in this life.   Let me start by recounting my first experience when attending an Elders Quorum meeting.  For those who are not LDS, young men who turn 18 and are considered worthy are ordained an Elder and join a quorum of adult male priesthood holders with whom they meet every Sunday.  I remember being rather intimidated by meeting with approximately 30 adult men who were all older and more experienced than me.  The lesson that first Sunday was on controlling our speech, with an emphasis on refraining from swearing.  

Near the end of the lesson, Ed Sharp (a man about 45 years of age) raised his hand and said he had an experience that he wanted to share.  He said a few years before while working in the early morning hours of a graveyard shift at the sugar beet factory in Nyssa, Oregon, the large conveyor belt broke that carried all the sliced beets into the factory.  It took quite a while to stop the beet cutting operation and so several tons of sliced beets spilled out all over the front part of the sugar factory creating a huge mess and effectively shut down the factory.  He watched as the foremen and mechanics arrived and said each of them began swearing and uttering profanities because of all the trouble this would cause.  He then said Lorin Goates, the Assistant Superintendent who was in charge of this shift and managing the approximately 60 men who were working, came on the scene.  Ed said everyone was quiet while my father surveyed the situation, and then my father said, "Well, I'll be darn!"  Ed went on to say that my father immediately began giving orders as to what various individuals were to do to clean up the mess, repair the equipment, and get the factory back into operation.

A cursive weapon when combined with manure

I could tell that Ed Sharp and the others in the Elder's Quorum were impressed by that story and the fact that my father, the person with the responsibility to make that shift productive, didn't resort to swearing in the midst of what was viewed as a horrible problem.  My father's reaction, however, was no surprise to me because I knew he didn't swear.  I had spent many a cold morning with my father milking cows at 6 a.m. in the winter, when the temperature was below freezing and a cow would step on your foot, kick you, or swish you with their tail that was covered in manure.  Under those circumstances, when no one of any importance is around and a cow's tail just covered your face with manure, there is an excellent opportunity to express oneself with language that would not be appropriate for church.  I would like to say that never happened, but in fact I have seen it all happen to my father while milking cows.  I mean I have seen it all happen except for the cussing and blaspheming, because I never heard my father swear - not once.

Clara Evan Goates

It would be another 20 years before I learned why my father never swore.  It was while driving across Oregon with my oldest sister Irene to visit our parents decades later that I recounted the Elder's Quorum story above and commented on never hearing father swear.  She then said, "Well, you know why don't you?"; and then, because I had no idea, she explained it was because his mother had made him promise when he was a little boy that he would not swear or take the Lord's name in vain.  Most little boys would not be able to keep such a promise, but my father could and would keep his promise.

Clara Evans Goates and children

While I have incredible respect for my father, it is my widowed grandmother, Clara Evans Goates, who amazes me.  This woman would die in the Spanish Influenza epidemic of 1920, twenty-seven and a half years before I was even born, and yet her influence on me is profound.  It starts with having a father who didn't swear, but he also didn't drink or smoke (another promise he made to his mother) and was morally clean (also something he promised her).  

My father didn't lose his temper, because it seems that if you can control your language, you can also control you anger.  My father was physically very strong, but I was not afraid of him because his temper never got the better of him.  I have seen fathers who when they felt challenged, fought with their sons; it is ugly and no one is the winner, no matter who comes out on top.  But that never happened to me and I credit both my father and my grandmother.  I have a deep debt of gratitude for Clara Evans Goates for how deeply she has blessed my life; and all because she made a little boy make promises to her.