Just How We came to Such a State as This Without Really Trying

Kristina Mikkelson Casanova Dec.12,2017

Part One

  It started a few years back when we were living in Spanish fork Utah and taking care of my mother in our home. That was a very hard time as she had become quite senile and hardly knew me let anyone else. Those were very difficult days and if you knew the way in which the whole thing came about.....well maybe will tell you sometime but not now. She was becoming harder and harder to manage and then one day she collapsed and died in my arms. Was a nightmare from that point on.

Within a week Pete was laid off and has internet business went out of existence and we were broke .

We both tried finding jobs but when you are our age it is almost impossible and so it was. We had no choice to but to sell our house or it would have been foreclosed and we did not want that on our records. So we sold it and moved down to Sanpete county Utah on five acres of land in a old 1980s trailer. We had to sell and give a lot away but still had a lot of things that we wanted to keep so we set up a few tents near us to hold our things including my large paintings and supplies.

I was very depressed for a long time and cried a lot. This was not how I imagined spending my later life.... it was what it was and I just had to deal with it .but living in a tiny 32 foot trailer was hard to get used to after living in our beautiful house and I missed my house so very much.

A few years went by and I was sick..breathing problems and other things. I was allergic to a plant called Russian Nap weed as well as pine and juniper trees which were quite abundant on the place. And after some complications with the people who had sold us the property..(.they being dishonest ..and used forms that were not legal.)..we basically were forced to leave and this time even more of our belongings were given and thrown away.

/The only place left to us was an RV park in the town of Mt. Pleasant...a few miles away. Not a pretty place and very crowded with trailers and RVs and so very noisy. I really hated it and if it had not been for our wonderful neighbors Amanda and James..I do not think I would have handled it very well. After a year of this terrible way of living Pete and I decided that we had had enough. We wanted to go see places and enjoy the beauty of America so we bought an old truck that matched our old trailer and took off for Idaho.

It was sad to say good bye to James and Amanda and I missed them as soon we left the RV park but we just had to do this..we just had to go.

I remember that day...May 9 as we left the town of Mt. Pleasant....this ten hour trip ahead of us would take forever. We passed through Provo and drove the very crowded highway of Salt Lake city...past Ogden where the traffic started to lighten and on up to where we entered Idaho.

I felt a little fear on entering Idaho..not really knowing what to expect. It was a life changing moment and I knew it (and boy was it life changing . The scenery changed..everything changed and after a very big rig almost hit us as he went around us on the curb of the interstate (was that scary)..we found ourselves in the land of IDAHO LABS...a 850 square mile underground,privatized secret lab whatever. It honestly felt like what I imagined Area 51 to feel like. Miles of underground experiments I guess. but the whole length of the highway was being watched.so we hoped that we did not have to stop for anything .

Finally we pulled into Arco also called Atomic city as it was the first all atomic powered city in the world......and we had reached our destination.

Will have to go on with this story tomorrow for it is long and very strange. Lots of things happened so until tomorrow I bid you good night my lovely friends,