Favorite Story From My Grandmother

Today would have been my Grandmother's 96th birthday. I miss her. I was thinking about her this morning and pulled out her life history that she wrote a number of years ago. As I was reading I came upon the following story. It is one of my favorites. It communicates so effectively the great faith this woman had.

"We were approached one afternoon by a person from the Washington State Highway Department. He informed us that the state would like to buy some of our acreage as a new highway was to be constructed and it had been surveyed through our land. Not only did he tell us that, but he also said that the highway was to be constructed in such a way that we would lose the use of our barn. That came as a shock as losing the barn was tantamount to going out of the dairy business! Compensation was paid according to the present value of the barn and as the barn was quite old, payment would not be sufficient to build a new one. We were trying to pay off debt an did not want to borrow more money in order to build a new barn and keep in business. Nevertheless, there was nothing to be done about it and after negotiating for what seemed to be the most payment that we could possibly expect, we signed the right-of-way permission papers. Sometime later construction was begun on the new road.

I need to explain that the barn was situated on a hill which had the road going north and south on the east end, a gully on the north side, the hill was cut off and steep on the west end and the cows came up the hill on the south side, entering the barn beside the road on the east end of the barn. The reason that we were to lose the use of the barn was because the new road bed was going to be much lower than the barn and the banks on either side of the road at the point would slope back so far that there would only be 3 feet of clearance to the barn doors. That was not sufficient space to get the cows into the barn. Hence, the reason for the loss of use of the barn.

It was at this time that Heavenly Father intervened on our behalf. When the bull-dozer started to work on the road at the end of the barn, it did not get very far down into the earth until it was very evident that the machine could not scrape, push and level off the dirt at that particular place. There was a thick strata of blue clay! An engineer was called in for consultation and it was decided that the road bed would not be lowered much more than it was at that point. As a result the banks would not be sloped back so far as earlier indicated and we were left with plenty of room to get our cows into the barn.

We already had our payment. Everything had been legally settled. As a result we were allowed to keep our money and we paid off the mortgage on the farm. The barn is still being used by Stanley Cass who purchased the land when we left Skamokawa, moving to Cathlamet about 1968."

In General Conference this past weekend, the choir sang one of grandma's favorite songs, "I Wonder When He Comes Again." We sang it at her funeral (at her request) and whenever I hear it I can't help but think of this incredible woman. I love you Grandma and look forward to seeing you again! Thank you for your example and persevering attitude. You are truly a remarkable woman.