Company Retreat

Some of you may know that I work with my husband at his mortgage business, Primary Residential Mortgage, Inc.  We recently spent some time in Moab with all of Britt's employees.  The word all sounds pretty serious, but it amounts to Kayela Bradford, his processor, Beverly Digiambattista, his underwriter, who lives in California and flew out for a meeting we had with local realtors, and Merri Shumway, his new assistant.  Yes, he just hired Merri to work in the office full time.  Does that mean I am out of a job?  Not exactly.  I just get to work on stuff at home now, which is lovely.

We spent a wonderful couple of days getting to know each other better, outside of the work environment, as we toured some of the awesome sites around Moab.  Of course, Arches is one of our new favorites:

I love this guy

Inside the frame created by the arch, if you look way in the distance, you can see two other arches on the horizon.  I guess Arches National Park is supposed to contain over 2000 sandstone arches within its borders. 

 Britt looks like he can take on the world, doesn't he?

This bowl beneath the arch is pretty cool, too.  It kind of seems like it ought to be a natural pool you could jump into.  Merri said the whole place reminded her a lot of Lake Powell, except without the water.  She used to practically live at Lake Powell.  Her father was the original owner of Halls Crossing Marina.

Looking at these pictures has been reminding me of something.  Several years ago--it would have had to have been 15 or more years--I tutored a Western Literature class at the college.  One of the books we read was Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey.  Toward the end of the quarter, we took a class field trip to Arches National Park, and hiked to Delicate Arch.  It was the first time I had been in the park, I remember, and my little brother Tim was one of the students in the class.  I loved the book!  In some ways, it is hard to think of the wonderland Edward Abbey loved so well being changed as it has since this park has become more popular.  Still, I have to say, we are grateful that we can enjoy the natural beauty that is contained within Arches National Park.

We are also grateful that our own little backyard, San Juan County, is mostly undiscovered.  When we want to go explore our world, we don't have to pay to enter a park.  We don't have to do litter patrol, or try to find animal tracks amidst all the human tracks.  We just pull out the GPS and wander to our heart's content, very rarely running into any other hikers along the way.  Call me selfish, but I like it this way.

I also remember that when we entered the park all those years ago, we were supposed to get a discount for being on an educational field trip, but the ranger there said she had to charge full price.  I remember about a week afterward, I wrote a letter of protest to the park, asking that they recognize the educational nature of the trip.  I even included specific references to the book in my arguments.  I wish I still had a copy of the letter.  Yes, I am bragging, but it was pretty well-written, if I do say so myself.  A few weeks later, the instructor of the class received a refund of the money she had been charged.

I think I am going to dig out some of those old pictures, just so I can show you my young self and my cute little brother Tim on our first hike out to Delicate Arch.  Not for a few days, though.

From now on, my Sundays will be computer and phone free.  I promised my husband, and now you are all witnesses.  I won't even be blogging.  Sorry.  See ya later.