I spent April 18 through May 5, 2010 in our Park City, Utah home. My original plan was to fulfill a teaching assignment at Utah State University in Logan during the first week, spend the second week attending the National Genealogical Society Family History Conference in Salt Lake, spend a few days working on the Miller Eccles website, then return home. Dawn stayed home as she had classes to teach and had already traveled quite a bit recently.

The first week went according to schedule, as I drove to Logan and back (a three-and-a-half hour round trip) on Tuesday and Thursday (May 20 and 22) to teach in Dr. Philip Barlow’s Mormon Studies class. Dr. Barlow specializes in American religious history and religious geography. After graduating from Weber State University, he obtained a masters and then a doctorate in theology at Harvard Divinity School.[1] Phil and I serve together on the board of directors of Dialogue Foundation, publisher of Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. While visiting in his office we had a nice opportunity to discuss issues related to same-sex marriage and to get to know each other better.

Phil’s office is on the third floor Old Main, the iconic and historic building that a visitor first sees when approaching the college. It was there when my parents graduated from Utah State. Both of us treasure opportunities to exercise, so we walked up and down the stairs each time we went to Phil’s office. Continue reading →