I took a hiatus from blogging for a bit. I’ve been traveling for work and for fun and it’s been difficult to write. I’m home for the foreseeable future, however. So here’s to getting back into the routine!

More importantly, Owlbertson is back! I saw him in his tree a few days ago! I stopped to get a photo of him to post here, but as soon as I got out of my car he jumped down into the hole he likes to perch in and disappeared. So maybe that’s why I haven’t seen him in such a long time; it turns out he has a basement!

So, no photo. Sorry about that. Instead, here is a description of a conversation I had last night with a ten-year-old.

I went to see the Avett Brothers with some friends.  They were playing at this huge venue here in Utah called USANA, which is far away from downtown Salt Lake City, near the foothills of the Oquirrh Mountains. My friends each brought one of their children, which was fun. It also made us behave a little better than we sometimes do when we go to see live music when we are completely off Mom duty.

It was between sets and I suddenly smelled a cloud of marijuana funk wafting over from nearby. I could see on the kids faces that they registered the stink, and for some reason I decided to tell a fib about it. Maybe to protect their innocence just a little longer.

“Oh no,” I said. “Smells like there’s a skunk!”

“Yeah,” said the ten-year-old girl. “But where could it be?” looking around at all the people and wondering how a skunk could possibly be mingling among us without a mass freak-out.

I pointed toward the mountains just beyond the stadium. “Out there, somewhere, I guess.”

“Huh,” she said. “Must be. But the funny thing is, I went to a country music concert a few months ago, and there was a skunk there, too!”

“That is a coincidence!” I said.

It’s a lot harder to protect kids from the “skunks” of the world now that it was when I was growing up. Then again, I grew up in Utah County, the capitol of Mormondom, in the 80s, and we truly did have more skunks than joints. *Sigh.* It was a simpler time.

About Rachel Lewis

I am a writer, ceramic artist, knitter, and stepmom. As a playwright, I had six short plays produced in showcases and festivals in Manhattan, Salt Lake City, and Austin. My full-length play, Locking Doors, was presented by Wordsmith Theatre Company in The New Lab Theatre (University of Utah) in 2005. I co-wrote a teleplay titled “Thank God I’m Atheist” which won the 2015 “No God But Funny” contest founded by the Center for Inquiry. My short nonfiction essay, “It’s Coming Down,” was published by the online literary magazine Halfway Down the Stairs. My essay "The Red Rock Chronicles" was published in Contemporary West magazine. I currently work in pharmaceuticals professionally and write recreationally, but dream of making the transition to write professionally and do pharmaceuticals recreationally. I am a Utah native and live in Salt Lake City with my family and our Goldendoodle. I am working on a collection of humorous non-fiction essays and a second full-length play. Follow me at: rachelclewis.com @rachel_lewis_ut (Twitter) @rachel_lewis_ut (Instagram)

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