Heather was moved to the mental hospital and life in our home seemed so much more peaceful. My parents were both working full time still and while Heather was in the care of the state, my parents still had custody rights and therefore had to pay part of her expenses. Over time various therapist would try new things with Heather, we watched her get moved from place to place, treatment centers all over Utah. My parent maintain custody because they wanted a say in what happened, wanted to be informed but ultimate the bills for Heather's vandalism kept racking up. Eventually they had to turn custody over to the state completely.
In the mean time I continued with my high school education. I discovered one of the counselors at the school had horses and I started spending a lot of time out at their ranch. They were good people who hoped to help a lot of youth by starting the very kind of therapeutic facility that Heather often went to. I was skeptical of their ability, because I knew from my experience of living with her that none of their intentions would be enough for her. But I hoped they would help some other kids. I was just grateful for a chance to be riding again.
Eventually the High School I was going to had an issue with the deal we had worked out. It was actually a school intended for troubled students that had suffered in regular classrooms and needed smaller class sizes for their teachers to be more effective. Other kids complained about my being allowed to skip class and my grades had been so well maintained that half way through the year they suggested I attend the High School closer to home. I hated the idea. I knew I wouldn't be able to go out to the Sterlings Ranch anymore and I didn't like the classroom setting. There were teachers with unreal expectations, boring lectures, and many of the other students were rude. But I was ready for home school again either. I was 14 and in 9th Grade.
I transfered to the new school and started attending classes. Classes were as boring as ever but I did start to meet a few fun people and started enjoying the social scene a little more than previous years. At lunch I would sit with various different groups, the science geeks, the drama nerds, the "goths" that weren't really goth. I hated Jock Hall and never went there. I was invited to attend football and basketball games, theater shows and dances. Usually I was invited by my friends C..J. or Robin, girls I came to know along the way.
That summer I worked for a man name Dwayne Haskell. He was very much the western cowboy, brown leathery wrinkled skin, and an attitude. I didn't like Dwayne a lot, but he tried hard to teach me and I tried hard to learn. It was a long summer.
In my 10th grade year I continued to attend the high school and while I enjoyed some of the things I learned in various classes, other required courses still bored me entirely and I could never understand why some of my class mates even bothered to show up. I loved my drawing and english classes, they were easy and interesting to me and the teachers appreciated my efforts. My history teacher had a way of talking that was hard to stay awake through. I don't remember what spanish I was told and Math was a toss, I was good at it but it was boring.
Since I was 15 that year, Utah had a deal that you could start Drivers Ed at 15 years and 6 months and get a learners permit until you turned 16, so that fall I started Drivers Ed.
Drivers Education was so much fun! Payson High school offered a class with cars and a parking lot for lots of practice driving before we hit the road. I got to be the volunteer that wore the funky glasses that tricked my brain to see things as if I were intoxicated. The humor in this is my instructor asked me to try to walk a straight 10 foot line. I was laughing so hard I couldn't take one step! He said I should definitely never drink and drive. I never thought I would anyway... I got a free t-shirt for volunteering.
Practicing in the school parking lot was so easy to me. See, my parents had let me steer the car around an empty church parking lot MANY times, they usually controlled the pedals until I could finally reach them. So for me it was a breeze, but for many of my classmates it was all new. I never LIKED parallel parking but I wasn't horrible at it. I still don't know why we practiced figure 8s backwards, but it was fun.
By the end of Drivers Ed I felt pretty good about being able to drive on the road except for one thing... It was terrifying to be in the drivers seat, so close to that yellow line that was supposed to keep drivers on their own side of the road. I could see other people hugging that line and was terrified that if I got too close we'd be in a head on collision. My poor Mother did not like being in the passenger seat as I hugged the white line or if there was no white line, I hugger the curb. Eventually I got over it, and actually started driving the speed limit instead of 5 miles slower. I grew more confident in my ability to handle the vehicle at high speeds.
As part of the requirement to get your drivers permit, we were required to get a number of practice hours at night with our parents. My parents hardly ever went out at night, so we planned a special trip to get the hours done all at once. We loaded up in the van and my parents switched off who would be co-pilot, while the other would sleep in the back. We drove all night, from Payson, Utah, to Vernon, Utah, and home again. It was a very mountainous terrain and right before we entered Vernon we came through an area FULL of deer! I had to slow way down for almost a full hour, surrounded by deer that might choose to enter our path at any moment. My dad said later he was actually glad I was driving because he probably would have gotten impatient and sped up anyway.
With my drivers permit in hand I drove my parent's Camero all over town. I couldn't get a job till I turned 16 so I made due with taking my parents to run errands whenever the opportunity arose.
