Neighbors or Family?

So about the time we were looking at this sunset on the Gulf Coast of Florida, my phenomenally good neighbor Greg Clark was holding a shovel and looking at a dead skunk in my backyard. The day he and his wife Linda discovered the

smelly invader, it was impossible to enter the immediate area to attempt to water our lawn, a task they had agreed to undertake while we were gone. The following day Greg buried the offensive creature, then put our fire pit grill lid over the top to mark the spot as well as to prevent the remaining neighborhood wildlife from digging it up.

So, what kind of neighbor does this kind of stuff? Um, the best kind. Other neighbors, Randy and Cathy, were watching our evil black cat, daily giving her food and attention. Randy somehow felt obligated to try to pet the cat. Yeah, the cat that consistently bites you after three strokes of her fur, all while sitting disrespectfully on your thighs, which she considers to be her territory even though they are attached to your body. The text conversation is on the right:

Sometimes folks just do stuff above and behind the call of duty. It doesn’t take long until you realize that these people are no longer just friends, but have become family. Or maybe they are family and you just don’t realize it.

Just last week, our Clark neighbors (yard waterers, buriers of the skunk) were over in the forest which is our front yard picking chokecherries off the trees there. As I chatted with them, they shared that they had gone to a family reunion in Oakley, Idaho and also visited Grantsville, Utah. I was surprised, as my Dad, Hal Wilson Walker, was born in Oakley and, back a ways, in my grandmother’s line, we have a relative with the last name Clark. We also have roots in Grantsville.

Yup. For the past 8 years, I’ve been living next door to my cousin 

(however distant) and didn’t even know it. And another relative, Jon Clark, had recently moved from a house just up the street. I did a little Web-digging and found some delightful information about the Clarks of Oakley on Jon Clark’s daughter’s blog (including the fact that the Clark’s bought the ZCMI store in Oakley, a location I am certain my father visited often as he referred to the store in number of his stories: http://almosthalfwaythere.blogspot.com/search?q=Oakley

It’s funny, because these are two men, and families, that I really like. I thought they were intelligent, creative, occasionally a little quirky, but always kind and filled with a sense of humor. How pleasant to discover that we share some of the same heritage and bloodlines. Funny how just a little knowledge can tweak your mortal perspective.

Our common ancestor is a guy named Thomas Henry Clark. He was born in Acton, Herefordshire, England in 1805—the same year as Joseph Smith. As a young man he was affiliated with the United Brethren, a religious group who listened to the gospel preached by a missionary named Wilford Woodruff and were baptized into the LDS Church. He sailed from Gloucester and emigrated to America and later led a group of Saints through Canada and down to Nauvoo. One of his descendants, David Mark Smith of Springville, wrote this about Thomas Henry Clark: “He was a great leader, a tough resilient pioneer, dedicated Bishop, zealous missionary and devoted family man. He was a man of many paradoxes, a noted athlete but a humble servant of God, he helped settle and defend a tough Indian territory but became highly respected and loved by the Native Americans, he experienced incredible hardship and tragedy both personally and with those he had stewardship over, yet he maintained a positive outlook and remained faithful in his beliefs and even showed, at times, a sense of humor.” (http://smithharper.org/docs/clark/thomashclarkbydavidsmith.pdf)

Sounds like some people I know, just subtract some Native Americans and add some leather gloves and skunks.