Things I Miss #'s 19-22: More Newton Stuff

I knew there would be more Newton memories I would decide to add.  Here are a few:

#19- The Newton Sky.  I took for granted being able to see the stars when I was little.  When I was 12, we had a foreign exchange student from Paris visit for the summer.  I remember how amazed she was at the stars.  She had never seen them before living in the city.  That was unfathomable to me.   When I was a teenager, my dad was a bishop in a USU student ward.  Sometimes some of his students would come to our house to stargaze.  I thought they were strange.  When I moved out, I realized how many more stars you can see there than the small cities I have lived in since then.   I'm always amazed when I am at my parent's house at night and step outside and see the stars.  It's beautiful.

#20 - Softball Tournament.  Until I was a young teenager, Newton hosted a softball tournament every summer and for a week or so, our town park was the place to be.  They borrowed my dad's guitar amp every year to do the announcing and teams came from all over the valley to compete.  We loved hanging out up there and feeling a little taste of independence since our parents just let us be there with no supervision.  I was sad when they stopped the tournament.  There is something so fun about a softball game on a summer night.

#21 -The Beanery.  I guess this is technically a Cache Junction locale, and not Newton, but close enough.  When I was very little, there was a restaurant in Cache Junction.  Yep, the Cache Junction that is now basically a ghost town with four houses and a granary had a restaurant.  It was a big railroad stop when railroad was king and the restaurant was still open when I was little.  I was probably only six or so when it closed, but it made me very sad.  I remember that I loved their chili and that they sold t-shirts and I always tried to get my mom to buy me one.  I also remember that some of the teenage girls from town worked there and I hoped to be a waitress there when I was a teenager.  Big dreams.  I think it was mostly a hangout for old men, maybe kinda creepy old men, so my dad probably would've killed those dreams even if it hadn't closed.

#22 - The Newton Cafe.  For several years, there was a cafe in the back of the store in town.  Greasy, fried food at its finest.  I don't think it was the food I cared about so much as the fact that when I was a young teenager, my parents would let me meet my best friends there with no adult supervision.  I relished those kinds of experiences.  I have good memories of meeting my friends there and hanging out.  Loitering, I suppose you could call it.  No one seemed to mind, though.