East of Eden Favorett

Time for a little catch-up posting on our Huntsville holiday (and then I am grounded from blogging until I clean my room ... like until November.) There's a Favorett that lies in a grave east of Eden. Sounds like a line from a celtic ballad (like one you might hear if you purchase a Fiddlesticks CD in time for Christmas.) No, really, there is a Favorett in cemetery in Huntsville, just up the road from Eden, Utah.

Lena Favorett Grow was my grandmother's aunt. My grandmother is also a Favorite as is my daughter. Somewhere the spelling shifted. From what I can gather Lena Favorett -- my great, great aunt -- was named for a relative who's name was Favor. Just like Hope, Faith, Prudence or Temperance, Favor (or Good Favor sometimes Goodie for short) was a 19th century, christian name. "Favorett" is the diminutive form of Favor, little Favor. Maybe she was named for her great, great aunt who was named Favor. The genealogy is very hazy on this point. Could it be my fore-mothers were given some of the first true Utah names? (Read "made-up".)


I don't know much about the first Favorett. Se died at 19 and her father was the Henry Grow who was the bridge designer responsible for engineering the SLC tabernacle. The next Favorite is legend. Grandma Fay was a character and a vision. She upholstered a piano in white vinyl with rhinestone studs and would dye her white hair slightly pink to match her cardigans. (She is quite famous in Alberta, Canada ... I dare say you might know someone who has an Aunt Fay orange roll recipe.)

My family is FLUSH with Fays as a middle name, but not one Favorite made it to the next two generation. It was the subject of much debate in my house and I all I will say is that I added the name to my baby's birth certificate when sweet Marco was away on business . . . in Calcutta. But that is a story for another day.

My two grandmas, Fay and Zina, were friends and would go on cruises to Hawaii together. (I will have to find a picture another day. But find one I will.) By giving my kid both of their names, I was hoping to bestow her with the hidden gifts. May she sew both fast and precise.

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Our other stop in Huntsville was the monastery of Trappist Monks. **Hey Marco, will you take a 10 minute mental health break and write up a brief description of this? Please include the words: bomb-shelter, apricot-honey, reverse-mortgage and monks who flirt with grandmas. Go!**

Marco's visit to the Monks.
Huntsville is known as the birthplace of David O. McKay, Mormon Prophet, but just up the hill a few miles you'll find the Abbey of Our Lady of the Holy Trinity, an Trappist monastic enclave that's about the last thing you'd expect in a rural Mormon town like Huntsville. It was founded by monks from Kentucky in 1947, and the post-war roots show: The entire complex is built of recycled army quonset huts that look like they could double as bomb shelters. The main chapel (where they meet to recite their prayers 8 times a day) also has the feel of a Washington DC metro station....

Between rising at 3:15 am for the morning vigil and retiring at 8pm after the last evening prayers (with six other common prayers chanted in between), they farm several hundred acres and keep bees and sell a variety of fruit-flavored honey. (You can check out their prayer schedule, and even see a video, at the monastery's website. ) It must have been quite an adventure for the young men that started it up all those years ago, but judging by the average age of the brothers we saw hobbling around, apparently it's getting harder to make recruits these days. A life of hard work, silence, poverty, and celibacy, no pay, no vacations. They probably don't get a lot of takers at college job fairs.

So it seems like the founders from 1947 are still the ones running the show now -- and they're starting to look a bit, um, past their prime. The monk at the gift shop, assured my mom (who must have looked like a fresh young thing to his ancient eyes) that "the ladies love the apricot-honey. Trust me, dear, you'll be back for more," he said with a sly wink. A bit cheeky, maybe, for a man of vows, but, hey when you're short handed you can't come down too hard on monks who flirt with grandmas.

("Are these people really my parents?")