Working hard (teenage years part 7)

Please be warned that this post contains details about my life that some might not be interested in reading. Any post marked as personal will contain events that are just that, personal. Feel free to continue reading only if you want to hear about my life. This post also deals with things that could be fairly foreign to anyone that isn't familiar with the LDS church (mormons.)

That Sunday before church started, I approached a member of the bishopric and asked if I could talk with him in private. This man on the bishopric I knew understood the situation for those of us that lived out in the hills. He had been one of the men I had seen on video giving a talk, a private fireside about his personal feelings of the gospel a few years back. I knew I wouldn’t have to spend time explaining the situation of my neighbors or the people that thought the end times were nearly upon us. I told him that I had just found out that that someone was now spreading rumors about me, and not just about my parents this time. Word was going around that I was brainwashing others, programming the youth to disobey their parents. I didn’t know what to do, and I asked for his council.

He was shocked and appalled, and asked me for names of the people that had been saying these things. He wanted to call them in and find the underlying cause of these things. I didn’t want to give him names; I didn’t want to get others in trouble, especially parents of my friends. I didn’t want this to be a bad experience for others, or to be an excuse that pushed some of these people over the edge to leave the church. Most of all I didn’t want this ward polarized like that last I had been in, with me as the center and reason for the split. How could I tell him it was my seminary teacher that was the cause of this, I knew she enjoyed her calling and I didn’t want to be the reason for that to be taken away from her. I told him I didn’t want to get anyone in trouble, and that I really didn’t want a big deal made of this. I just wanted him to know what was going on in case he heard anything through the rumor mill.

He said that he understood, and he didn’t know what he could do for me, but that he would think about it. It was nearly time for Sacrament meeting to start so we left the room and went into the chapel. The meeting started like normal, and it was this man’s turn to preside over the meeting. Just as he finished going over all the ward business that week he paused and then he took a deep breath. He said that he had just found out some very disturbing news. He said that he had heard that some rumors were going around about a member of this ward. That things were being said that were not true. I could see he was angry and doing his best to suppress it. He told the entire ward that actions like this, gossip, rumors were destructive, and not actions the Lord would be pleased in seeing take place. He called the entire ward to put an end to things like this, to not pass on rumors, and to not judge others by what they heard from others second hand. He said he was ashamed that he was part of a ward that would allow something like this to happen. He finally ended this impromptu chastisement with saying that he supported and upheld the integrity of the target of these rumors, and he knew they were not true. The Lord would stand in judgment upon those that spread these rumors and we all needed to make sure not to be on the wrong side of the Lord. Then the sacrament was to be blessed and passed.

My jaw hit the floor I couldn’t believe what had just happened. Part of me felt so good to be defended like that, but part of me was freaking out. I didn’t want anything like this to happen. He hadn’t named me by name, but those that heard the rumors knew what was going on. They would know that I had talked with this member of the bishopric. What would go around about me now? Would they say I brainwashed a local leader of our ward? All during the sacrament meeting, I could hear hushed whispers asking what was going on, and where did all that come from. The people that lived in town had no idea what was going on. Those of us in the hills knew, and I got a couple cold stares my way. I didn’t want to be the center of attention again or ever again. This had not turned out the way I wanted, I just wanted him to be aware, I didn’t want him to make such a public announcement. I just sat their quietly and didn’t look around at anyone during the meeting.

I did my best to play dumb about the whole situation. I went to all the rest of the meetings like normal and went home with my mom. Monday morning I got up and went to seminary. I made sure I waited until there were others there first; I didn’t want to be the first one to seminary and be alone in the house with DT’s mom. I continued going to scouts on Wednesdays, church on Sundays, and working everyday at the health company. I still got rides to church activities with the kids on W-hill, but I made sure I never went into anyone’s home, or was alone with anyone. I didn’t want there to be any way for someone to blame me for anything that might happen or how others might act. I was so lonely for friends my own age, but did the best I could with the situation the Lord wanted for me, and just worked harder and tried my best to enjoy my work.

The father of the “rebellious” girl (RB) that I had liked for two years was suffering from Parkinson’s disease. A year earlier he didn’t know what was wrong with him but complained he just didn’t have any energy to do anything. He tried very hard to work on their house, but just couldn’t work. Everyone on W-hill complained about him, and thought he was lazy. They put him on every kind of diet, cleanse and herbal remedy. Finally, they took him to a doctor and he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s. I felt bad for their family; I could see it was hard on them. Since he wasn’t able to go to church anymore, the boy to the north of our land was my age; he and I would go over and bless the sacrament for this man. I was honored to be asked to do this every week, church service like this was what everyone should be doing. My companion priest and RB had been “dating” for months. Then one Sunday I found out they had broken up and no longer interested in each other.

I had waited for a while to see if that relationship was going to work out, and now it looked as if I would finally be able to ask RB out on a date. I decided I would wait a couple weeks for her to get over this neighbor of mine, no reason to swoop in like a vulture. I had no idea how things like this were done. I’d never asked a girl on a date before; I’d never even really had a lengthy discussion with one. I was always so busy with work, and my life had been so different, I didn’t know how to connect with other kids. RB was different, she had moved up when we did, and so she had known everything that had gone on around me. I felt that maybe I’d be able to talk with her, and she’d not think I was too weird. I waited a few weeks.

On a following Wednesday as we were waiting for others to get ready to leave for mutual, my neighbor to the west drove up. It was the mother of SF, TE’s friend, the same guy that picked me up for scouts the week my dad had passed away. She started to talk with us, and told us that SF was back from Washington State. He had been there working with his older brothers. She said that SF was depressed and she was worried about him, and that he felt he didn’t have any friends. She wanted everyone to go over and visit with him while he was at home that week. All the girls sighed, and started making plans about what they could do for him. Soon everyone was ready to leave, and we left for mutual. That Sunday I saw RB with SF sitting next to each other in sacrament meeting. For weeks, I watched SF and RB grow closer together and soon it was a serious relationship. I couldn’t believe it.

SF hadn’t really been active in the church; he didn’t participate much and didn’t seem to take the gospel seriously. I couldn’t believe that RB was falling for him. I had just been ready to ask her out on a date and now I had lost my chance. What did she see in him? I was active in the church, had a strong testimony, was smart, and I had a full time job. I was going to go places in life. I respected her ability to think for herself and wanted to see her succeed in life. I didn’t care that she didn’t want to be miss molly Mormon homemaker; in fact, that is what I liked about her. She was intelligent, so why was she perpetuating this stupid church female role? Was SF now her project, was she trying to re-active him? I’d seen that before, girls would bring inactive boys to church, only interested in them to see if they could bring them back into the fold. Ok, so he was feeling down on himself, maybe she thought she could cheer him up. All these years I had tried to hide the pain I had inside, the incredible loneliness. I had put on a strong show, pretended the things that had happened and said about me didn’t bother me much. To know, that maybe if I had shown a little weakness that maybe others would have treated me different. It was so frustrating to me, and I concluded that RB wasn’t whom the Lord had planned for me. I guess I would just have to keep on watching out for the right one.

One week during Sunday school, we had a lesson about preparing for marriage. The teacher told us that there wasn’t such a thing as the right one, or the only one for us. Any person of the opposite sex, if a member of the church and following the commandments, could be a good spouse. The Lord would bless anyone to have a good marriage if they both kept the commandments. He said that we should marry the very first person we met that was temple worthy, and willing to get married in the temple. He ended the lesson baring his testimony to us that he knew that if we kept the commandments, had a temple wedding, the Lord would bless our lives and we would have a happy marriage. I had never heard such a thing before, but he had quoted a couple of different prophets, so it must be true.

DE decided to move the health company down to Boise. He also moved his family down there as well. TE was getting ready to head off to college for a semester before he would be old enough to go on a mission. I helped move the company down and returned back home. JW found a job for me with his company from New Jersey, doing assembly programming. I started carpooling with JW to work every morning. The youth on my hill, (land we had traded to those families that had helped us build our house,) had all reached an age where there were enough of us to justify a neighbor to drive us to mutual every Wednesday. I no longer needed to be over on W-hill anymore, and I soon stopped going to seminary completely. I still stayed active in all the other youth activities.

My mom had stayed in contact with one of the neighbor girls (TD) that she had known when my parents lived in southern Idaho. This girl had grown up in a family full of boys and her mom had been sick, dying of cancer. My mom took TD under her wing and treated her as one of her own daughters while they lived near each other. Once my parents moved to St. George, my mom had kept in contact with this young woman. Eventually she was married and moved out east. My mom told me that she had received a phone call from TD. TD’s husband was having a hard time, he had just lost his job, and they weren’t going to have a place to live and they had a 3-year-old daughter. I told my mom that they could come out and live with us for a while, until they could get back on their feet. I had my job as a computer programmer, and I could support another family living with us. They could stay rent free with us, and I wouldn’t mind paying extra to feed them either. TD’s husband could find a job; they could save up enough money and start over. They packed up all their things back east, and came and moved in with us for 6 months. TD’s husband had been a cook for a big sky-rise office building, so he didn’t have a hard time getting a job as a cook at a local restaurant.

I was made the first councilor of the priest’s quorum. I felt honored that I had been chosen to lead our quorum, even though there were only four other priests in our ward. I couldn’t trust any of them to show up to church on time, or bring the bread for sacrament, so I made sure that I brought some every week just in case. I always made sure I was to church early and everything was ready for sacrament meeting. We had a new Sunday school teacher, and this one gave us a personal challenge to read the entire Book of Mormon in 24 hours. He told us that the audio cassette reading of the Book of Mormon was less than that amount of time, and there was no reason we couldn’t complete this challenge. I had read the Book of Mormon many times already, all of the scriptures and a few other church books. I took him up on the challenge and completed reading the Book of Mormon on a Saturday. After I was finished, I decided to do the same with the Pearl of Great Price and the Doctrine and Covenants.

The Pearl of Great Price really interested me; I found the revelation of our beginnings as intelligences inspiring. Some of my neighbors and others in the church asked me what I was reading, because I was putting for an effort to understand everything that was in the Peal of Great Price. When I told them, what I was studying and that I found it so interesting, everyone kept giving me strange and weird looks. I was confused by the reactions I kept on getting whenever I would bring up something I had learned or read in it. At the time, I had no idea that there was controversy around the origins of the Pearl of Great Price. I had never heard anything other than the church standard explanation of how it came to be written. Next, I started reading the Journal of Discourses. I had been warned by my dad a couple years ago that there were things in those books that were not taught or discussed in the church anymore. I was careful about what I read and kept an open mind that times were different now, and that things taught in the past weren’t always for the future.

For mother’s day when I was 17, I was asked to give a talk. I decided that I was tired of always hearing the same “praise the mom, mom is great,” talks every year. I thought I’d prepare my talk based on some guidance to mothers from some talks that I had read in the Journal of Discourses. I had the right intentions, but I don’t think my talk was quite what everyone was prepared for. It was a bit heavy for what was usually a light sacrament meeting every year. At the time, I saw nothing wrong with my talk, now I realize it was outrageous having a 17 year old on the stand telling the mothers of the ward to do their duty, and that God had given them a very special calling in life to raise children. Open mouth insert foot, but it was with the best of intent, I was doing and living the gospel as everyone said that we were supposed to live. They were talking, I was doing. I had the church and gospel as my focus, and was working hard every day to put food on the table and pay the bills.

Continue reading: Rude awakenings (teenage years part 8)