Thanks to the story last night of the BYU valedictorian who came out of the closet during his graduation speech, I didn’t sleep well. I lay awake with some serious thoughts floating around in my head, and I thought it would be a good idea to start a group for those of us with a similar background.
There seems to be a bunch of us here at the Daily Kos who grew up mormon and have had that experience shape our lives, for better or worse. So I though I would start things off by sharing what’s going on in my world right now.
My father is dying of cancer. He refused treatment even though it was completely treatable and he could have had a good quality of life afterwards. But since he went back to the church, all he cares about is himself and going to heaven. Now, let me start at the beginning.
I was never in the LDS church until the age of 12. My fathers parents were born in Utah around the turn of the century. Grandma was faithful and one of the sweetest ladies this world has known. I never heard her speak ill of anyone or anything and she lived a life of joy, peace and love. Grandpa was a great Jack Mormon. When I was a kid, they lived on a dairy farm in Rigby, Idaho. I spent every summer up there with them. I loved them dearly and still think about those times as some of the happiest days of my life.
Grandma died in 1986 from heart failure. When she was taken to the hospital, we got the call from grandpa and dad left that night and flew up there. Mom and I left the next morning. But we were too late to say goodbye. Dad however was able to talk with her the morning she passed, and something happened to him. See, dad like grandpa was a swashbuckling hell raiser of the finest order. He taught me how to shoot pool in a bar by the time I was 8. He was funny, tolerant, adventure loving and he loved his only son very much. After grandma passed, he started going back to church. I didn’t even know he was a member. I though that was just something grandma did on Sundays when grandpa and I were out having fun.
Very quickly, trouble arose between my parents. My whole childhood was spent knowing they were happy together and stable. Now there were heated arguments and cold feelings. They split up with in two years. I choose to live with dad, because we had been inseparable. But soon I realized his priorities were changing. He cared more about reading scripture and condemning others for their actions, that not so long ago he was doing himself. I tried to play the game. I started going to church with him and at the age of 13 was baptized in to the LDS church.
One of dads big changes was his concern about being able to live forever in the celestial kingdom. Therefore, he had to find a proper wife. A couple years later, he found a single mom of 7 that would marry him. So, we went from the two of us living together in a beautiful little town on a beautiful little creek, to living in a strange town surrounded by strangers. And I was now just another kid in a family of 10. That lasted two years before I decided it was better to live in a big city with my mom, rather than fight over the last slice of pizza and worse.
I knew at the time that dads decision to marry a woman that he hardly knew, just so he could spend eternity with her in the highest levels of heaven was about the dumbest reason to get married that I had ever heard of. And it didn’t last. After I had left, he spent another 6 months with them before leaving himself.
I spent my high school years growing more political and aware, while still trying to get along with dad by going to church with him. He would pick me up from moms house to go to church and I was still stoned from the night before. By the time I was a senior, I knew my time in the church was up. I put up with it until I graduated and never went back. This caused some very hard feelings between dad and I, and I quickly realized that I was no more than a minor concern for him. He was gone.
Dad remarried again, this time it stuck. She had 4 kids, two boys and two girls. Over the years, I learned that I could not count on my father for more than the passing advise of a stranger. He would tell me about his new family from time to time, though only through rose colored glasses. Both boys had committed suicide. Dad said it was because they took drugs. Yeah, right. Both girls had multiple children from multiple fathers and multiple divorces. But I got the cold shoulder because I didn’t go to church or get married and have kids by the time I was 24. He has spent the last 20 years babysitting children that aren’t his and ignoring me. And I learned to mourn the loss of my father a long time ago, yet he is still here, for a little while longer.
I saw him on Saturday and it’s like meeting a ghost. Everything is fine between us as long as the conversation is about trains, geography or the weather. On any other topic he is just a grumpy old man with no sense of humor or compassion for anyone that’s not a member of the church in good standing.
And so, I will loose my father for the last time, knowing that every time I tried to reach out to him I was rebuked. I have no tears right now. I used those up years ago. But I know they will come again when he leaves. And they will be for what could have been but for close mindedness and myopic thinking.
Of course there is much more to this story and I hope to share during appropriate times with everyone that joins. Maybe you have a story that you never shared because you thought no one would be able to relate. Maybe you have some tales of the good times that helped shape who you are. For whatever reason, let’s come together as kindred spirits that probably have more in common than we know.