Reflections from the Last Year

When I created this blog, back in the good old days, you know, 2008, I added the following under the name of my blog: "I write stuff and you decide whether you want to read it or not." I think I recognized I was writing mostly for me, but I sure wouldn't mind if someone else read it and possibly enjoyed it. Well, here I go again. Writing for me. And you decide whether you want to read it or not. In this case, if you are Mormon, I am almost certain you don't want to. I wouldn't have when I was a Mormon. Then again, you might. I mean, you do have free agency, right? In any case, if you don't like what you read below (whether you are Mormon or not) remember you decided to read it.

It was almost literally one year ago that I committed a serious wrong in the eyes of the LDS Church (the Mormons), and read some "anti-Mormon" literature. I used quotes there because it was not anti-Mormon literature, but I had been raised, and lived until I was nearly forty-four years old believing that's what it was. I had been taught and had truly internalized the teaching in the Mormon church to not read anti-Mormon literature. So I never did. Not in high school, when an insanely zealous born again Christian friend offered it to me, and even opened books and put them in my face. Instead, I followed another Mormon teaching to simply avoid talking of such matters altogether. The result of this was that this friend of mine, no longer was a friend. At least not NEARLY to the degree he had been. He became an acquaintance. I never speak to him now. I never read anti-Mormon literature while serving a full-time two year mission for the Church in Brazil, when angry opponents to our message wanted me to. And I never read anything during the 20+ years after my mission, during which time I was sealed in the Mormon temple in Dallas, raised three children in the church, and was an active member of the congregation in every ward I lived. But I did a year ago. More on what it was shortly.

The Book of Abraham. Ever heard of it? If you're not Mormon, probably not. The Book of Abraham for Mormons is scripture, the word of God, its teachings just as important as what is in the Book of Mormon, or the Bible. So what is the Book of Abraham? Well, I am looking right now at a copy I have had since my childhood, my name stenciled in gold on the front cover, so I can tell you EXACTLY what it says on the title page:

THE BOOK OF ABRAHAM

TRANSLATED FROM THE PAPYRUS, BY JOSEPH SMITH

A Translation of some ancient Records, that have fallen into our hands from the catacombs of Egypt.--The writings of Abraham while he was in Egypt, called the Book of Abraham, written by his own hand, upon papyrus.

I will confess I never knew all the backstory to the bringing forth of the Book of Abraham as is briefly mentioned on its title page (and believe me when I tell you it is part of no lesson ever taught by any teacher in any class I ever attended at church, if by any teacher in any class), but I am sure I was happy the Lord had seen fit to somehow have delivered into the hands of his chosen prophet Joseph, this papyrus, upon which Father Abraham himself had written.

So you know what's funny? And by funny I mean I didn't find it funny in the least. What I read that most disturbed me, that upset me the most, that planted the first seed of doubt in my mind, the thing that caused me such great stress and rattled my testimony, this terrible fact I was exposed to simply by committing the error of reading anti-Mormon literature? The Mormon church did not refute it, did not deny it, and indeed, LDS scholars had researched and written long indecipherable treatises on the subject. 

The papyrus from which Joseph translated the writings of Abraham, a papyrus which is in the possession of the Mormon church still, does NOT in fact contain the writings of Abraham, nor any mention of Abraham, and it is universally known by scholars Mormon and non-Mormon, to be a common Egyptian funerary text from a time well after it is estimated Abraham would have been alive. This is fact. The Mormon church knows it and accepts it. And when I read this, it bothered me greatly, as I hope you can imagine it might have. I felt betrayed and tricked. I felt I had been treated as a child. I truly believed I should have been trusted to accept the truth of how the Book of Abraham came to be, whatever that truth was. "Dear Brother, we want you to know the Book of Abraham was NOT translated from papyrus, and Joseph simply felt inspired to write it." Sold! "Brothers and Sisters. It has come to our attention that the papyrus we previously believed to have been translated as the Book of Abraham, is a hoax, and we are removing it from our canon." Sold! "Dearest members, notwithstanding it is clear from Joseph's journals he believed he had interpreted characters on the papyrus to correspond to phrases and words in English, it is now also clear he did not, and we must conclude the papyrus simply served as a catalyst of some sort for the prophet to receive inspiration to write these great words we revere and rely on so much today." I'll take it! But the Mormon church took and takes no such position. 

And if you think it is ridiculous I might have swallowed any or all of those explanations, consider what I already gladly and fully believed when I read this information (whether the church has changed its position on any of these is immaterial, as I fully believed them when they were accepted church doctrines):

1. A fourteen-year-old boy LITERALLY saw and spoke to the all powerful and omniscient creator of the universe and universes without end, and his LITERAL son, Jesus Christ.

2. This Jesus Christ LITERALLY died, was dead for several days, but began to live again, and lives to this day.

3. A man or woman cannot aspire to reach the highest degree of glory God has prepared for all, if that man or woman;

    a. is not sealed to another man or woman (well, you know--one man to one woman [or more], or one woman to one man [but not more than one].

    b. does not wear a specific set of undergarments at nearly all times of their life.

    c. does not wear a specific set of outer garments (robes and aprons and veils and caps) during an ultra-sacred ceremony one must never speak of outside of the temple upon penalty of death (unless one did not go through the temple before 1990).

    d. does not know specific passwords, grips, and handshakes that guardians of the heavens will ask them for.

    e. drinks coffee and does not go through the full repentance process to clean one's self of this sin.

4. Negroes were spirits in our pre-mortal life with our Heavenly Father who were less valiant in a pre-mortal war between the spirit children of our father in heaven, and Lucifer and his followers. As such, any Negro cannot hold the Priesthood, the authority to act in God's name and perform sacred ordinances.

5. The previous teaching about Negroes was miraculously undone in 1978 by a loving God after constant fasting and prayer and long-suffering.

6. That my oldest brother and my now ex-wife (wife at the time), who both left the church many years ago, would continue to be affected and protected less and less by the spirit of the Lord and would be every day more susceptible to sin, wickedness, and unhappiness. (I shrugged away the reality that both seemed to do the absolute reverse of that.)

So, yes, I very much believe I might have believed any number of explanations about the true origins of the Book of Abraham, if any straightforward answer from the Mormon church had ever been released on the subject. Read the Mormon-church published essay yourself to see if you feel they have.

Just Getting Started

The baseball season only started officially on Sunday. And it's a long season. Very long. Only the third day today. But the Orioles won the first two games. In Tampa. Or wherever it is the Rays play. So some good things have happened. And at this pace, they will be 162-0. A little unlikely, I am told. That's fine. I'm not hoping for a perfect season, anyway. Just a good one. More wins than losses. Hopefully a lot more. But if you know me, you know I will be living and dying by what happens with the Orioles. Doesn't make a lot of sense, but it is what it is. IIWII. That's it is what it is. I might have made that up. Or maybe someone else did. Who knows.

For now, I am trying to see the upside:
Tillman looked good. Chen was decent but not great. Pearce has hit a couple bombs. De Aza looks good at leadoff. And the Yankees suck. Okay, I haven't paid any attention to them, but they still suck. Hardy will be back soon. And Davis tried to bunt. All good things as I see them.

And I am trying not to take these things for granted.

Retired

The co-worker over the cubicle wall from me is leaving for the next couple of days to go hunting. Hunting, people. Yes, hunting. He is doing this, you know, over the course of a couple of days that coincide with the first rounds of the NCAA tournament. Coincide is the wrong word.  They don't occur at the same time. The NCAA tournament occurs. Everything else is a nuisance. An afterthought. A waste of time.

So imagine how much this co-worker of mine have in common. He's very in to guns and motorcycles and chit-chatty small talk. A true candidate for my new best friend.

The NCAA tournament. Yes, I will be taking the afternoons off, or just ditching work (and if that bothers you, figure out who my boss is and go tell him) to watch as many early round games as I can. I get less and less satisfaction out of filling out a bracket and following my success (or lack thereof) in calling upsets, but I still love the games. And I love basketball. Watching it now. Not playing it.

Because I am retired.

I don't play basketball any longer. It is a difficult thing to write, but it has been true for a couple years now.

[Picture about ten blank pages of space here with no writing, since that might come the closest to conveying the first part of my feelings on this matter.]

Yeah, I don't play. And I used to. Used to seek out any and every opportunity to play this game I loved. I still love it. But not playing it.

I was a pretty good player at my best. Not great, but pretty good for a skinny white kid with coke-bottle glasses and sore knees from Caldwell, Idaho, who never saw the floor as a member of the varsity team, which he only made as a senior. I got better in college and perhaps a little more finesse came to my game in my twenties. And I could still bring it in my thirties.

I mean check this out. As a twenty-one year old, I could do the following: Be standing still with the ball in my hands about six or eight feet from the basket. One strong dribble as I moved closer to the basket, and a leap off of both feet (harder that running and jumping off of one foot for most people) and I could rise, cock the ball back behind my head, and then bring it forward and dunk it forcefully with both hands. Pretty neat stuff if I say so, myself. I didn't know (I know there are plenty of people who can, I am just saying I didn't personally know them) a lot of people who looked like me who could do that.

I was a decent shot, from both inside and outside the three point line (although not as good as my son by the time he was 17, dad burn it), and I was quick, could get around people, drive to the basket. I could score. But I never played defense. Never. I got some blocked shots and steals, but it was never a priority. You can't score on defense, you know.

But all I have now are memories of good games I had, times I dominated the gym, gave referees attitude (a lot of that, actually), and the fun it was to play basketball. I don't do it anymore.

I am retired.

I Already Know This (Do You?)

Something happened when I watched Sense and Sensibility. I mentioned this. Something changed inside me. I felt something I had not felt before. Sounds like a cliche, but I believe it.

I have not been a person to share my feelings freely, and when I do, there is some misleading going on. I put on a front, act a part. It is ever-present in my dealings with other people. Ok, yes, I know, same with everyone. Fine. But I don't like people. I don't have close friends. I don't bond. I don't. Ask anyone. Seriously. You'll not find a person on the earth who will say, "Oh, yeah, Phyllis? Good, close friend of mine." No one feels that way about me and that's fine. I don't feel that way back.

It is probably because I don't feel like someone could know me, know all about me, I mean ALL, and still think, oh yeah, totally still want to be his friend. Sure, I hear it all the time from the same sources one would expect about how great I am and I shouldn't think that way about myself, blah blah blah. Every person knows themself the best. So they can be their own worst critic. Typical human failing. So some people are able to overcome it? Perfect. Congratulations.

Maybe it's because I was a crybaby when I was a kid, wearing my emotions on my teenage sleeve for the world to see. Really embarrassing. Shameful stuff. So I taught myself NOT to feel. Or at least worked hard to conceal it. So there you go.

No. This is not a pity party or anything like that. I will make a point. Right now:

When I watched Sense and Sensibility something happened. And it happens every time (just watched it a couple weeks ago) or when I read a favorite novel. I feel something. I love. AND I admit it. Pretty silly thing for me to make a big deal about loving it, huh? I know, but that's it. That tells you how strongly I feel about it and how attached to it I have become. It is now part of my identity, part of ME. I can't remove it. I don't try. I want it to be true about me. I take pride in it.

It confuses people I will admit (if some strange series of events ever leads me to tell anyone about it), as most people will step back and do a double-take. "You? Really? That doesn't sound like you." I know.

But get used to it.

Eddie Still Loves Elinor

As I went back and re-read my previous post (and I do re-read them--sometimes several times over. is that weird?), it occurred to me that although I have professed a love of 19th century British novels, what came across was a love for period movies like Sense and Sensibility. I spent almost no time talking about novels. So let me set the record straight, although I know I mentioned it in the post: I love the novels of the period much more than I love the movies made from those novels. I do. So that should tell you something.

Jane Austen is so smart, so witty, so clever. I scarcely need mention this, as most people who have read her know this. But it truly is indescribable. You cannot appreciate her until you have read her. So many times I will read from her novels and remark to myself, I know what she is doing here and yet I can't describe it.

And much of the same goes for so many others. Have you read Thackeray's Vanity Fair? Please. Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre, and Agnes Grey by Emily, Charlotte, and Anne, the wonderful sisters Bronte? Collins's The Woman in White or The Moonstone? Mary Shelley's Frankenstein? Bram Stoker's Dracula? The Mayor of Casterbridge  ANY THING AT ALL by Thomas Hardy??? Come on, people. Please recognize before it was a movie that brought you to reluctant but honest tears it was a book that one of these stupid geniuses wrote down. BY HAND. on crappy pieces of PAPER with a lousy dip-it-in-ink-a-million-times pen!!!  That is insane! So, yeah, these movies I now love could not have been made without the book first.

So as much as I love Sense and Sensibility (have I covered how I feel about this movie?), or any others I have enjoyed, I bow in awe to the book and its author.

I really felt like I needed to get that down. And so in my next post I will attempt to defend my gushing professions of love (ok, not defend but explain and explore) of this stuff. And Sense and Sensibility (as you have seen) plays a considerable role in it. Make a note of it.

Eddie Loves Elinor

Weird title for a blog post, I know. But stick around. It will all make sense soon...

Seven years ago now, I posted something here in an attempt to explain the name of my blog. Actually, it wasn't an attempt. It's pretty simple. I love Somerset Maugham. I'm a lot like Gerald Haxton in that way. Ok, so not exactly.

But if you know me (and even if you don't, what I am about to write is still true), I also love 19th century British novels. Austen, Thackeray, Eliot, the Bronte sisters, Wilkie Collins, some Dickens, Gaskell. You get the idea. All the way up to Thomas Hardy. And do I love Thomas Hardy.

This post will cover a little more Maugham territory and then proceed (actually go back in time) to the 19th century.

So, yeah, Somerset Maugham. Let's go clear back to high school and establish the fact I was like a lot of boys. "Hated" reading. It was always assigned. English class. No choice of which text. Write about it. Learn from it. But although I "hated" reading, I was aware even then that I enjoyed what I read most of the time. I was proud I had finished a book, could say "I've read that." But I still didn't read very much.

In my second year of college, however, something happened. An older brother of mine, who I very much looked up to, was reading. A lot. And apparently liking it. And reading some more. I decided to see what all the fuss was about. I took a couple suggestions and read them. Liked them. And he suggested a Somerset Maugham novel. After that, the ship sailed, as they say. And people DO say that. I know.

So in the first few years after I was married (in 1993 so you have a reference [although you must know, because I can't imagine anyone other than my mother is reading this]), I read several Maugham novels: Of Human Bondage, The Razor's Edge, The Narrow Corner, Mrs. Craddock, Liza of Lambeth, Of Moon and Sixpence, and so on. And since those early years I have read almost every other novel of his (and short story, and play), and several more than once.

I loved Maugham because of how he writes (well, wrote, since he is dead). He does not judge. He reports. His characters sometimes do terrible things (if you consider murder, prostitution, betrayal, and duplicity terrible things), and he does not tell the reader how to feel about it. He also introduced me to something that may have set me off toward my love of 19th century novels. This thing is hard for me to identify exactly but is something like this: the non-explicit conveying (description? relation?) of profound emotion. Does that make any sense? He did not have to say, "And then the man told the woman he loved her very, very, very, very, very much. A ton. Really strong feelings, reader. Take note of this!" He simply described their interactions and my mind did the rest. And it did something to my heart. Or something like that. I put that disclaimer there since at the time (and even sometimes now) I hate to admit that about myself. Why? Another post, I imagine.

But let's leave Maugham for now and travel to 1995. In that year, a movie called Sense and Sensibility was released. I remember how the following year it won an Oscar for something, and even recall a lampooning of it on Saturday Night Live. I also remember I had no interest in seeing such a movie. People dressed in crazy old clothes, talking as they did, falling in love. Come on, a chick movie!

So I did not see Sense and Sensibility until several years until after it was released. To say it affected me is an understatement. I could not attempt to deny I loved it, loved how it made me feel. Obviously I did not discuss these feelings with anyone, but I felt them. And I realized it was because of the interactions between characters. They made no blatant declarations or demonstrations; the sum of their feelings was very many times only betrayed by a look or a stare or an uncomfortable silent moment. Have you watched it? Do see how Edward (I like to call him Eddie) looks at and acts around Elinor? Can you not tell by just looking at her how much she loves him in return? You have to, since she cannot tell him, forced by circumstances into her guarded reserve. I like to think it is painful for her even to speak his name.

Ok, that might be going a little far. The movie doesn't mention that, and perhaps I just wanted it to be true. But I think it helps my point: when a movie is done well enough to make clear there are profound feelings, but leave the fullness and depth of emotions between its characters to the imagination of the viewer, it is well done indeed. So say I.

So realizing I loved this movie, I soon set out on others of its type and time. Pride and Prejudice (the 1995 BBC version--definitely not the Keira Knightley one!), Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, Nicholas Nickleby. Then I realized I must read all these books. And if I have painted a positive picture of them as movies, let me assure you I love them all more as books. Perhaps the movies are a bit better at drawing out a stubborn tear at just the right time (although I have had to set a book down a time or two to compose myself), but the skill and imagination and wit and dead-on portrayal of human emotion in 19th century British novels cannot be equalled. Again, so say I.

And if you think I am wrong, keep it to yourself.

Facebook killed the blog, y'all

Right? At least the family blog? You know the one I mean, the blog recapping family trips, birthdays, and other significant events in the life of a family. And pictures. Lots of pictures. A great idea, I admit. Other family members and friends could subscribe to your blog and stay up to date on your family.

And, yes, I think Facebook put a hurting on that. Much easier to reach your audience, know you are being followed, post pictures, tell stories, with Facebook.

But that isn't what happened to me (I don't think). I never used my blog or my facebook to post family pictures (at least not a lot of them) or to write (which is what I use my blog for). I really think I just got lazy. But I also think I stopped truly following the theme or mantra or whatever-you-want-to-call-it of my blog: I write stuff and you decide whether you want to read it or not.

Because you can tell when people are reading your blog and when they aren't. And not just using analytics. The comments decrease, the references to it conversation with others decrease, you get the idea. And I am sure that affected me. You want to think (I do, anyway) someone is reading what you write, thinks the story is good, thinks you are clever, thinks you are funny.

Well I still want those things, but I also need to write. That much occurs to me. There is stuff inside me. Stuff that needs out. Stories to tell. Names to change. So I will write some more. And you will decide whether you want to read it or not.