The Church of Latter-day Singles

Nemesis sent this article to me and a few others and ask for our comments. Read the article if you like---it's long, though.

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/cover/2005/cover0729.html

My summary (without rereading it, so I might be getting a couple details wrong) is simply this: A girl from the D.C. area talks about being single. She is 33 and has recently moved from the singles' ward to the family ward. She is very liberal and quite candid. She even goes so far as to use the f-word a couple times.

I really sympathize with her situation. I am 24 and single, and I feel old (she comments in the article that once you are 24 or 25, you're "off the conveyor belt"). I won't lie and say that I don't envy pretty much every person who has found marital bliss. My mother can attest to the fact that I think about my single status a lot, and I am even known to whine and complain about it. Some days I'm downright bitter. I am painfully aware of when exactly the last time I was kissed was (one year, one month, 27 days...) and I'm also aware of the time I generally average between kisses (2.5 years). I have no idea when and if I will find a reciprocal and fulfilling relationship with the man of my dreams. So much of my life is uncertain at this point; I just don't know what the future holds.

All that being said, allow me to be at least a little critical of the view expressed in this article. What I believe is that we can all choose our attitude. I apply this to myself and to everyone else: I can choose to be bitter all the time about my status as a singleton, or I can choose to accept what life's given me now and work with it and be happy.

The article describes one particular Sacrament meeting where a young pregnant woman gets up to give a talk:

A very pregnant young woman totters up to the podium to deliver a talk on fighting impure thoughts. Before she begins her prepared remarks, however, she launches into her bio, ostensibly to introduce herself but effectively a laundry list of her "accomplishments": She and her hubby, both from Utah, began dating at 17; her husband served a two-year mission in Sweden; they married when he returned, both graduated from Brigham Young University (where the joke is that if you don't get married by graduation, you get your tuition back), and moved to Washington so her husband could attend law school; they have a 2-year-old boy and are expecting another child in a few weeks. The young woman recounts this with obvious pride. Although she looks as if she could still be in high school, her story is not only unremarkable in the church but also what the vast majority of young Mormon women aspire to.

The next paragraph is as follows:

Taylor snorts. "This is going to sound a little bitter," she says later, "but her resume was picture-perfect. There's a side of me that wants to scream, "What the f***? Why just get up and tell us that?" I have nothing to say except, "I've successfully stayed a virgin and I'm 33," or "I went on three dates last week and nobody touched my boobies." I have no other way to show my faithfulness. I'm being really irreverent, but it's true."

I'm fairly intolerant of being critical of those speaking from the pulpit. Sure, maybe some people deserve a bit of criticism, but I'd rather give people the benefit of the doubt. The majority of people asked to speak in Church are nervous to be speaking in front of everyone. They have not chosen their topic. They deliver a talk on their topic according to their own personal experience in the best way they know how to. Certain people have a gift for public speaking. Others don't. For the most part, the speakers are trying their best, and they are certainly not trying to offend anyone.

I guess I could go on and point out all the areas where I disagree with Taylor in her views or in the way that she chooses to express herself. I won't do that, though, because I've run out of time. What I will do, to reward everyone for reading this rant, is post the poem that I wrote in response to this article. Enjoy!


Sunday Singles Scene


I've heard it called the "Fashion Show"
where unwed men and women go
to worship God. Banana-clad,
they praise who wears the latest fad.

They come in late and choose the pew
that has an advantageous view
of who's dressed nice (and who is not)
of who, right now, is looking hot.

They fold their arms and bow their heads
and take the sacramental bread,
then pass the tray and take a peak
at who does not partake this week.

And during talks on Making Choices,
they gossip, all, in lowered voices:
"I hear she kissed the EQP!"
"But last week she was kissing me!"

And when their Sunday meetings end,
they look around to find their friends
and walk around and mince and mingle.
It's all part of being single.

I've heard the term "Meat Market" too,
where singles search for someone new.
The YSA attend their ward
to find a mate and love the Lord.

With candy words and sugar tongue
some say, "Oh well. Your time will come!"
to those, too many times rejected,
who wish their love lives resurrected.

Quote from Coop:

On the subject of God's sense of humor:

"How can He not have a sense of humor? Have you seen a baboon? Blue butts? Brilliant!"

Free Collagen Implants!

My new house has a mosquito problem. I subjected poor Nemesis and Brother 2 to an evening in my apartment last night. I felt bad for the following reasons:

1. My house gets hotter inside than it is outside. In the late afternoon, I will set up fans to blow in the cooler air from outside, but in the evenings, I have to close everything up on account of there's mosquitos and bugs and stuff.
2. I don't have a TV yet (still waiting for Brother 4 to move in...) and all I have that plays movies is a little laptop without external speakers. This means that we need to turn off all fans in the house so that we can actually hear the dialogue (and we don't want to miss a word of what Horatio Hornblower is saying!).
3. The mosquitos found their way in anyway. So they attacked us during the movie. We couldn't see them because it was dark.
4. Brother 2 was disappointed to find out that we were actually roasting our marshmallows (for s'mores) over the open flames of my gas range stove. When he saw me straightening wire hangers, he thought that I was working on some cool art project, not getting our marshmallow roasters ready.
5. All our marshmallows caught fire.
6. My freezer wasn't even up to the task of fully freezing our ice cubes. (My landlord has been uncharacteristically absent when it comes to responding to my demands for a new freezer/fridge combo.)

We took an intermission during the movie to get drinks and to kill mosquitos. Nemesis showed her mad skillz at killing them with the Ensign and I held my own with a broom.

Shortly after Nemesis and Brother 2 left, I went to bed. I found a screen for my bedroom window and put it in. That was exciting. I figured that I'd be able to sleep with the window open and the fan in the window and not have to worry about mosquitos so much.

Every time I woke up during the night, I had a 15-minute scratch session before falling asleep again. I think that most of the bites are from the past few days, and not necessarily last night, though there were a few new ones. I knew how to out-wit those mosquitos, though. I put the sheet over my entire body, leaving only a hole of about three square inches for my mouth and nose.

When I was in the shower this morning, I noticed that my bottom lip felt hotter than normal. It felt fatter than normal. It felt number than normal. When I looked in the mirror after getting out of the shower, I looked like a lop-sided Angelina Jolie. Ack! I have a mosquito bite on my lip. So much for me being smarter than the mosquitos.

**But since I'm a Canadian from Canada, I shouldn't be complaining about mosquitos because the mosquitos in Canada are larger, nastier and more plentiful.

Where Lies the Lying Line?

I once convinced a friend of mine that he had to grow out his hair. His hair was always just barely longer than a buzz cut. As it would grow out, it would start looking like a wavy coat---the kind that a rex cat has. And since blogger won't let me upload the rex cat picture for some reason, I'm going to have to give you the url (http://made-in-afrika.com/kittens2cats/braviout.cornish.rex.cat.jpg).

I realized that he had curly hair, and therefore the hair was worthy of being grown out. I promised him that if he did it, he'd be known as the Curly Haired Boy in his ward. Well, what can I say except that he's married now? I'm rarely ever wrong, folks.

And so we come to present day and my current dilemma. My coworker, DP, would have wavy, curly hair if he just grew it out! I'll admit it---when he came back from Spain with longer hair, he had me swooning. But then he cut it? Why? It was just getting longer again and today, I noticed that he cut it again.

I don't know what to say. I figure that if I say nothing, it's obviously insulting. Like the time that I got my hair cut---several inches came off---and no one said anything to me about my hair cut. Ouch. So then I see my options as being these:

1) "DP! You got your hair cut!"---obvious lack of any compliment, may lead to DP asking if I like it

2) "DP! Your hair looks nice!"---it does look nice... it would just look better if he would stop cutting it

3) "DP! You got your hair cut! I like it!"---I shall be thrust down to Hell with all the other liars

4) "DP! You got a hair cut. What on Earth were you thinking?? Don't you know that your curly waves make you infinitely more attractive? You cut it right before it was getting good."

Brozy suggests option 5, which is pretty good: "You got a haircut! I bet it's much cooler in this weather."

The sad thing is that it's no secret that DP is on the hunt for a wife. If only he knew where his locks of wavy hair would get him...

With all the religious sensitivity I can muster...

Not to make fun of anyone's religious beliefs or anything... If this post is going to make any sense to you, you're going to have to read the following article:

http://www.sltrib.com/search/ci_2898004#

Now, I'm not sure which are the most disturbing things I should comment on here. First of all, without giving away my Secret Identity, I may point out that it's more than a little bit creepy that both my first name and my last name are in this article. That and the fact that all of this occurred just down the street from me...

I think that the most disturbing part of all of this is that during my trip to Allen's grocery store on Saturday night, although I saw all the washing machines bolted together, I did not stop to pay tribute to Heavenly Mother. What was I thinking?

My aunt points out that the other disturbing part of all of this is that her husband was the one to send me this article---and so I found out what's happening in my neighborhood from someone who lives on an entirely different continent.

My aunt also comments, "I am surprised you didn't clue into the fact that it was Heavenly Mother---after all there was a big hint there---washing machine, cleaning, caring for others..."