Rons journey may be coming to an end

Yep once again I am reposting from my wifes blog – she has put into words what I myself have been feeling for a while. It has been a couple of months since I last posted and I have to say that my expectations of this bishopric have fallen short. Now don’t get me wrong I am fine being a mormon – I am a mormon and no one can take that away from me. But the leadership in this ward I feel is lacking, I have no other experience to draw from but I would have to imagine that not all wards are like this. I have been trying so hard for this last year to do everything that was asked of me and I figured that someone would have talked to me about the temple at some point, but that has never happened – yes I feel forgotten. I see now why so many go inactive. This is not about callings or home teaching, this is about one on one counseling from the bishop or his counselors. I figure that my name must be on some list somewhere and it would let them know that I have now been a member for over a year – I would also think that if I have done something or not done something that someone would let me know so that I could fix the problem. But of course I am probably just putting too much thought into it and it is more likely that I have just been forgotten – on that I say Shame on you.

Now onto my wifes blog -

My Last Complaint

As I sit here thinking on this subject, I have two analogies in my mind. One is the heavily laden donkey who continues to pull the cart because the farmer has tied a carrot to a string that is attached to a stick that keeps the carrot in the donkey’s sight, but he will never reach it. The other is the performing poodle who jumps through hoops to please his trainer (or master). A performing poodle is only as good as his latest trick.

It has been more than a year now… Before Halloween in ‘07 is when our journey began. It rolled quickly by and Ron was baptized in mid-November. It is sad and it hurts to know that we are at the end of the road here. About 6 months ago, Ron told me that we wouldn’t be going to the temple any time soon. He said our new bishop had expectations he couldn’t reach. He apologized to me for that. I kept hoping. But yesterday that fact hit home very heavily.

The poodle master is holding that hoop up high, waiting for us to perform to his liking. But I know from life that you can’t perform a trick that no one has taught you. I should have seen this coming. We moved into this ward more than 4 years ago. The old ward clerk (from Mom & Dad’s ward) wanted to help us because Mom had helped his family in their preparation for the temple. He called the current ward clerk asking for help with our move, etc. The new ward’s clerk told the old ward clerk that we weren’t his problem. For three years we lived here. We never saw anyone from the elders quorum. No Relief Society. No Bishopric. No visiting teachers. No home teachers. I guess I shouldn’t have expected anything from them.

The missionaries taught Ron the basics. Then they turned him over to the ward for further teaching. Ha! What a joke. I am finding two types of people here in this ward. People who know my family and just assume that Ron has been fellow shipped and taught by them. Or people who know the Joneses and seem to be waiting for me (or us) to act as they do. (most likely why they asked me to be a cub scout leader). It almost feels like a slap in the face to still be ‘meeting’ people who say, “why you don’t act anything like Suzee, do you.” That feels like a rude way to learn that the people I’ve been going to church with think they are very familiar with my family. If they are so familiar with my family, they would know that we are not connected or close in any way, shape, or form.

Ron’s learning of the gospel has come from the missionaries and myself. No one else. I can only explain things to him. I can only show him what I know. Dad has assumed that Ron joined the church because he absorbed it through osmosis. Which of course takes aways from the years that I spent talking to my husband about the church, bearing my own testimony and the hours I spent with scriptures and prayer. Does the poodle master think this way too? (Everyone who had joined the church in our ward this last year has gone inactive, maybe the osmosis process just isn’t working for them either)

Recently, we had two boys advance to the position of deacons. Shelley told me by way of talking that people came to her house to talk with her son about the priesthood (he also had a father for that). Her son learned the importance of his role and they talked about his serving the sacrament and they helped him to understand that part of his role. -Ron once said that most Mormons were at a disadvantage because they had everything handed to them. It’s true. Learning for a convert is a very difficult process. No one is teaching you or helping you understand anything. Nothing is explained. Nothing is taught. A convert is expected to just know all that a long-term member knows after their baptism.

It hurts to have a goal and see it lifted beyond your reach. It hurts to be reminded that I don’t have a place in this world. (I have a place beside my husband. In my home is the only place where I feel like I fit in.) I just go to church to partake of the sacrament anymore. No one has taken that right away from me yet. But why am I working and trying to reach the golden carrot? The truth is, I am not a dumb donkey. I know the carrot is out of my reach. And I am stubborn enough that I have no intention of performing tricks for the local poodle master just so I can prove my worth to him.

-I don’t want to be a visiting teacher. I have been a member of the relief society for 23 years and have had visiting teachers for almost 5 years of that time. And for my first 3 years in this ward I was placed on a mailing list. (Quite honestly, my adult years in this church have not been very pleasant ones). I have been given callings and left dangling with trying to handle them on my own. I don’t want my callings anymore. I am in a ward of strangers with friendly faces. That’s all. Believe it or not, we actually have home teachers. We’ve seen them all of 3 times in a years time. As a home teacher, Ron has been out very irregularly. His companion keeps waiting for him to take the lead, yet what is Ron to draw from? That’s a good question. What do the people in this ward think Ron is drawing from?

And that is all the fat lady wrote… This is the last time I plan to use this blog. The purpose of starting it no longer exists, so I plan on deleting it soon. Just wanted you to know.