Posted by:
flash
(
)
Date: April 23, 2019 10:42PM
My fellow Exmo’s. I have posted many times about the last day of my mission and how happy I was to be done with it all. That post was on April 13.
Today I thought that I should post this narrative about the beginnings of my mission, and the misery I endured as a missionary. This will give a glimpse into why I was so happy when my mission ended.
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My path in life as a Mormon boy consisted of reaching the typical male Mormon milestones; Primary, Cub Scouts, MIA, Boy Scouts, Deacon, Teacher, Priest, Elder, and four years of early morning seminary. All of which left me with no energy, time, or opportunities to pursue the things I wanted to do. No one ever asked me what I wanted to do. I wanted to learn to play the piano. I wanted to continue to bowl in the leagues and maybe become good enough to go professional someday as I was averaging around 220. I wanted to get involved in television studio productions through the high school career programs and other activities.
In high school, I also wanted to pursue a few young women that were non-members. I once took a non-member girl to the beach for the day, and by the reaction I got from my parents, you would have thought that I had spent the day at a brothel. You see, in their eyes, non-Mormon girls were evil and unclean and would lead me into the gutter of life and nothing but bitter dregs awaited me.
From childhood through my teenage years the focus was going on a mission. That was the plan and nothing else held any importance. Got educational opportunities awaiting you during and after high school? Got a girlfriend Mormon or not? Tough! Those things were not part of the mission plan as those opportunities and girlfriends were to be forfeited for a mission. A mission was the only goal that my parents and grandparents gave any value.
All throughout my life I was taught over and over and over again that serving a mission would be this wonderful spiritual experience of serving with my fellow young brethren while having the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost guiding you to honest seekers of the gospel and testifying to you daily that the gospel was true. You could have angels administer to you to help you in the work and the MP and his wife would be like a 2nd set of parents to you. They would be kind, loving, and willing to lift your spirits when you would become discouraged and downcast.
I was also taught that a mission would be such a wonderful experience that, once you returned home, you would be like a saturated sponge dripping with spiritual knowledge and with wisdom beyond your years preparing you for a dedicated life to the Mormon Collective. The very first day of my mission and every subsequent day of my missionary experience showed me that these teachings were all lies. Lies that were spoon fed to me from the first time I could form sentient thoughts.
At 18 my parents and grandparents were always saying to me how a mission would be the next goal to accomplish on the Mormon conveyer belt of happiness. I don't recall them ever asking me whether I want to go or not. It seemed like any dreams or wants or aspirations I had were things of naught and were of no value. All the focus was mission-mission-mission.
I had graduated a year early from high school before I turned 18 and was fully involved in attending local college classes. I was so happy to be out of the day-care environment of high school and to be in the college environment. I could call my own shots on what classes I wanted, when to take them, and I no longer needed to have a hall pass to use the can. It was so refreshing to be treated like an adult. I had my own car that I refurbished into a virtual new condition and had an interesting gas-price marketing survey job to supply me with enough spending money.
However, the expectation from parents, grand-parents, and the ward leadership that I would be serving a mission at 19 hung around my neck like a millstone. I had absolutely no desire to go whatsoever. I was on a good college path with my education in electrical engineering and I was happy with life and I really did not want to interrupt it to do something I already knew I detested.
Around 18, I had fallen deeply in love with a beautiful Japanese girl Mormon convert named Kathy. She was not the typical Mormon girl I was used to and I enjoyed being with her more than any girl I had ever been with. I fell in love with her as deeply as one could at 18 and I couldn't imagine myself leaving her for 2 long years. The thought of being away from her made me sick inside.
My parents and my grandparents were not happy that I had a girlfriend now. My grandparents were especially upset as they still harbored prejudices from their World War 2 experiences toward the Japanese people. More than once I had to remind my grandparents that WW2 was their war, and not mine. I felt so trapped on this Mormon conveyer belt speeding me toward a mission and I could see no way to get off. I felt as though my life was coming to a dead end at 19.
MY OWN ENDOWMENT
Another glorious milestone on the conveyer belt of Mormonism to prepare me for a mission was for me to receive my own endowment at the Oakland Temple. This was to be a crowning spiritual experience to sustain me throughout my mission and to give me great insight and a testimony of the workings of the almighty God. At last, I thought, I would be able to feel the real power of the Holy Spirit. Maybe I would see something extraordinary to bolster my faith. Maybe a spirit would manifest itself from the other side or maybe a whisper of encouragement from a dear departed relative? All I can say is that the endowment ceremony was an eye opener to say the least. To say the most, bizarre, as nothing prepared me for what I was getting into and I thought I knew what the church was all about. How wrong I was!
While going through the bizarre experience of an endowment session, questions kept popping into my mind:
Why is this old man with PolyGrip breath touching me under my togo?
Why am I learning secret combinations and handshakes while dressed up as the Pillsbury Doughboy?
Was not secret combinations forbidden by the Lord?
There is a true order of prayer?
You mean in church, we are using a false order of prayer?
I am promising to slice my throat or disembowel myself to keep secrets?
Oh God, that old man in front of me just passed gas and my eyes are watering.
Satan is the best character in this incredibly boring movie.
Where are the spiritual experiences to testify to me that the Church is true?
Where are the angels?
Where’s the burning in my bosom?
Where's the Holy Ghost descending like a dove to confirm my faith?
Where's the exit?
I found the exit and now I was wearing some kind of long-johns under my clothes that were climbing up my butt all the way home. I am supposed to wear these for life? I am so hot wearing these things. I hate being hot.
PREPARING FOR THE MISSION
The Bishop requested that I spend a week with a full time Elder to help me see what the mission experience would be like. For that week, I lived the restricted missionary and I detested it. I learned first-hand how much I hated knocking on doors all day. At least was able to get around using my car and not some damn bicycle. The moment that week was over and I no longer had to be with this missionary, I got into my car, cranked up the stereo, ripped off my tie and suit coat, and drove to the nearest A&W for some decent food after a week of eating the crap this missionary ate. That Papa Burger combo never tasted so good. I sat at the drive-in for an hour relishing the food and the music. I should have put my foot down after that fiasco and just told everyone that I was not going to do that for 2 years but the social & family pressures was too great for me to overcome at 19.
The Mormon conveyer belt continued to move on with me on it and my mission application papers were sent in. I took the church's intelligent tests to see if I had the aptitude for learning languages. I guess I failed because the call came in January of 1977 that I would be serving in the Virginia Roanoke Mission and I was to report to the Salt Lake mission home on April 23, 1977. The prophet's auto-pen signature machine had spoken.
Everyone was so happy for me but I wasn't. I looked upon that April date with dread and foreboding. It was the date that my life as I knew it would end and that I would end up forfeiting everything that made my life worth living. I say forfeited and not sacrificed because to sacrifice means to give up something good for something better. But to forfeit means to give up something good for nothing.
That April date felt like a death sentence. Little did I know that this date would mark the beginning of the end of any belief I had in the divinity of the Mormon Church or its leaders, and the beginning of the end in any belief that the Lord cared about me. That April day, the warm loving “Jesus loves me” church I grew up in warped into a mean-spirited adult church.
THE TRIP TO THE SLC MISSION HOME (pre-MTC days)
I had to get up early in order to get to the airport to catch my flight to Salt Lake City. I was very depressed inside as I looked around at my room and my home knowing that I would not see it again until I was 21. I looked at a picture of Kathy and began to cry knowing I would not be able to see here anymore. I would not enjoy our pool; enjoy two Christmas’, or any other family events for two whole years. It was hard to comprehend that I would be gone and doing something I already knew I would hate to the fullest. I felt like a man who was reporting to prison for the beginning of his sentence of hard labor convicted of a crime that I did not commit. I had only a Pop-Tart and a glass of juice for breakfast as I was in no mood to eat a large meal.
In addition to my family, my girlfriend and our other friends came to the airport to see me off. It was a very tearful and gut wrenching feeling to kiss my family goodbye and especially to kiss Kathy goodbye. The last boarding call was being made and I was compelled to let go of Kathy and walk down the jet way. I found a seat near the back of the plane and just sobbed quietly into a blanket.
Such bitterness and sadness gushed out as I soaked the airline blanket with my tears. I understood now what those children in the Old Testament must have felt, as their parents sacrificed them into the ovens of the idol Moloch. I hoped in vain that this day would never come, but it did.
After the plane was in the air, a flight attendant noticed my anguish and sat by me to ask if she could do something for me. I could hardly talk but somehow was able to ask her for a soda. She was kind enough to get me one and I thanked her for it. Little did I know that this would be the last act of kindness I would receive from anyone for two more years.
I sobbed for most of the journey and I was running out of dry areas of the airline blanket to wipe my tears. Fortunately, the plane’s engines drowned out my sobbing. The plane was only a third full so I could be somewhat alone in my grief. Somehow I just knew that this two year experience was not going to be a good at any level. My intuition soon proved to be correct.
THE SALT LAKE MISSION HOME
The start of my mission pre-dated the existence of the MTC in Provo so I spent a week in the SL Mission Home in Salt Lake City before flying off to Virginia to be a door to door sales associate for Joe Smith. I never had a worse week in my life. As I said earlier, the warm loving “Jesus loves me” church I grew up in, warped into a mean-spirited adult church boot camp.
I saw the mission home leaders dish out many acts of incredible emotional cruelty and I began to wonder if I was at the right place. The first set of emotional cruelties was witnessing the scene of missionaries being separated from their families and girlfriends. I had never seen so much anguish and sadness erupt in so many people all at once when the families & girlfriends were told to say goodbye to their missionary and to immediately get out while callously reminding them that they would not see them again for two years.
Since I was from California, I had already experienced my own tearful goodbyes to my family and Kathy two hours prior and I was still reeling from that. How gut wrenching it was to witness again, people having their hearts broken, and while this ugly scene was transpiring, watching the mission home leaders smile with a sanctimonious glee of sick satisfaction. I wanted to punch them so badly. This scene looked like a WWII movie where families are ripped apart to be sent to Nazi death camps. Oh, remember, families are forever...yea, right.
The mission home nightmare week progressed as the mission home leaders attempted to brainwash me, along with the rest of the Elders, with their non-stop scripture and discussion memorization, multiple temple sessions, endless boring meetings, horrible food, no down time, and sleep deprivation. It was like a week-long Sunday with everyday being not just a 3 hour block of boring meetings and nonsense, but an 18 hour block of boring meetings and nonsense with no breaks. I got so fed up with all the berating talks from mission home leaders or some pinhead General Authority. They constantly said that I (we) did not or could not be worthy in any way to God, that we were not much better than pond scum, and cruelly chastised any Elder publicly when they asked any tough doctrinal questions. The GA’s were the meanest, coldest, and cruelest SOBs I have ever seen. Any respect I had for the General Authorities of the church was now gone. I saw that they had no more inspiration than that of a fence post and no more compassion than someone dripping hot wax into your eyes. If Jesus Christ was like them, I would rather be in outer darkness.
Each day this SLC mission home experience was becoming more and more of a “Bad Boys Reform School” nightmare. I remember one particular day when everyone was gathered in the main meeting room, the GA speaker asked what our jobs as missionaries was to be. Some poor elder raised his hand, stood up and said "...to teach the gospel of Jesus Christ and fellowship people into the church." The response from the GA was, "No Elder, you are totally wrong. Your job is to not teach the gospel but to be obedient and tract out people and baptize."
That elder was so humiliated and stunned. I was stunned. Everyone else was stunned. I sat there and thought, "This is not what I signed up for. This is not what I was taught since my early childhood of what a mission was all about.” This was a major damage moment to whatever testimony I thought I possessed. It seemed like I could almost hear that testimony fracturing like a glass window being over-stressed. I kept thinking over & over, "I left behind Kathy, the love of my life, scuttled my college educational opportunities, sold my car, and gave up my good life to endure this emotional brutality?" It finally occurred to me that I had been lied to during my growing up years.
Oh how I wish that I possessed the courage then to just get up, pack my bags, and hail a cab back to the airport. But at 19, I was too much of a coward to do so. To this day, I regret not taking charge of my life’s direction and just fly back home before suffering two long years of similar shit.
Being a cynical person by nature, I inquired at the front desk of the mission home one day and asked if this was really the LDS mission home. They said "yes, why do you ask?" I replied that I have yet to witness any manifestation of Christ-like love from anyone. That raised their eyebrows and after that I seemed to be watched more closely than before.
NOT DRINKING THEIR KOOL-AID
I was able to not succumb to the brainwashing but by the end of that god-awful week, I was exhausted and shaken from what I experienced. I was still "Flash" and would not allow myself to turn into a mindless Morgbot named "Elder Flash". I still had my self-respect and identity intact after all the ugliness I endured and witnessed. I would not drink their Kool-Aid. Others around me were drinking the Kool-Aid, and heavily, and it was scary but interesting to watch as people became brainwashed and changed before your eyes into mindless missionary Morgbots.
Critical thinking skills had evaporated from most of the Elders. I did talk to a few who were seeing things as I saw them, and they too, wished they had never signed up for missionary service. One of these Elders I talked with did escape because one morning he was gone, bags and all, and no one knew when he left. I wished that he would have taken me with him.
Every night, lying on my bed, my thoughts went around in endless circles for hours thinking: Where was the brotherhood in this nightmare? Where were the spiritual experiences to confirm my testimony as promised? Where was the Christ-like love and appreciation from the Church and its leaders for their "volunteers" that gave up so much to be here? Where was any ounce of compassion for the Elders shaken from being separated from their loved ones?
At the conclusion of this nightmare week, I discovered that whatever testimony I thought I possessed had evaporated. All that I was taught prior to this experience of what a mission would be like was false. I could not believe that I had been deceived my whole life and that I could not see through the lies. I felt so wronged and trapped and now I could no longer trust anyone anymore.
On the cross country flight from Utah to Virginia, feelings of great emptiness, deep sadness, and foreboding overcame me with such intensity that I could not speak to anyone the whole way there. My thoughts only consisted of saying to myself, "What have I done? How did I end up here? Why was I such a coward for not putting my foot down and telling everyone, No, I do not want to serve a mission? I don't want to be here! How could I have been so foolish to get succored into this shit? I should be in college now. I miss Kathy so much it hurts."
THE VIRGINIA ROANOKE MISSION (Hell on Earth)
The Virginia Roanoke mission was nothing more than a tracting mission with few, if any people there, wanting to know about Joe Smith and his damn church.
If there is anything I hate more than going door to door selling, I don't know what it could be. I hated tracting with a passion and that is all I ever seemed to do. The drudgery of spending all day, every day, weekends and holidays, knocking on doors and being told to "get lost" over and over again drove me into the ground. The degree of being told to get lost varied widely from a polite "no thanks" to having guns shoved into my face, but rejection is rejection no matter how it is dished out. A person cannot receive daily non-stop rejection and be immune to it. I certainly was not immune to it.
Coupled with this daily all day tracting drudgery was the constant harassment of the mission leaders with their false sense of urgency for higher baptism numbers, more tracting hours, and more teaching appointments. The quarterly Zone conferences provided no relief from the mission drudgery as they turned out to be nothing more than day-long reaming sessions by our "numbers-pushing" clown of a mission president and by whatever pin head GA that came to speak. "Work harder" they would always say, "Tract more hours and don't waste any time". If you're not finding people to teach, it was because of your unworthiness".
Did I ever receive any praise for my efforts, or encouragement for enduring daily rejection, or gratitude for giving so much of my time from my young life to bring souls into this church? Never!
Did I ever receive any encouragement to keep going and just hang in there? Not once!
All I ever got (as well as the other missionaries) was unjustified condemnation for not working hard enough, for being slothful, or being nit-picked on the way were dressed, or condemned for random bad luck, or for breaking mission rules; rules that often contradicted each other so you were damned either way.
No matter how much success you had, it was never good enough.
I found out the hard way that if you ever let it be known that you were having a bad day or that you were tired or depressed or just needed a break, you were rebuked harshly for not having "The Spirit". The responses received for feeling down or for feeling depressed were "You don't have the spirit, Elder.” “You must have some un-repented grievous sin in your past, Elder.” “Are you worthy to be here, Elder?” “Are you masturbating, Elder?"
Empathy and compassion for one another were foreign concepts especially to the MP and to the Elders that came from the ‘factory’ of Utah or Idaho. I found them to be the most intolerant, arrogant, selfish, compassionless, and ignorant bunch of oxygen wasters that I have ever been forced to associate with. Their treatment of non-members was embarrassing to me. I found out later that the Elders and Sister Missionaries that were not from Utah or Idaho felt the same way about their Utah and Idaho counterparts.
I never went away from any Zone Conference uplifted and rejuvenated. I always went away feeling depressed. Driving back to our place after any Zone conference, I was counting the days I had left before I could go home.
NUMBERS, HOURS, CHARTS, & GRAPHS
I saw firsthand how the gospel of Jesus Christ took a back seat in favor of just getting higher numbers of tracting hours and baptisms for meaningless reports. During my first few months of my mission, there was a woman we began teaching that was married with a young daughter and her husband wanted no part of Mormonism. Our presence and our constant visits were really irritating the husband and was causing a lot of marital unrest in this once happy marriage.
I voiced my concern that maybe we should not pursue this family as we were becoming more and more unwelcome to the husband. I resisted my companion’s eagerness to continue teaching this woman and it became such an issue between us that my companion called the ZLs to come and straighten out my “bad attitude”. According to the ZLs, we needed the baptism stats higher and I was standing in the way.
Well, being the junior companion and having my concerns swept aside, we ended up going several more times to teach this woman and she was agreed to be baptized without her husband’s blessing. Afterwards we found out that they began some serious arguing and fighting over her being a member and eventually she filed for divorce. She left with the young daughter and moved to Utah and the husband stayed in Virginia vowing to do what he could to destroy the Mormon church.
So a once happy home and marriage was systematically destroyed and a little girl had her world turned upside down for the sake of baptism numbers. It was the saddest thing I ever had to be part of.
On and on and on did the days of being a missionary drag on. I found myself just merely existing to get up in the morning and going tracting, maybe eating some lunch if I could afford it, then go do more tracting, have some swill quality dinner, then doing even more tracting and then maybe, if I was lucky, go to a teaching appointment that, almost without fail, fell through. The next day I would do the same thing, and the next day, and the next day, and the next day, and the next day...all week...week after week...month after month. Work without end, toil without reward.
The yearly holidays would come and I would find myself out tracting. It's my birthday and instead of celebrating, where am I? I am out tracting. It's Thanksgiving Day, and where am I? Out tracting and interrupting someone's family gathering. It's Christmas time; that depressing time of year deserves its own section.
THE DEPRESSING MISSIONARY CHRISTMASES
Christmas time was the most depressing holiday for me as a missionary. Knocking on door after endless door in the December bone chilling Virginia winter was so depressing. I was always thinking of my family buying gifts for each other and thinking about being with Kathy.
When some people would open their door, I would see their lighted Christmas trees with presents under them and see them enjoying the holiday time. These scenes would make my heart almost stop from the flood of depression that would wash over me. How I longed to be with my family and Kathy. How I missed the fun of Christmas shopping. How I missed watching football while a fire burned in the fireplace. How I missed listening to Christmas music and enjoying all the fun things of the Christmas season that were now, as a missionary, considered evil, taboo, slothful activities, and a waste of time.
No one, and I repeat, no one who answered their door at this time of year were ever interested in knowing about Joe Smith, especially from two depressed 20 year olds who didn't even want what they were selling. I remember some people wishing us a "Merry Smithmas" because they believed Mormons worshipped old Joe and looking back now I understand why due to all the emphasis on Joseph Smith, Joseph Smith, Joseph Smith, and more Joseph Smith.
What kind of church sings a song like "Praise to the Man" at Christmas time? And don't get me started on the un-Christmas like services the Mormon Church has. I was always grateful that no investigators ever showed up at church at Christmas.
I did call home a few times at each Christmas and also called Kathy. I was so happy to hear their voices that I cried and cried and could hardly talk. I did not want to hang up because I knew I would sink even further into depression (if that was possible). When the calls ended, I sat there and cried until there were no more tears left thinking to myself over and over again how could I have been so stupid in my choices to end up in this god-forsaken place and condition?
The first mission Christmas I experienced was worst of all because I knew that when Christmas rolled around again, I would still be trapped in Virginia doing the same exact thing, more endless mind-numbing tracting with 4 more months to go. Sure enough, when the 2nd Christmas came, I found myself still stuck in Virginia and still saddled with a smothering religious duty of endless tracting to perform. My depression had reached such depths; I was in an unknown territory lifetime low.
PLANS FOR TERMINATING MYSELF
In a desperate attempt to deal with the pain of my loneliness and hopelessness, I decided to just shut myself down and do the physical motions of the job to just get the tracting hours to go on the weekly report. Some people commented to me that my countenance had become so joyless but I had run out of energy to fake it anymore. I just didn't care. My prayers were never answered. My leaders just constantly condemned me unjustly and my family seemed oblivious to my suffering.
The mission drudgery continued relentlessly on and on. More & more lonely thoughts would swirl together endlessly in my mind with ever increasing intensity. "I could be in school now finishing my degree…I wish I had my car instead of this damn bicycle…I am so cold or so miserably hot…I am so lonely and I miss Kathy and her soothing presence…How could I have been so stupid to allow myself to end up in this hellhole place?"
I did not realize it at the time how dangerously depressed I was. I found myself having no hopes, no dreams, no joy, and no real reason for living anymore. How down and out I was. "Could I do anything at all to change this joyless existence?" I thought to myself. “Was there any way to put an end to this? Could I do anything? What options are open to me? There must be some solution to end this pain.” I have been depressed before just like anyone else and had bounced back. But this was intense depression and I actually had pain in my chest from it. This was a first.
A solution did creep into my mind; a solution that would definitely put an end to this miserable existence; a solution that had a compelling sweetness to it.
THOUGHTS OF TERMINATING MYSELF
For the first time in my life, the thought of suicide presented itself as a sweet and practical way for ending my joyless existence. It was such a shock to me that I would even seriously consider such a course of action, but I had reached absolute rock bottom and I truly felt that I had nothing to lose.
Here I was, a missionary of the Lord's supposedly true church, who was supposed to be blessed by the Lord for sacrificing all to serve him, who was promised the blessings of success for following all the ridiculous & uncountable amount of double-bind rules, who was promised the ministering of angels for support and encouragement.
But instead, I was a missionary that was planning out my own murder in order to end the pain of depression generated from the drudgery of missionary life and to end the lonely horror of having nowhere to go and escape, of having no tears left to cry, of having no one to talk to, and of being unable to produce the courage or money or family support to just walk away. "My yoke is easy, my burden is light"…The Lord was apparently out to lunch when the missionary program was enacted by his church.
Several circumstances offered me the chance to end it all but I never fulfilled them. One opportunity came one day I was riding my bike on a narrow busy road against traffic and I saw a large semi-truck approaching. Without any sense of self-preservation, I found myself on a collision course. Thoughts of how quick and sweet the end could come, kept me there in that lane. Some people slowed down and yelled at me to get out of the way and the horn of the truck was blaring loudly. But I did not care. Why should I?
Sweet relief from the horror of being a missionary was coming fast. Only when the thoughts of the sadness Kathy would feel upon hearing of my death entered my mind, did I swerve back to the shoulder and barely in time. What a bizarre feeling it was to not have anything to lose and where even your own life means nothing to you.
After I pulled back onto the shoulder, I stopped and looked back at the truck fading into the distance and then something bizarre happened. I actually heard in my head a loud snap sound like two pieces of wood slapping together and then I felt some strange sensation I cannot describe. The fear of man seemed to be leaving me and I felt a strange sense of empowerment and courage that I never had before. I believed my brain was saying "Enough of this mission bullshit. Quit taking shit anymore from anybody.” Unknown to me, I would use this new courage at my last Zone Conference.
THE DROOLING ANGRY MISSION PRESIDENT
Four months before I was to go home, at my last Zone Conference, I had the usual interview with the MP as every missionary did. But as the usual "blame the Elder" one sided interview commenced, the MP became unusually hateful and vindictive toward me because this time he stood up from behind the desk and proceeded to yell into my face saying point blank that "…I was a failure as a missionary…" as he pointed out my lack of baptisms and the low number of investigator discussions indicated on my weekly reports. A week before this Zone Conference, we had baptized a young couple.
Every Zone conference always produced a similar tirade but for me, this time was the last straw with this GA-wannabe pin head. Too many times did I sit through similar interviews enduring his phony self-righteous indignation and said nothing. But now, with my new found courage, I fired back at him with everything I had.
I stood up from my chair, leaned over his desk and yelled back into his face saying, using several colorful metaphors at a high audio volume, that he was a f***ing failure of a mission president for blaming me for things I had no control over and I was not someone who was motivated by his threats. I continued yelling into his face saying that if he was incapable of offering any kind of encouragement, support, or compassion for me or any other missionary who gave up everything to be in this armpit of a place, he was unfit to be here and should go pack his bags, take his clueless wife with his dumb-ass children, and get the hell out of our lives so someone qualified with Christ-like attributes could take his place. I also told him that most of the Elders despised him and wished that they could be transferred to another mission. This man was not the kind of man used to being put in his place by anyone let alone a lowly elder.
In all my days there, I have never seen him madder but I did not care anymore. He went beyond red faced to purple and began to drool onto the desk. He was so angry he could not speak anymore and I had run out of colorful metaphors to continue. We stared at each other for a few moments then I turned around and began walking out the room. My last words to him, before I left the room, were that I would never speak with him again for any reason. I walked out and left him sitting there with his puddle of drool on the desk and I never did speak to him again for the remainder of my mission.
After that heated exchange, I went outside the church building for the remainder of the Zone Conference and fed squirrels from a jar of Planters Peanuts. I was drained body and soul and that was the last time I ever took lip from him or anyone again.
Any belief I had left of the divinity of the Mormon Church and any belief I had left that God cared about me ended. I now saw with high clarity that the whole Mormon Church was a bowl of excrement and that I had been fooled and swindled out of two years of my young life, tricked into laying on the fools "Alter of Forfeit" my girl, my education, my car, and my freedom. Now what do I do? I have 4 months left. Should I end my existence? Do I have the strength see this hell hole through? Should I just go home?
I decided to finish the mission so my parents could at least have their bragging rights in the ward of having an RM son. That last 4 months was the hardest time I ever had to go through but my thoughts and desire to commit suicide slowly evaporated. I knew I was going home soon and Kathy was still there writing weekly letters keeping me going.
I do wish to say that had it not been for Kathy's love and her weekly letters & tapes, I would have gone over the edge and self-terminated. Unknown to her, she was the only anchor that kept me tethered to the world of the living.
My day of release from the "best two years of my life" was getting closer every day. For the remaining 16 weeks, I just did the mechanics of the job. I did not fill out any weekly reports and I did not care what the members of the branch thought anymore. Mentally, I had checked out.
But the last day of my mission did arrive.