Life among the FLDS (2 of 2): Life Outside the FLDS.

From Lost Boy, by Brent W. Jeffs, with Maia Szalavitz (2009; pp. 149-150):

About a year after I’d moved in with my brothers [who left the FLDS]... I got a lot better at meeting girls and hanging out with them.

In fact, I found that girls really loved lost boys.  Unlike many men our age, most of us actually wanted commitment.  We looked for frequent contact and connection.  We didn’t want casual sex.  We didn’t play games.  We even wanted to know their families.  Lost boys didn’t complain about hanging out with Mom and Dad or going to family functions.  Indeed, we actively sought them out.  We were unlike any other boyfriends they had ever had.  Fear of settling down was definitely not our main issue.

A lot of women also liked the idea of rescuing someone.  So many of the guys I knew who left... actually got engaged very quickly after leaving the church.

Of course, we were awkward at social functions at first – and as a result, some guys got engaged to pretty much the first woman who would go out with them.  But unlike other men, they were happy to hang out with the in-laws and aunts and cousins – in part, I think, because they wanted to replace the big families they had grown up in.

. . .

Life among the FLDS (1 of 2): Idolatry.

From Lost Boy, by Brent W. Jeffs, with Maia Szalavitz (2009; pp. 103-104):

Warren and Rulon preached that, because the apocalypse was coming, the people needed to be even more perfect and godlike to ensure their survival...

Warren began preaching that almost all material possession were “idols” and that we had to stop worshipping them.  He wanted us to rid ourselves of worldly good in preparation for the apocalypse.  Anything that wasn’t “useful” was a worldly thing.   This included all kinds of trinkets, artwork, even family photos...

I’d start taking woodshop class in about fifth grade.  We’d make wooden boxes and other decorative items as projects.  But when Warren started in on idols, that had to stop.  One morning when I was in eighth grade, Warren preached that wall sconces were idols.  When we went into the shop that day, the teacher was practically in tears.  He dismissed the class and told us to play outside because he was afraid that anything he could think of to make might be interpreted as idolatry by Warren.  That would get him into trouble, and possibly even lose him his wife and his kids.

. . .

My Mom on the New Pope.

So yesterday I was talking with my parents, and even though she doesn't pay much attention to the Catholic Church, my mom got on the topic of the new pope.

"Really," she said, in an 'I'm going to speak my mind now' tone-of-voice that I realized that I got from her and use when I go off on things, "How much change can we expect from a 76 year old white guy?"

When I pointed out that the new pope was from Argentina, she was like, "Whatever, he's still part of the old boys club."

Then, she started going off on about how "the old boys club" says nothing can ever change, "But then suddenly one of them wants to retire, and things can change, and he retires."

"They can change things when it's convenient for them," she was like.

Classroom eccentricities.

With my kids where I'm teaching, I:

1) make them roll dice to determine where they'll sit for class, and always tell them it's to "prevent build-up of negative energy in the room", which they'd notice if they taught a lot

- and-

2) have them write their weekly in-class essays on old coffee-stained scrap paper, and thank them for humoring my "environmental neuroticism", as well as reducing the large stack of paper for reuse that I have heaped up on my kitchen table.

Upsetting.

I still get kind of upset whenever I heard about that poor Hadiyah girl who was shot in Chicago.

From everything you read about her, she sounds like such she was such a bright, vivacious girl with a lot of drive and who was a lot of fun, just like you'd want your child to be.

I was pretty hammered when I was watching the State of the Union at the student bar, and me and my one hippie friend from Michigan started talking about Hadiyah when Obama mentioned her, and we both started crying profusely.

Phew - Just in time - Latin accomplishment.

So yesterday me and my one grantwriting Latin student finished up our special readings to coincide with the conclave.

Last week was our 2nd session on sections from the Apostolic Constitution "Universi Dominici Gregis" (the most recent doc outlaying conclave procedures), and we did a ton of sightreading at the end to power through it.

Yesterday we worked on Benedict's resignation announcement.  He had prepped about half, then we powered through and did a ton of sightreading to finish that off too.

I'm happy, my goal had been to finish both those readings before the new pope was elected!

In like 2 places (maybe 3), too, the Latin of Benedict's announcement was kind of shitty, from what I could tell:

1) He used "conscius" instead of "conscius sibi" to mean "aware of".

2) He went back into an accusative-infinitive instruction after a purpose clause, when it seems like it should have been a continuation of the purpose clause.

Also, I think he used "non solum - non minus" when "non solum - non etiam" would have been better (I'd have to check usage on that, though).

I wonder who drew up the Latin text - and what language Benedict's resignation was originally written in (Italian? German?).

Non-pareils (sp.?).

Back in January, I was craving fatty foods a lot, sometimes ice cream, sometimes chocolate.

One night I got home late and had a craving, so I popped into the liquor store near my house to see if they had a candy bar.

As it turns out, they really don't stock candy bars, though they had a few random candies and stuff in a cardboard box lid on the counter, and among them was a box of non-pareils (sp.?).

The incredibly heavy-set Puerto Rican-American woman who owns the store was a bit chatty, and started talking about how when she was a kid in the city her parents would take her and her siblings to this Roy Rogers movie theater that isn't there anymore, and they'd always get a box of non-pareils (sp.?).

I then shared that when I was a kid, my parents used to bring a box of them home for me and my brother, whenever they got a babysitter and went to the movies without us.