Before I met my ex (he's the first Mormon... well, ex-Mormon I had ever met & the catalyst for me being in Salt Lake City,) I thought Mormons were Amish/ Jehovah's Witnesses. Basically I didn't know the difference and thought the tall, skinny bike riding guys with the white helmet & backpack in the city were called Jehovah's Witnesses when they came knocking at your door, and became Amish with seven wives when they returned home to ride their buggies and work the land. (I was obviously confused.)So the first time I went to Provo to visit my ex's parents (who unlike my ex are still LDS) I was excited to spend a week in a house with no electricity and wondered if I should bring a full skirt, cape, and apron so I didn't stand out in my New York winter garb. But to my disappointment, his childhood home looked more like a page out of Architectural Digest and his parents looked as though they had just stepped out of Bloomingdales.
To help me better understand the culture he had left behind (in seeing my confusion), my ex showed me Southpark's season 7: All About the Mormons. That's where I learned everything I know about the Mormon church and Joseph Smith. So when I moved to SLC against the wishes of my friends, my ex, and my parents to wait for the housing bubble to pop so I could move back to San Francisco, I promised I'd stay away from the Mormons and their divine inspiration from the golden plates, aka the Book of Mormon. The move to Utah was strictly a business venture in my eyes and a way of making another fortune through real estate so I could go back to the city I adore.
For two years, I was pretty successful at staying away from the non-drinking, perpetually happy, Book of Mormon toting populous of this City. Then I met HasenPfeffer. He showed up at my house one night (I had thrown a party for a friend's birthday) uninvited with my friend Phil's ex-wife who I also had never met. Being the gracious host that I am, I walked up to them and said, "Hi. Hmm... I should know you, but I can't seem to recall... Where do I know you from?" When in fact, I was thinking, Who the h*ll are you & why are you on my property? Well, he ended up staying, drinking and partying with the rest of us and even entertained us with a song. Then I found out he was Mormon. A church going Mormon who drinks and parties. I was intrigued...really intrigued.
He was Mormon alright. Without me asking, he came over with his friends and took all my empty bottles from the party to the recycling place at the golf course. In all the parties I had thrown, no one had ever really helped me clean up the mess; and this Mormon I hardly knew volunteered to help. Not only was he nice, but as I subsequently found out in hanging out with him & his friends (he lives pretty close), he turned out to be incredibly cool.
He and I had many discussions about the Mormon religion while getting intoxicated with vino & beer over the next several weeks, but it was never really in-depth as we were partying with friends. Then I met Beau. He is Hasen's friend, and a real Mormon meaning he not only goes to church every week, but follows the church doctrine to a T. But unlike the gray-suit wearing church goers I see on Sundays, he is hip. The first time I met him, he was on his way to church, but looked more like he was going to a young, hipster fashion show in Soho.
Beau and I have had extensive dialogues about his faith in the last few weeks. I even went to the Mormon church with Hasen-Beau last weekend. Even last night I was on the phone with Beau until 2 a.m. exchanging our ideas and beliefs about god. I'm finding out that Southpark might have not been the best source for learning about the Mormons. I'm also realizing Mormons aren't freaks as so many people think they are. They don't have seven wives, they don't have tassels on the nipples of the undergarments they wear ( I don't know where I got that idea), and they actually are quite fun to be around. (Oh and not everyone wears those undergarments.)
Not to worry, I'm not converting. However, what I am being is being open to the people I swore I'd keep away from. Instead of judging and excluding a group of people just because they don't drink coffee & believe in some golden plates, I've decided to embrace them for who they are. My non-Mormon friends here think I'm crazy & on a mission to deflower all the Mormon boys, but that's not it. I've found that a lot of things I believe in are in sink with what the Mormons believe in. It's just that we use a different language to explain our faith.
I love my new Mormon friends, and as my friend Kevin (a native Utah-n who was raised Momorn) from SF always says, "Utah-rds are people, too, you know..." And they really are.
