Comic #4

What Was I Saying?

My mind tends to wander when I'm leaving voicemails for people.  After talking for a few minutes I'll often realize that I'm not entirely sure what I've been saying or if it even makes sense.  As a result, I'm pretty sure at least 72% of the people I call and leave messages for while at work hear something like this:

I wonder if, when people listen to these voicemails, they can easily recognize the exact moment in time when I realized that I was, in fact, leaving a message.  Usually, as soon as that light bulb clicks on, I hurry up and say something like, "Yeah, so, give me a call please."

I wonder if I've ever interrupted a really cool story I was telling someone's voicemail and they were disappointed and wanted to hear the end.

Foul Play

My very first real job was with the SL County Parks and Recreation department as a referee for their junior soccer league.  I was 15, and had never played soccer aside from playground pickup games.

I did not then, nor do I now, know the rules of soccer.

That's not entirely accurate.  I know some of the rules.  For example, I know that the ball has to stay within the lines on the outside of the field or it's out of bounds.  And I know that when the ball goes in the net it's a goal.

But that's about it.

It was easy enough to fake it when I was reffing for the three-year-olds.  Every thirteen seconds I'd have to blow the whistle because the ball went out of bounds.  They almost never scored goals, and at that age they didn't keep track of points, anyway.  I spent a lot of my time on the field tying the kids' shoes.

The seven-year-olds, however, were a different breed.  The kids themselves still didn't quite understand the game and were just in it for the fun of running around on grass and kicking a ball.  But the parents... the parents were out for blood.

It usually took them until about two minutes into the game to realize that I had no idea what I was doing.

"Come on, ref! What're you doing?" they'd scream from the sidelines, fists clenched, faces red.

"I wish I knew!" I'd think.

"Stay off the field!" I'd say.

I'm pretty sure that's a rule.

One day, one parent was particularly upset.  I can hardly blame her.

I mean, I've seen Jurassic Park.  I know that a butterfly flaps its wings in Peking and in Central Park you get rain instead of sunshine.  Seemingly tiny, insignificant events can create absolute catastrophe.

So when I, a poorly-trained teenager with a plastic whistle, carelessly called a foul on her precious little child when he merely kicked an opponent in the back of the knee, I must have opened Pandora's box.  Because that child had a foul called against him, because the other team got a penalty kick, because that penalty kick was missed and the game resumed, that woman's kid would not grow up to become President of the United States.

Also, that woman would not be able to see the end of her son's soccer game, because I kicked her off the field for rushing out me and screaming.

It's all my fault.  I can see that now.

I'm sorry, America.

When soccer season ended and the Parks and Rec department released the work schedule for basketball referees, I wasn't on it.  I still don't know if I was fired or just overlooked.

Phones

What is wrong with people?

I just answered a phone call at work.  It went a little something like this:

Me: "Good afternoon, this is Kristen."

Caller: [in a demanding tone] "Bob or Joe."

That's it.  No "hello," no "may I speak to," no "please."  Just "Bob or Joe."  Would it have been that difficult to actually ask for either of them rather than just blurt out their names?  If the caller had added a simple "please" at the end, or an even simpler "hi" at the beginning, or had even spoken to me in a tone that didn't sound like he was accusing me of dipping his cats in boiling oil, it probably wouldn't have bothered me so much.

Who am I kidding?

Yes, it would.

I hate answering the phone.  This is mostly because approximately 137% of the people I have to talk to have exceptionally poor phone etiquette.

I often blogstalk a friend of mine who works at a public library and writes highly amusing posts about his phone conversations with socially retarded patrons.  A former roommate of mine often shares stories of crazy phone stories from her job at an architecture firm.  While it should make me feel better to know that I'm not alone in having to deal with these people, it doesn't.  It just makes me more upset.

If I am on the phone with stupid people all day, and my friends are on their phones with stupid people all day, and we all have such different jobs that the chances that all of our stupid people are overlapping each other is practically non-existent, then it only makes sense that most people who are on the phone all day are having to deal with stupid people.

And if there are so many stupid people making these stupid phone calls, then I must assume that some of the people who are on the phone with stupid people are day are, in fact, themselves stupid people.

Based on highly advanced mathematics I calculated in my head as I was typing this sentence, I'm fairly convinced that, worldwide, there are only 27 people who I could talk to on the phone without wanting to punch them in the face.

Unfortunately, none of these 27 people ever seem to be the ones calling my office.

Rant

I just overheard a conversation between two coworkers. Let's call them Nancy and Chuck.

Not to protect their identities, I just enjoy fake names.

It's one of my quirks.

Chuck and I have never been particularly close, but he often stops to chat with Nancy, who sits near me. Chuck and his girlfriend have been engaged for several months, and so every few days he and Nancy discuss the various drama that comes with an impending wedding. And I eavesdrop when I have nothing better to do.

Which is most of the time.

My job is boring.

Anyway, last week the big issue with Chuck's wedding was that his parents don't much care for his fiancee. This resulted in the wedding being pushed back yet again while the involved parties attempt to reconcile their differences. So, last week Chuck was telling Nancy that they didn't know yet when exactly when their wedding would be, and it was stressing him out.

Today, Chuck mentioned that his weekend plans included moving some of his things to the house that he and his fiancee would occupy once they got married. Perplexed, Nancy asked why he was moving so soon if the wedding wouldn't be for months.

"Well, we're getting married a week from Saturday," Chuck explained.

Perk! went my ears.

"Why?" went Nancy.

"Because the girl's pregnant," went my instinct.

"She's pregnant," whispered Chuck.

Now I've never been that big on gossip, particularly office gossip. This can be attributed to the fact that most of the time I just don't give a damn about other people.

Except you.

I love you.

But Chuck is one of those sweet, innocent, round-faced, super good LDS kids like so many others I grew up around, and I have a wicked soft spot for hearing stories about how these kids react to their own transgressions.

Call it a research project, if you will.

I'm convinced that there is a large number of LDS people who, much like the Me of Years Past, feel completely out of place within their religion and culture but are just too completely absorbed in it to do anything. And hearing stories about good people who do things the church considers "bad", like having sex with their fiancee, sometimes makes me feel validated in this belief.

There will be more about that in later posts.

Moving on.

Nancy moved forward without so much as a blink. "How far along is she? When did it happen?" (As a side note, I love Nancy's straightforwardness. The woman could get anyone to tell her their deepest, darkest secrets just because of the completely bold and badass way in which she asks questions.)

"A couple weeks ago. And maybe about a month before that," Chuck responded.

"Where?"

"At my house." Chuck lives with his parents.

"What did your parents say?" Nancy asked.

"They still don't want me to marry her. They said it's not too late to get out of it," Chuck admitted, his voice staying remarkably even considering the weight of his words. "But it's really their fault."

SCREEEEEECH! Mental brakes. Pop it in reverse. What was that, Chuck?

"But it's really their fault."

Please, Chuck, please. Explain to Nancy how exactly you having sex with your fiancee and getting her pregnant is your parents' fault, before I lose all self-control and look straight at you so you know I've been intently listening this whole time.

Chuck delivered.

"They would leave us alone all the time," he explained to Nancy. "Like, they'd leave us in the family room and they'd be in another room down the hall."

It's moments like these that make me wish I were a sassy black Southern woman so that I could effectively and convincingly pull off a, "Honeychild, please!" So please take a moment to imagine me as a sassy black Southern woman, waving my finger at Chuck and saying, "Honeychild, please!"

Did you picture it?

Was I wearing a headscarf?

You racist.

Chuck, it is not, in any conceivable way, your parents' fault that you two had sex. Unless Moms and Poppsy dimmed the lights, popped on some Marvin Gaye and REMOVED ALL OF YOUR CLOTHING before leaving the two of you alone, their absence from the family room did not cause you to knock up your girlfriend.

Sadly, this idea that two kids having sex is somehow the fault of their parents is an idea I have heard many times before. In all those "chastity lectures" of my adolescence, we were told that it was dangerous to be left all alone with a member of the opposite sex. Especially at night.

"The Holy Ghost goes home at midnight."

The basic lesson that came out of this is that we, as a human race, are completely unable to control our sexual urges. Once the lights go out and the chaperones head to the kitchen for a snack, our libidos will strangle our common sense by the throat. We have absolutely no say in the matter.

Now, I know that sexual desires can be overwhelming. But I also am a strong believer in self-fulfilling prophecies. Telling eager young virgins that the moment they find themselves alone with someone they're attracted to the devil will take over is the surest way to make it happen. It's like a placebo effect in reverse.

Then you end up with people like Chuck, who refuse to take responsibility for their own actions. "It's really their fault. My parents. They would leave us alone all the time."

Now, I am not taking a stance on either side of the abstinence before marriage issue. I am a firm believer that what's right for some is not right for all.

But I am taking a stance on the holding-yourself-accountable issue.

Seriously.

I have to wonder if Chuck and his fiancee had decided that because it was his parents' fault they had sex, they were still "worthy" of an LDS temple marriage. If last week the marriage plans he discussed with Nancy still involved the temple, but he and his fiancee got it on weeks before, were they more than willing to go through the temple ceremony "unworthily"?

I am no longer LDS. I don't believe having sex with someone makes you unworthy of God's love. I frankly couldn't care less who has sex and when and whether they do it with rings on their fingers.

But I do believe that if you voluntarily belong to an organization, you should respect that organization enough to obey their rules. In the LDS world, that means not going to the temple unless your local religious leaders deem you free from sin and worthy of entering.

If you don't care enough about your church to abide by its most basic rules, then why the hell do you continue to voluntarily belong to it?

I am insanely curious as to how many couples like Chuck and his fiancee fool their families and friends by going through the LDS temple wedding even though they've slept together prior to the ceremony.

How many of them convince themselves that it's okay with God because it's their parents' fault for leaving them alone?

That's a statistic I doubt the church would publish in any of their family-themed pamphlets.

Chuck, it's not my business if you have sex. It's not my business whether or not if you believe in the church you belong to. The decisions you make affect you and you alone.

But for God's sake, man. Admit that it's you who is making them.