Today a long-time good friend is moving into a room in our basement. He had put his house on the market and much to everyone’s surprise, it sold rather quickly and he has been scrambling to find a place to live, so we offered him a private room and bath — not to mention a dog and two cats who will appreciate more company.

Our circle of friends got together this morning and helped him move stuff into storage, Deseret Industries and his new home. He was completely organized and it was almost more of a social gathering than the older Elders’ Quorum guilt-induced moving obligations.

All-in-all, a good day.

A really good friend of ours died Tuesday night of a sudden and unexpected heart attack.

H. Francis Sellers was an artist, inventor, inveterate tinkerer, musician, traveler and unconditional friend. He was a stellar husband to his wife Patrice and a father without peer (and artistic mentor) to his 13-year-old daughter Frankie.

Harry always has a ready story or joke and even though we had heard many of them multiple times, there was as much entertainment in his telling as in the actual content.

We always laughed at his stories of learning how to smoke pot at BYU in the late 1950s.

He avoided hypocrisy, religion and crippling belief systems that he felt served no one well. A friend said, “he was true to himself”. I think that hits the nail on the head.

We’ll miss him.

I watched a very heart-warming and yet chilling documentary last night. Dear Zachary tells the story of Andrew Bagby, a young doctor who was killed by his ex-girlfriend. She turns up pregnant in court and his parents fight to gain custody of their soon-to-be-born grandchild.

This film is a visual letter to that child, Zachary, about his father from the perspective of dozens of his closest friends, family and co-workers. It also covers in great detail the legal battles and the love his grandparents had for him.

Well done, poignant and thought-provoking about the impact that a life — and death — can have on so many.

A married LDS couple with whom we work invited us to the wedding reception of their son the other night.

Now, I want to note here that I am not a big fan of being asked to celebrate (e.g. contribute financially or gift wise or in most cases, even attend) something in which I can not legally partake. Also note that we had never actually met the couple, but I acquiesced to attending because I like and respect the parents.

Like any social being, I can show up and smile and make witticisms and be my normal charming self, but I personally begin to bristle when asked to swallow my pride and ignore the fact that my 23-year relationship would not only be unacknowledged by this particular group, it is essentially considered immoral, if not illegal by many of them.

We arrived at the evening gathering to the sight of what appeared to be an entire LDS ward plopped into the backyard: Small children, babies, older people, young couples, singles. A multi-million-dollar building overhead and industrial carpeting underfoot and we could have been in any LDS chapel in the world (except for the exceedingly “white and delightsome”-ness of the prevalent skin tones).

My honey always makes me do the writing whenever faced with a joint task, so I signed the guestbook, “At least yours is legal. Best wishes….”

I felt much better.

We had an enjoyable 2011 Utah Pride weekend with attendance at both the (now) largest parade in Utah and the festival at Library Square.

The local NPR affiliate, KCPW, reported that there were 30,000 in attendance, which is a record-breaker by quite a bit (I think last year’s 20k was the previous high). We joked that KSL would report (as in years past) that “hundreds attended”. I guess it’s accurate, depending on how you define “hundreds”.

It was also predicted that this year’s parade with 100 registered entries and floats would now be larger than the “Days of ’47″ parade held in July. No one from the media is quite calling that race yet. I’m sure the LDS church will encourage local units to get involved this year to maintain the record. It would be a shame to lose to ‘diversity’.

2011 Utah Pride Parade (looking west down 200 South)

The Grand Marshall this year was Roseanne Barr, who seemed pleased at the size of the crowd.

Roseanne Barr - 2011 Grand Marshal, Utah Pride

A rather touching sight was the Utah high school students’ “QSA” alliance, which marched holding signs representing their respective schools. My honey admitted that he ‘teared up’ over that. I did as well.

2011 Utah Pride Parade - QSA

“Calm, spiritual and confident”.

Those were the three words used to describe the long-ago me by a 53-year-old man today, who was my first junior companion almost 32 years ago in the mission field.

Of course, in July of 1979 I was just coming off a months-long stint in São Gabriel — a mission pothole if there ever was one — and the two sequential Brazilian senior companions who made life hell for me — and had learned several life lessons by the time I was transferred.

In retrospect, I suppose I was calm because I had grown to know that anger and other untoward emotions had not been productive.

I was spiritual because I really believed in what I was teaching and that feeling had not abated for the year that I had been in the field — in spite of others’ best intentions to make that happen.

I was confident because I felt that the cause was just and I was in the right place at the right time — and I finally was a senior companion.

After having conversed with me for the better part of an hour today, I asked my ex-companion if he still felt that that description still fit and he said, “yes”.

I started attending Seminary in August 1973 — the month before I was baptized as a fifteen-year-old convert. My teacher was a brilliant, inspirational, 27-year-old mother of three small children, who had moved to southeast Wyoming with her husband, a teacher at Eastern Wyoming College.

They have recently retired, moved to Utah and were in Salt Lake visiting their daughter for the holidays, so we arranged a long-overdue visit at our house today to spend time catching up. I had last seen them in 1982, so we had a lot to talk about.

It was really a beautiful opportunity and both she and I teared up several times during our lengthy (albeit too-short) conversation as we reminisced of our lives crossing 37 years ago. Her husband was a bit more stoic, but the kinship I always felt with Carla was renewed and I suspect that we will begin to see each other more in the coming years.

I thanked Carla and her husband for being the catalyst for bringing culture into my life. I first heard classical music at their house. I first watched movies and received an education as to what when into them from a scholarly and artistic perspective (Martin was a drama teacher who taught film history as one of his subjects). We talked of art and sculpture and painters throughout history.

My first adult-level intellectual and spiritual discussions were with them.

I learned much during those two years I knew them then — and their small family served as a bedrock for my own turbulent life when I joined the church and struggled with my own family’s acceptance on many levels.

Good people and great friends.

Had dinner last night with family-in-law and Maxine Hanks (one of the infamous “September 6″ who were excommunicated as ‘heretics’ in the early 1990s).

Fascinating discussion around religion, belief (or lack thereof) and LDS church history. It’s a good thing my honey was in Milan; he would have been bored to tears.

It made for a pleasant evening to have like-minded souls conversing about the great mysteries. The food was outstanding as well, which didn’t hurt the overall sense of well-being and feelings of kinship.

I can’t tell you how pleased I was to receive a Facebook request today from someone whom I had not seen since 1985. She was the youngest daughter of my high school LDS Seminary teacher (and Stake Presidency Counselor), whom I revered as an example of what I wanted to become.

As the sister of the girl whom I dated in my senior year, I always noted that she was a precocious child. She had large, watchful eyes and an intelligent, but quiet demeanor. She always seemed to be taking in my actions and listening to my words and I felt it was important to be an example to her.

I’m always a little trepidatious when I receive friend requests from people I knew when I was actively LDS. Will they now judge me? Will they quickly de-friend me? Will they respect my life and choices?

Will we have anything in common but our shared humanity? I guess in this instance, I will shortly see.

[UPDATE - 16 December: After several attempts to communicate via telephone, we finally had a very nice conversation last night. It was great catching up on 25+ years and comparing notes about our lives.

It was cathartic for both to have this discussion and to see where we have landed at this point, after so many fits and starts.

One interesting note, on the Myers-Briggs scale we are both INTP, which didn't surprise me in the least.]
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Meanwhile, I have been reading the blog of another old friend who turned fifty this year. He proclaims himself happy, but his postings seem to show something else: a bitterness, a longing and a questioning.

This caused me to evaluate my own life a bit and I determined (probably superficially) that I am happy where I am in my life and with my relationships and in my thoughts and feelings.

I see old friends reaching certain milestone ages and turning so introspective that it becomes a miasma of “me, me me”. I think they sense that they are that much closer to dying and death, and their surroundings and other people fade a bit in their egocentrism.

Hopefully, I have not done the same.

Hopefully the life that I have made for myself can serve as an inspiration to others; that a fulfilling, happy, shared life is possible and probable.

I mourn for others’ seemingly wasted lives (their words), overwrought with guilt, anger and blame, but realize I can only be responsible for me.

And I am content.

“Everything was beautiful, and nothing hurt.”
– Kurt Vonnegut
Slaughterhouse Five | (epitaph of Billy Pilgrim)

After many years and this second physical attempt, I found the grave of Betty Maud Clements in a Blumenau, Brazil cemetery yesterday morning. Her granddaughter — who died two years afterwards — is buried in the same grave.

I genuinely loved this quick trip to Blumenau and feel like really accomplished something good.

I spent the rest of the day site-seeing, reminiscing and generally enjoying the first city of my Brazilian mission in 1978-79.