Snippitts of Illusions

My parents were never particular active in church. There was a time both my father and mother would attend, my mother had been raised Mormon, my father had not. For both of then, and my mother today, it was an opportunity for them to touch on their spirituality. Not quite the words they would use, but a good interpretation of it. "It makes me feel good." Simple enough. My father quit going when I was very young, it was several years after that before my mother quit. I remember being young and in Primary, as well as attending lessons about baptism, which I did do. It was a year, maybe two, that my mother stopped going regularly. I would attend occasionally after this, going with the neighbors, but soon it felt like a chore and even I stopped going. 

Sundays weren't about church in my house, at least not once I got into my tween's and teens. My father often cut wood on Sundays, and I would usually go with him. I suppose it's possible that my mother went to church when both my father and I were out cutting wood, but it seems unlikely. My father found solace out cutting wood. He said he felt more in touch with God out there then he ever did at the church house. I'm not sure my father was ever baptized, I know he identified with the LDS church a bit more than his older sister or his mother who were both born again Christians. His two oldest siblings also converted to the LDS church, my aunt Evelyn was active till her death. My uncle A.D. is still quite active. As for aunt Sharon, the aunt who is born again, still identifies as such. 

As for my own path, not being particularly active, and having some slight conflict at family reunions (not extreme, but arguments did arise) I identified as LDS never the less. I attended church sporadically, mostly going so I would be allowed to play on the church basketball team. Yes, there was a time I was nearly interested in sports. Two things happened that made me question my faith, or lack of faith (several things did, but two in particular during my teen years). 

The first was an incident very few in the family talk about: my father, on a cocktail of different pain medication and other drugs prescribed to him by a fairly incompetent doctor, had a long bout of hallucinations over the course of a single night. Most of these were religious in origin, but many were, in hind-site, nonsensical. He had two clergy men come to the house, and LDS bishop and the pastor from the local evangelical christian church and spoke to them at length about stuff he was seeing. I'm not sure what the men made of it. I was shaken to my very core, as was everyone in the house that night (if I remember it was primarily my mother). Watching somebody hallucinate is not particularly fun, despite what some stoners might have you believe (and perhaps the perspective is much different you're hallucinating as well I don't know.) We got through that night, my father quietly apologized for what happened the next day, though I remain unsure to this day what he was apologizing for exactly. I've forgiven him. The family doesn't talk about it. 

The second incident was, my father's death. My father was never in particularly good health during my life, he broke his back when he was in his late 20's and though he had a series of surgeries it only did so much. He was on disability for a while, taken off in the 80's during the Reagan administration, and forced to go back to work doing odd jobs and taking care of the family farm. He died on August 6th 1995, a few short weeks before I was to leave for college. 

I was adrift at this point, not sure what to believe in. There was one point, about a week into school (I had been up there two weeks due to marching band) where I called my mother and told her to come and get me. I had got some money from her the day before via mail and had put it into my wallet. I lost the wallet. It was a couple hundred bucks and I absolutely felt at a loss. I knew she didn't have it, I knew the wallet was long gone. My mother told me that we'd figure a way out of it, and that there was no way I was coming home. A few hours after that phone call another resident in the dorm knocked on my door and returned my wallet. I had left it in the laundry room he had found it and brought it back to me. 

It was that year I took my first philosophy class. I remember my uncle, when I mentioned to him on break that I was taking the class, expressing concern that I might question my faith. (I had none at that point, though I didn't realize it then). I loved the class, and excelled in it. I can not say that trend continued to this day but at the time I did well. It was also the year I was introduced to Buddhism. It was something I had a periphery interest in during my high school years but had no means to research in my backwoods little town. I remember reading a chunk of the Buddhist bible during that freshman year, and meeting a friend (Ken, not sure what happened to him) who was of Japanese decent and also a Buddhist. I attended church with him in Ogden on a couple of different occasions and they even lent me some books (which I'm ashamed to say I still have). 

This is what set me on that path. The path I'm currently on. Death, philosophy and Buddhism. I particularly sticky combo. One that I wouldn't reconcile for a few more years. 

To be con't...