Baptists at Our Barbecue, page 10
“I’ve noticed,” Ian said, wind from the open half blowing a few of his papers around.
“Well, what do you propose we do about it?”
“What can we do about it?” Ian asked.
I could almost hear everyone thinking things like “Spray paint the Baptist’s building” or “Let’s tar and feather Pastor Stevens.” Everyone remained silent.
“I can probably guess what you all are thinking,” Ian said. “But none of those ideas are real solutions. We can rant and rave, spilling ill will among the group, or we can go on with our lives.”
“How can we progress with only half a building?” Orvil asked.
“It’ll work out,” I said, jumping in for the first time. “Whoever did this intended to make us angry.”
“That’s right,” Sister Lynn said. “Upsetting us will only make them happy.”
“I talked to Bob just a few minutes ago,” Ian said. “He volunteered to camp out here at nights until we can get things fixed up. I also put in a call to Brother Stolt, whom I’m sure when he hears about this will respond immediately.”
The wind whipped through our congregation and blew a couple of people’s hair around.
“What about the wind?” Chad asked.
“No need to worry about that,” Sister Lynn said. “Clara Reese has already started on a large quilt to cover this side until we can get it fixed or find our other half.”
“Good,” Ian declared.
A closing prayer was offered and everyone started home. Charity and I stayed around to fill Ian in on the day’s activities and wait for Bob.
Bob pulled up around eight-thirty with his camper trailer. He parked it at the open end of the building and started to make himself at home.
Charity and I left Ian and Bob, while Bob was questioning Ian about the possibility of our building having just dissolved.
“Particleboard doesn’t last forever,” I heard Bob say as I held hands with Charity and walked her to her car.
“I think I’m beginning to feel a little bit too intertwined with the community of Longwinded,” I said to Charity.
“Is that good or bad?” she asked.
“I’m not sure,” I said. “I guess it all depends on what happens between you and me.”
Charity smiled.
Chapter Nineteen
Singular
If some grand historian ever writes a history of Longwinded—although I have no idea why any grand historian ever would—the period of time we were now in would have to be titled “The Era of Odd.” Things were falling into place, except they were landing in slots and notches they had never inhabited before.
A good number of Baptists were convinced the perpetrators of the mobile home heist had been from their parish. This was creating awful fights and disagreements within the Baptist congregation. Pastor Stevens had said last Sunday from the pulpit that even if it had been a Baptist who took the building, they should support him instead of sticking up for the Mormons. This made every Baptist who had an ounce of liberal in their blood furious.
Their division grew.
We Mormons were a different story. With half our building exposed to the elements, we went forward in faith. Sister Reese kept her word and made a thick, giant quilt that spanned the entire length of our building and closed up our missing side. She stitched the image of a fireplace in the middle of it and made a tricky opening at one of the ends. It did a pretty good job of keeping the place closed up and wind-free.
Whoever had taken our building had been kind enough to push all the personal objects to the side they left. So we still had all of our chairs and materials, and most importantly, we had our hymn books. I’m not sure if it was the result of years of musical drought, or just a branch of people with powerful pipes—but when we sang, we sang! Our building shook, as adults and children alike belted out hymn after hymn after hymn. Ian started to capitalize on our desire to sing by having us sing whenever a lull occurred. For example, if Sister Rawlings’ testimony dragged on just a little too long or if Brother Merrill’s talk on repentance turned into nothing but a story of his former life of debauchery and womanizing, Ian would cue Sister Lynn, and she would pop up and start leading us in song. Nonmembers would comment on the fact that our quilt was always quaking due to our constant singing.
With half our building gone, sacrament meeting was pretty cramped, but we managed to squeeze everyone in. The space deficit made sitting closer to Charity a necessity. I delighted in this perk that our plight provided.
Ian’s big emphasis was on being more tolerant of other religions in the area. When he announced this was what we should be working on, a few of our less compassionate members got up and left. Sister Moteah hexed us with her hands as she stormed out, putting a curse on the whole lot of us. Ian took it all in stride.
“Brothers and Sisters,” Ian said. “If you could bear with me for just a moment.”
Sister Paul raised her hand.
“Yes?” Ian asked.
“I was wondering if I could get a CTR ring for my daughter?” Sister Paul asked.
“Well they are supposed to be for the Primary children,” Ian explained.
“I realize that,” Sister Paul said. “It’s just that Kathy’s going through some hard times now, and I know it would be easier for her to choose the right if she had a ring.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” Ian said.
Sister Paul sat back, happy that Ian would consider her request.
“Brothers and Sisters,” Ian said. “I wanted to talk to you about—”
Lehi made a loud chicken noise.
Sister Lynn stood and put her hands upon her hips. “President Smith is trying to talk,” she chastised.
The room quieted down.
“Thank you, Sister Lynn,” Ian said. “I wanted—”
Ian was interrupted again, this time by Brother Hatch, who was sitting in the last row, to the side, near the quilted fireplace. Apparently Brother Hatch had forgotten the wall was fabric. Tilting his chair, he leaned back into it. His feet flew up as he pushed through Sister Reese’s masterpiece. For a moment he was suspended as if he were lying in a hammock, but then the duct tape that was holding the bottom of the quilt in place gave way, dropping Brother Hatch like a big wad of wet clay. His scream ceased the moment he hit the ground.
Thud!
Everyone raced to the opening he had created in the quilt. Brother Hatch lay there silently, sprawled as if the ground were his cross to bear.
“Conroy!” Sister Hatch screamed, jumping over all of us and onto the ground. Her high heels almost stabbed Brother Hatch in the head.
“Conroy!”
Brother Hatch’s eyes slowly opened. He looked at all of us leaning over the edge of the mobile home and grimaced. The chair he had been sitting in now lay a few feet to the west of him. He saw it and started to laugh.
Ian was down next to Brother Hatch now, trying to help him to his feet. Everyone else jumped off the edge of our building and came down to join them.
“You okay?” Ian asked. “Did you break anything?”
“No, I think I’m all right. Just had the wind knocked out of me.” Brother Hatch’s face was now regaining color.
“What did he say?” little Lehi asked his mother loudly.
“He said he had the wind knocked out of him,” she explained.
“Then how come he’s still so fat?” Lehi asked.
Everyone went silent.
Brother Hatch had this thing about his weight.
According to Longwinded legend, two summers ago he locked himself in the library bathroom for six days. The reason being, someone told him that for his height he was seventy pounds overweight. When he heard this, he rushed down to the library to find out for himself.
Sister Wingate helped him find the book Fat Facts, and there in black and white, more painful than declining a second helping, was the sad truth. Brother Hatch wasn’t seventy pounds overweight, he was eighty-five! Disgusted with himself, he hid up in the library bathroom, refusing to come out until he had starved off a few pounds.
Bob was called in to help, but he couldn’t see any harm in Conroy dropping a few pounds, especially if he wanted to. Sister Wingate, furious that Brother Hatch would choose to cloister himself in such a public place, and tired of him being in the bathroom for six days, called in a couple of professionals to take the door off from the outside.
What they found was not a pretty sight. There was Brother Hatch, knee deep in Twinkie wrappers (he had found Sister Wingate’s secret stash in the vent), delirious from hunger, and moaning something about slow-cooked roast beef while lying in a bed of unrolled toilet paper.
Brother Hatch underwent some intense therapy for a couple of months and then spent two weeks on a diet ranch. When he returned, his wife threw him a welcome home party to show her support. It was the biggest spread Longwinded had ever seen.
“After all,” Sister Hatch had said, “Conroy loves a good meal.”
She was oblivious to that fact that what her husband had been trying to do was break off his steamy, passionate affair with food for a far less exotic relationship with fitness. Well, Brother Hatch gained all thirteen pounds back his first night home, and out of kindness to his mental well-being no one had breathed a word about his weight since.
Brother Hatch now stood there silently. Lehi’s mother gathered him up as if she could foresee harm in his future.
“President,” Brother Hatch said.
“Yes?” Ian replied, a ring of members surrounding the two now.
“Could I talk to you for a moment?”
Ian ushered Brother Hatch into our kitchen/bishop’s office and closed the quilt behind them.
“We need our building back,” I whispered to Charity, as others began to gossip about Conroy’s fall and little Lehi’s comment.
“Shows great restraint on Conroy’s part to take a time-out instead of beating Lehi,” Sister Hatch said. I tried to imagine their home life for a moment.
We all climbed back into the building and took our seats in our half chapel. Sister Theo started up a lively debate on baptismal fonts and the growth that had followed their installments. Where she got her statistics, I have no idea.
Ian came out of his office and motioned me to come over into the Primary room with him. I left Charity and the others to join him.
“Brother Hatch has asked for a blessing,” Ian said in hushed tone.
“That was a pretty hard fall,” I replied.
“Actually,” Ian said, a small smile playing on his lips. “Actually, he doesn’t want a blessing for the fall; he wants one to lose weight.”
I smiled also. “You’re kidding.”
“Nope.”
“Is that legal?” I said. “I mean isn’t that blasphemy or something?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Are you going to do it?” I asked.
“Why not?”
I could think of a few reasons why not, but I kept them to myself.
“Listen, Tartan, Brother Hatch thinks this might work. So you and I need to go in there and give him that blessing without laughing.”
I snickered.
“Brother Hatch asked that we don’t tell anyone what this blessing is for. He said he wants to make sure that if he ends up not losing any weight nobody’s testimony of priesthood blessings will be affected.”
“How noble,” I commented.
“Yeah, isn’t it?” Ian said.
“Certainly you couldn’t blame Brother Hatch’s mouth for the failure. The priesthood seems like a much more sensible force to blame—will-power versus priesthood power.”
“Well, I think we should do it,” Ian said.
I agreed, and we walked back to the office. I could hear the blessing already: “Bless that Brother Hatch will stop after seven doughnuts and that his fat intake will always stay somewhere in the double digits. Please bless his wife that she might only include two pounds of cheese in her famous no-fuss lasagna.”
We entered the office and Ian closed the quilt behind us. Brother Hatch sat there, fidgeting and darting his eyes back and forth between Ian and me.
“Does he know?” he asked Ian nervously.
“He does.”
Brother Hatch dropped his gaze to the floor.
“He won’t tell a soul,” Ian comforted him.
We put our hands on his head.
“Aren’t you going to use oil?” Brother Hatch asked.
“I think it would be best if we didn’t,” Ian counseled. “Besides I don’t have any on me.”
“I had a whole bottle at home that I’ve been meaning to bring to the branch to consecrate,” Brother Hatch said reflectively. “I used it all up on the fried chicken, though.”
“Waste not, want not,” Ian said.
I could think of no better segue into a weight loss blessing than a conversation about fried chicken.
Brother Hatch shook our hands off of his head. “Maybe I should eat something before.”
Ian gave him one of his branch president glares.
“Yeah, right,” Brother Hatch said, settling back into his chair.
It was a great blessing.
Ian gathered us altogether after the blessing to make the announcement he had intended to make before Conroy’s fall.
“I just wanted to announce that the entertainment committee and I have decided to do something a little out of the ordinary for our Fall into Winter celebration. We’ve decided to throw a community party.”
“Whom would we invite?” Sister North asked suspiciously.
“Well, for starters the community,” Ian answered.
“Just what do you mean by that?” Sister Hatch asked, giving Ian a hard stare.
Sister Lynn, our ward activity chairman, stood.
“President Smith had the inspired idea to throw a party where all faiths could have a good time together.”
She needed to make the obvious a bit more obvious.
“You mean the Baptists?” Lehi’s father asked.
Bronwyn squirmed in her seat, as Ian adjusted his tie and his attitude toward the open-mindedness of Longwinded residents. Charity sat perched on the edge of her folding chair, as if waiting for the first side to draw blood.
I stood.
“Brothers and Sisters, this is an inspired idea,” I said. “Just think how much more charitable this will make us look than the Baptists.”
I had their attention.
“We’ll openly invite them to spend time with us—you know none of them will show—and in the end we appear to be the more Christlike religion.” I hated to be doing this, but I could see no other way to talk some of our members into it. If in some small way they felt this was a chance to look better than the Baptists, I knew they would jump at it. “Love your enemies,” I pleaded.
The room was quiet as everyone thought about this plot to outshine our rival religion.
“Where will it be held?” someone finally asked.
“Sister Smith and I,” Ian said, “have decided to have the celebration at our home outside of Meadow Lane. We just built a new barn, and before we put any animals in it we want to throw a party.”
“That’s almost an hour away,” Orvil protested. “How are we all going to get there?”
“Orvil,” I questioned, “how many cars do you have?”
“Seven, but only five run,” he answered honestly.
“Those who can’t drive can surely find a ride with someone else,” Ian said. “We could even post a ride board at the library. I’m sure there are some Baptists that may need rides as well.”
“But none of the Baptists are actually going to show, right?” Brother Hatch asked.
Ian shook his head in disgust.
“Surely none will show, but we have to look like we are doing everything possible for them to have a chance to come,” I said. “Just think, if one actually does show up we’ll be so nice they’ll run away scared.”
“I like it,” Orvil commented.
Sister Lynn, Ian, Bronwyn, and I all sighed a great sigh of relief. Orvil carried a lot of weight around our branch. It had been Orvil who had talked everyone into burning the hymn books at the Pinewood Derby. The Saints of Longwinded seemed to think that because he was Native American he had some sort of spiritual connection with the elements and God that they didn’t possess.
Everyone began talking about the party and how Christian they all were to be hosting it. I could tell it depressed Ian to see the depth of his branch surface in such a manner.
When the meeting finally broke up, everyone was hyped. Sister Lynn and the Primary kids made some big posters with maps and then left to hang them up at the post office. Orvil had plans to paint up one of his cars, so as to create some sort of a moving advertisement. But then he became concerned about anti-Mormons slashing his tires or scratching up his paint. The suspected harm was too great.
“Maybe I’ll just put a poster on my lawn,” he compromised.
“Good idea,” Ian said.
Sister Hatch had volunteered her services as food chairwoman. I could see Brother Hatch sweating over her desire to serve. All other areas of concern were quickly filled by members who were for once excited about the Fall into Winter social.
Charity and I spent some time alone at her house that night while her aunt went around collecting clothes from other people. It seemed like the right time in our relationship to kiss Charity, but instead we just talked about the barbecue.
Neither one of us could wait to see how the Baptists would respond.
Chapter Twenty
Reaction
They couldn’t believe it. Bob called Ian twice to confirm what the yellow sign in the post office said quite clearly.
ALL FAITHS BARBECUE
(Yes, all faiths)
time: Saturday, August 20th From 1:00 pm Till 8:00 pm
place: See Map at Bottom of Poster
purpose: To Bring All People of Longwinded
Closer Together
Everyone Is Invited and Encouraged to Bring a Dish of Their Own (Meat Will Be Provided). There Will Be Games and Activities, As Well As a Talent Show
Call Gwen Hatch for More Details 888-2634
