My Least Favorite "Holiday"

Every Mormon congregation celebrates Pioneer Day. Growing up in the south, I knew no one else to "celebrate" this day besides the few mormons within 50 miles of me, so I've always been hesitant to call it a "holiday." Besides, us southern mormons never celebrated it on the same date every year. We just did something on the closest Saturday evening. (Keep in mind that we couldn't get too wild and crazy on a Saturday night. Still have church the next morning! For twenty hours!)

Years went by before I discovered that Pioneer Day is a legit official holiday in the state of Utah. It is celebrated on July 24th. So there, now I can call it a "holiday." From what I understand, it can sometimes be more like a Mormon Comic-Con. (That might possibly be a wee-bit of an exaggeration.)

I've never really fit in with mormon culture, but Pioneer Day is quite possibly the thing I hate most about mormon culture.

Now, I know I shouldn't hate on my ancestors, and we can't be too harsh on the people that did some serious work on settling the western half of the United States. I have no problem commending them for that, but I've always very strongly disliked Pioneer Day.

Everyone has played the Oregon Trail. (I mostly only had the privilege of watching my siblings play it on the ole Packard Bell.) All of the stories about pioneers I were ever told now seem overly sensationalized, dripping with sappy, emotional appeals. Some of the most famous pioneers are those of the Willie and Martin Handcart Company. In the church, they're well-known for their noble endurance and faith through incredible disasters and hardships. Their inspiring stories often sneak their way into General Conference addresses. However, I once did some research on pioneers for a middle-school project. I discovered that the real reason they had so many hardships was because of painfully poor planning and horrendous decision making. When you decide to walk across the country without enough provisions during the absolute worst time of year, folks iz gon' die. and a lot of 'em. My distaste for Pioneer Day was already there, but this enhanced it.

I even hated Pioneer Day as a small child.

My stake once has a huge, two-day Pioneer celebration at a local campground.  Everyone was to dress up as 1840s pioneers for a short "pioneer trek" to commemorate the first group of Mormons entering the Salt Lake Valley. (I'll be honest, I had no idea that was what I was "celebrating" then. All I knew was there were some songs I sang in primary about some pioneers.) My father spent hours and hours building handcarts out of scavenged wood to make the trek as "authentic" as possible. There was to be square-dancing, cooking in dutch-ovens, and tons of hand-crafted, hot, itchy clothing to wear. (Keep in mind that I live in the most hot and humid part of the country.)

First of all, I was a total tomboy. I wore athletic shorts and nary donned a t-shirt that did not profess my love for sports. I had two hairstyles: ponytail or down with tangles. Needless to say, the absolute last thing I wanted to dress up as was a woman from the 1840s. THEY DIDN'T EVEN WEAR PANTS!

I would never voluntarily make myself look like this.

My aunt did the most classic Mormon thing ever: sewed me a bonnet to wear with her own two hands. If you don't understand, you don't understand, but nothing gets as Mormon-y as that.

And. I. hated. it. I can remember the pattern of the fabric to this day. I remember how those horrid seams felt between my fingers.

I straight up refused to wear it. There was no way in hades I was going to dress up as a pioneer. If I remember correctly, my very non-traditional-mormon mother didn't even fight me on it. I dare say she didn't blame me one bit. We may have even schemed together on how to resolve the problem.

And so that was the year I showed up to the Pioneer Day celebration as the pioneer family dog. The only dog costume we had in the closet turned me into a dalmatian. I'm sure pioneer families had dogs, but I'm not so sure they had dalmatians.

It wasn't a horribly traumatic experience. I had fun. Others found me somewhat entertaining. I took a nap in the handcart under a white sheet canopy. My siblings and I could take any circumstance and create some fun. Besides, what kid doesn't enjoy dressing up like a dog, thereby having every excuse to act like one? Crawling around panting with my tongue hanging out and barking at people wasn't a bad time at all. Dutch-ovens can produce some tasty food. Becoming the world's only square-dancing pioneer dalmatian wasn't a bad gig.

Nonetheless, I loathe Pioneer Day.


--Lady Jae

The Resume

I'm 21, and I've been an active member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for my entire life... until a few months ago.

My church resume (as I shall call it) is absolutely Siiiick.

Both of my parents have held every ward and stake level calling under the sun: Stake President, Stake Executive Secretary, Bishop, Seminary teacher (for 13 years!), Stake Relief Society President, Relief Society President, Young Women's President, Primary President, Gospel Doctrine Teacher, just to name a few. My grandfather (dad's side) was the Stake Patriarch for my whole life until he died. My dad's parents also held just about every local leadership calling.

I'm pioneer stock. My ancestors crossed the plains in the snow. Those mormons that went and settled the western United States are my great great greats. Heck, one guy in my family tree was the carpenter for the first odometer so pioneers could track how fair they traveled. I did a handful of middle school history projects on them and one or two on major early church leaders.

I've held callings as class president in nearly every class, served as the dreaded ward chorister, and even spent some time in the Young Women's Presidency. I somehow managed to dodge working in Primary as a young adult. (We all know that I needed the practice working with children, since my main purpose in life should be to get married, rely on my husband for all forms of sustainment, and raise kids.) I received my Young Women's medallion in high school. My mom helped me do some pretty awesome projects for it.

My sister also has her Young Women's medallion, has participated in just as much as me, and served in stake level YSA (Young Single Adult) callings. Both of my brothers are Eagle Scouts, returned missionaries, and married in the temple. All of us kids graduated with at least an average of 95% attendance in Seminary.

Being an active Mormon my whole life also means that the minimum amount of time I've spent at church on a Sunday is 3 hours. Add on the youth firesides, weekly youth activities, 6am seminary every day of high school, youth dances, summer and winter youth conferences, youth temple trips, ward parties, yearly week at summer girls' camp, institute classes, Church Educational System firesides, YSA family home evenings, YSA conferences, YSA dances (*eye twitch*). Throw in some service projects. Sprinkle on a fairly large amount of personal study. Tack on some leadership training for a few of my callings. General Conference adds up to be 10 hours over the course of a weekend. (GC happens every 6 months.) We're talkin' about a serious amount of my time here. So much time and energy has gone into making me a world-class Mormon.

Despite all this, I'm leaving.

So why leave? Well, the answer is not simple. There is no singular incident that has caused me to ignore all the things I've listed above. I'm still formulating that answer in my brain.

"Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he shall not depart from it."
Proverbs 22:6

My poor father. He has been a faithful member his entire life and did everything he could do to teach me to be one too. I'm sure he feels he has failed somehow, but he shouldn't. I am a smart and successful young adult, and I'm starting to realize that I've got a few good things going for me. I know he's still proud of me. I know he still loves me, but sometimes I sense a certain sadness beneath it all.

--Lady Jae

The Numbers

I've identified myself as "Mormon" for nearly 21 years. I'm a rare breed.
I graduated high school with 296 other students. I was the only Mormon kid.

1 mormon kid / 297 students = 0.34%

There's roughly 7.103 billion people in this world right now. About 14.7 million of these people are listed on the membership rolls for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Do the math. About 1 in every 583 people on the planet are "Mormon," or were at least Mormon long enough to be baptized and get their name on the roll.

1 in 583.
0.17%           That makes me pretty rare.

On top of that, I live in the Southeast, right smack in the middle of the Bible Belt. I shall specify the Southeast as: Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, Tennessee, Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina. On average, just 0.77% of the southeast population is a member of the Church of the Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints compared to Utah's 68%. The culture is VERY different. Take a Utah Mormon and drop them smack in the middle of the Bible Belt and see if they survive.

446,962 Mormons are on the rolls in the southeastern states. The combined populations of those states is 57,976,501. This means I culturally/religiously identified with 0.77% of people in the southeast and just 3% of Mormons in the world. Divide the number of Mormons in the southeast by the world's population, and that makes me fall under a very small percentage of the world. 

0.0063%           I am pretty darn rare.

On top of that, over 300 households are listed on my old congregation's directory. One household can consist of a couple and their kids or just be a young single adult gal like myself. I bet there are 500+ people named as members on that roll, but a rock-solid Sunday attendance consisted of a maximum of 150 people. Therefore, the percentage of members that are "active" is low. There are polls that try to determine the percentage of active mormons, what percentage of mormons participate in temple worship, etc. However, they're hard for me to trust as poll validity and reliability can be difficult to prove. I'll be generous and estimate based on my own experience that one third of the people in the south are active. One third of southeastern Mormons makes me identify with a very tiny percentage of the world.

0.0021%          I am PRETTY DAMN RARE, PEOPLE. Pretty. damn. rare.

--Lady Jae

Sources:

World Population Clock

Mormon Newsroom

Wikipedia: The Church of Jesus Christ Membership Statistics (The stats listed here are sourced to the CIA World Factbook and the United States Census Bureau)