All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Primary

At week #5 on the Island of Misfit Toys, we heard the counselors in the new bishopric speak. The bishop himself did not speak as he was out of town, visiting grandkids.

One of the bishopric members spoke on the theme "All I Really Need to Know I Learned on the Farm," based on the Robert Fulghum book All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten. Both talks were great and got me to thinking, with all due to respect to both counselors and Mr. Fulghum, of a list of my own:

All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Primary.

1. Nobody cares if you can't sing well; join in anyway. And if a song has actions that accompany it, such as "Popcorn Popping," you better darn well do them.

2. Speaking of which, you won't always sing soprano. Enjoy it while it lasts.

3. Be quiet and polite when others speak, just as you hope others will give you the same respect when you speak.

4. Respect and listen to your teacher. That may be your calling someday.

5. Speaking of which, be afraid of the Blazer B boys. Be very afraid. It's strange how karma works.

6. Even so, some bratty or misbehaving kids turn out to be fantastic, well-behaved adults. And vice versa.

7. Speaking of which, some girls I once thought of as "plain" grew up to be downright foxy. Just as flowers and trees need time to grow and blossom, so do people.

8. Drawing with crayons is still one of the best hobbies you can have in life.

9. Mom wrote me some pretty darn good talks.

10. Don't do rotten things to your friends just to fit in with "the crowd."

11. People make mistakes. Jesus taught us to love them anyway.

12. Pioneer children sang as they walked, and walked, and walked, and walked . . .

13. Sharing time is fun.

14. There is a time to sing and to play, and there is also a time to be reverent.

15. Say please and thank you often.

16. "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes" is pretty good exercise.

17. I am a child of God.

"Weird Al" Predicts the Future

Yesterday, much of the main cast of the new, as-yet-untitled Star Wars Episode VII was revealed, and to the glee of many fans/nerds, myself included, original stars Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker), Harrison Ford (Han Solo), and Carrie Fisher (Princess Leia) will be back to reprise their iconic roles. The new movie, set to be released in December 2015 (but who's keeping track of that in big bold red letters on their calendars?), will pick up the saga 30 years after the conclusion of Episode VI, Return of the Jedi.

I was seven years old, a second grader at Hannah Holbrook Elementary School in Bountiful, when ROTJ was released, and Dad got my older brother and me out of school for the day to line up with many other fans at something like 5:00 or 5:30 a.m. for the chance to be among the very first group to see the very first showing of the movie at a now-non-existent theater in downtown Salt Lake City. And we made it!

Good times, those. It's a cherished memory and one of the things about Dad that I remember best from my childhood.

At any rate, two years after ROTJ, "Weird Al" Yankovic came out with his Dare to Be Stupid album in 1985. Like the Star Wars franchise, it's also one of the greatest creations of all time. It included the song "Yoda," a parody of the Kinks' "Lola," which "Weird Al" fans once voted their #1 favorite song of his.

"Yoda," however, was originally intended to come out on "Weird Al"'s first album in 1983, before he hit it big and before the release of ROTJ. As such, it tells the story of Yoda only as it recounted as far as the previous Star Wars film, Episode V, The Empire Strikes Back, and includes nothing of the story of Yoda in ROTJ nor in the prequels, which didn't come along for more than a decade later anyway.

I listened to "Yoda," which is sung through the point-of-view of Luke, on my iPod today and found myself paying particular attention to the lines: "I know that I'll be coming back (to Dagobah) someday; I'll be playing this part till I'm old and gray. The long-term contract I had to sign says I'll be making these movies till the end of time."

And now, 32 years after ROTJ, and 30 years after Dare to Be Stupid, Mark Hamill, old and gray (at least, he's 30 years older and grayer than he once was) is once again playing the role of Luke Skywalker.

Nailed it, Al.

Stand

Earlier this week when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and refused to rule on California's Proposition 8, essentially making gay marriage legal in that state.

The AWL has recently addressed the issue of gay marriage, but I will offer one last opinion on it today.

The day before the Supreme Court issued its judgment, a friend of mine (and a member of the Church) posted an opinion on Facebook in support of gay marriage. He said something to this effect: "I want it absolutely clear as to where I stand on this issue, no matter what the court rules tomorrow."

To that effect, I want to make it absolutely clear where I stand on this issue. I sustain the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve Apostles as prophets, seers, and revelators. They are the 15 people designated to act on our Savior's behalf in this mortal sphere. That goes for both them and their revelations - including and especially the Proclamation on the Family, which states "that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God." There are no ifs, ands, or buts about it.

I believe the Lord is less concerned with what the judgments of men can do, for they are imperfect, than how we react to them. He wants to know whom we stand with and, at some future day, where we stood while all of this was going on.

Elder Mark E. Petersen taught: "If we do know what is right, have we the courage to stand up for it, to defend virtue, to declare the validity of our faith, to oppose false teachings, and to fight the unpopular battle? . . . The time has come when we must take a far more firm and positive stand than ever before. . . . We must become vigorous and enthusiastic about living our religion, for God commands that we serve him with all our heart, with all our might, with all our strength, and with the very best of our intelligence. With him there can be no halfway measures. We must be fully for him or we may be classified with those who are against him" ("Where Do We Stand?", April 1980 general conference).

Like the child throwing the temper tantrum, we mortals can often lose sight of what we need to be truly and eternally happy and instead demand something lesser or counterfeit that we think we want or deserve. Nevertheless, our Heavenly Father knows what will make us happy, and neither He nor His servants will lead us astray.

That being said, I have friends who struggle with same-sex attraction, and I believe that their struggle is a genuine and a difficult one. I believe that it is always a good choice to love these people regardless of the choices they make and that we can disagree without becoming disagreeable when it comes to discussing matters such opposition to gay marriage. Tolerance is not acceptance, and tolerance is also a two-way street.

The Man of Aluminum and His Kryptonite

I just read online somewhere (source: somewhere) that the new Superman movie Man of Steel soared (ha ha! . . . get it?) to an incredible $113 million in box office earnings over the weekend. That's a lot of money! Putting it into figures we can all understand, it is the same as approximately .0066 percent of the current national debt.

Contributing $7 of my own to the cause, I caught the film yesterday along with a handful of family members. It was certainly a trip down memory lane for me, as once upon a time I was a strange, little kid who liked to dress up in my Superman costume nearly every day, often accompanying my poor, embarrassed mother to such public places at the grocery store and Primary activities while dressed in said outfit.

Now a strange, big kid, I must admit that I enjoyed the film immensely. Not to give away too much, but Dwight Schrute of "The Office" fame makes a cameo appearance as a childhood friend of Clark Kent's who grows up to become the manager of a Kansas IHOP. Also (and these are real spoilers now, so feel free to put your fingers in your ears and chant "Lah lah lah lah, I can't hear you!" until the end of this paragraph): There is surprisingly no mention in the film of either Lex Luthor or of kryptonite, two staples of the Superman universe.

True and seemingly unrelated, but bear with me, story: For Halloween a few years back, I created one of my favorite all-time costumes by tearing off a roll of aluminum foil, folding it around my head, and going to a Halloween party as one of the characters from M. Night Shyamalan's Signs - you know, the scene in which they create aluminum foil hats for themselves to keep the aliens from reading their minds? People at the party apparently had not seen Signs (their loss entirely, am I right?) and were utterly bewildered, thinking I was some sort of mutant Hershey's Kiss.

Ergo, if I were a superhero, I would not be the Man of Steel but the Man of Aluminum. And my one weakness, or kryptonite, as referenced in my previous post, would be: talking to women on the phone.

After all of these years of trying (and failing) to perfect the art of conversation over the phone, it's still no easier in my 30s than when I was 16 and was planning my first date. It can be a fine line trying to be funny/charming and coherent, while showing an earnest interest in her and what she has to say, and often I end up being none of the above.

One thing remains constant: I am a dweeb.

Sometimes, I stay awake at night wondering exactly how women feel about talking on the phone to someone who sounds very nervous doing so and is trying not to come across as, oh, say, Ted Bundy. Are they amused by it in a you're-such-a-moron fashion? Are they trying their hardest not to burst out into laughter? When they agree to go on a date, is it motivated by pity? I have even heard of a third school of thought: They actually see it as someone who is moving forward with a date request in spite of his fears and/or nervousness. I daresay, some are even impressed by it.

Whatever the answer may be, I can certainly understand why people find security in texting or e-mails or Facebook or what-have-you. It's a lot safer that way - especially if the girl declines the date request. That way, there's no awkward conversation that follows ("Well, will you be washing your hair on Thursday then?") and a can't-get-there-soon-enough hanging up of the phone.

Nevertheless, fellow males and Justice Leaguers, I admire the fortitude you show me in moving ahead in spite of your fears, for I believe that we all have them with regard to the opposite sex and also that this is the only real way to conquer our fears in the long run. I have accepted the phone call as a necessary evil in life and will need to keep phoning (preferably texting) women now and in the future.

Just don't expect a Man of Steel on the other end of the line.

The Darndest Things

A couple of days ago, I got to spend the bulk of the evening tending my five-year-old nephew Jackson. Spending time with any of my nieces and nephews is always an educational experience, and this was no exception to that rule. Sometimes, they teach me how to take a different look at life from their innocent and unique points-of-view. Many times, they teach me patience and understanding. Almost always, I learn a great appreciation for the great people they are, as well as the people they are becoming.

On this particular Thursday night, I took Jackson to the local McDonald's for dinner, during which he proceeded to burn about 20,000 calories per hour by running and climbing up, down, inside, outside, and around the rocket ship playground. At times, I got exhausted just by watching him.

One of his favorite things to do, and something I had to ask him not to do more than once, was to climb up on the outside of the rocket - the part with no safety net attached to it. I asked him to come down and then talked to him about the dangers of climbing up there.

Five minutes later, I looked back up at the rocket to see he had climbed on the outside yet again.

Me: "Jackson, what did we just talk about?"
Jackson (without missing a beat): "Zombies?"

The funniest part about that response is that is was completely in earnest. You see, Jackson is lately a bit more obsessed with zombies than most five-year-olds. It is a topic that often comes up in his conversations; he's both fascinated and frightened by them.

There's also Uncle Crack.

Uncle Crack is Jackson's imaginary friend. According to Jackson, Uncle Crack is my brother - but also not, somehow, his Dad's (Mike's) brother, as well. He is much like the "Not Me" of the Family Circus comic strips and is usually the one to blame for things that go wrong wherever Jackson goes.

At another point, Jackson approached a little girl playing games on her iTouch and asked if he could have a turn if, he added, "your grandma will let me."

"I'm not her grandmother; I'm her mother," the lady replied defensively.

I also watched with admiration as Jackson instantly made friends with the other kids on the playground - and became the sort of leader of the group. Every few minutes, he could be heard to tell his playmates, "That's my Uncle Paco," and he'd point out where I was sitting to them.

You can learn a lot from a kid. Most of the time, they just want someone to listen to them.

They will want to talk about zombies.

Movie Review: "Bully"

Today, I hope you'll allow me to talk about a serious issue.

Yesterday, the relatively new documentary Bully arrived in the mail from Netflix, and I watched the film last night with a great deal of interest.

As someone who endured my share of bullying in grade school - especially junior high school - I must admit that this movie affected me deeply, and I found myself relating to many of the experiences shared by the five different stories of bullying that were presented. One is of a boy who was born prematurely and is now taunted by his classmates for the birth defects he suffered as a baby; another is of a girl who has had enough of her bullies, pulls a gun on them on the school bus, threatens to shoot them, and then spends the next several months locked up in juvenile detention; and a third tale is of a girl who has come out as a lesbian and is then shunned and avoided by most people she comes in contact with (a type of emotional or psychological bullying).


An additional story, and perhaps the most poignant of the five, is of a bullied teen who is not around to speak for himself and whose parents, siblings, and friends, instead, speak for him. Why is he not around to be interviewed for the film? Because he was hazed and made to feel worthless on a daily basis, up to the point that he made the tragic decision to take his own life at age 17. There is even a reference in the film to an 11-year-old boy - 11 years old! - who, very sadly, has taken the same route.

What exactly was it that happened to the AWL in junior high? you ask? Without going into too many details, in order to protect the guilty, I was made fun of in the locker room because of my eczema while in the seventh grade. Not only did I find myself having to adjust to life as a junior high student that year, dealing with no recess and lockers and going from classroom to classroom, but I also had to take showers in gym class. Those who shared the lockers adjacent to me noticed my skin rash when I changed clothes every day and soon nicknamed me "rash boy." They did other hurtful things such as hiding my clothes when I returned from showering. Finally, I was saved by a doctor's note that excused me from showering, and I could change clothes when my bullies were, thankfully, in the showers.

Then, in the ninth grade, my five siblings and I rode the bus to school each day, as we all attended a private elementary/junior high/high school together in Guaynabo, Puerto Rico. For some reason unknown to us, the others on the bus - comprised of high school and junior high students - decided to gang up on us and make fun of us both individually and collectively each bus ride, finding whatever excuse they could to do so. The worst part of it was that these were people in our own LDS ward that we also had to see on Sundays at church; the ones who should have been our greatest allies were, instead, our biggest enemies. They didn't mind picking on us, whatever their motivations may have been, and the fact that my youngest sibling was then only in kindergarten did not deter them from their cruel actions.

Yes, they were okay with taunting me, but they were also okay with harassing a six-year-old, too. My best friends from that time in my life were not in my ward but were of other faiths and were my classmates at school.

Back to the movie: It raises some interesting points, the most important of which is bullying others emotionally, mentally, socially, or physically based on their physique, body, sexual orientation, religion, race, or for any other reason is not acceptable. In other words, "don't be a jerk," and teach your kids, be they your own kids or those in your classroom, to be treat others as they want to be treated (something old fashioned we like to call the Golden Rule).

Another important point: Report bullying when it happens so that it can be dealt with immediately. Bullies not only make their targets feel worthless but also make them feel like tattletales or "momma's boys" when they tell an adult - be it a parent, teacher, or principal - about what is going on. As a result, many of them tell no one and suffer in silence for an extended period of time, and that's how I, too, was made to feel and what ended up happening in both of the examples from my own life.

Thirdly, if you're someone who is a witness to bullying, stand up and make your voice heard. Bullies tend to act in groups and not necessarily alone, following the mob mentality. If one friend stands up and says that bullying is not okay, others will follow. Peer pressure can be a positive thing, as well as a negative one. Especially in the seventh grade, I desperately (and silently) hoped one of my classmates would say something or come to my aid, but it did not happen for several weeks. Teachers and administrators look out for bullying and sincerely want to nip it in the bud, but their eyes and ears can't be everywhere at once.

Is this why the AWL is angry and a loner? you now ask? First of all, I'm neither of those things today, since some of you have asked me about it, and "Angry White Loner" is just a name. Those experiences of being bullied affected me for a time, true, but as time passed, those bullies grew up, and most of them have turned out to be good, decent people. A couple of them even issued friend requests to me on Facebook in the last few years.

One of the kids in the movie points out that those who are bullied end up wanting to hurt others as a way of feeling better about things or of coping, and I'll admit that I went through that stage, too. Fortunately, that stage also passed, and I grew out of it.

Junior high is hell, and I, for one, know it for a fact. But, it, too, shall pass for everyone who has to go through it.

As a final note: Though the film is rated PG-13, there is one scene in which a camera captures a bully uttering three or four f-bombs in succession, and they are not bleeped out. Like a similar scene in the otherwise brilliant Waiting for Guffman, it is over quickly. That scene aside, Bully is a must-see for parents, administrators, teachers, and kids (at least those in junior high) alike.