good times and an essay....
February 12, 2002 at 4:13 p.m.
yoyoyo! Gee golly, I have consistently been in the best mood the last few days. No reason, I'm just friggin' bubbly.
Yesterday when I drove to the store, the Pina Colada song came up on the radio, it made me laugh so hard I almost hit a pole. Wow... giddiness can be dangerous.. I'm a donkey on the edge!
And I'm so excited for my audition at CU this weekend... okay, so I get to hang out with Annie, meet my brother's fiance and have sushi with MatMunch oh darn, but I think I'll play well, too. This is a good excuse to go home:)
Speaking of preparing for the audition - today I tried an experiment. Yesterday I didn't start playing well until 11pm, and I blame it of the fact that I was cold all day. I looked cute, but I don't think I was warm enough. When my hands warmed up, so did my playing - finally.
So today, I walked sround looking like a goober - we're talking 2 sweatshirts, a jacket, gloves, and 2 layers of pants. Dang, I was WARM. But I sounded great all day!!!!
I am so weird. Oh, and my pants were slightly too short and everyone looked at me like I was a freakazoid. A friggin great violinist freakazoid, heck yeah.
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So that paper I mentioned? It's done and it is good. I'm proud of it. I have to edit it, but the first draft makes me happy. I'm debating whether sharing it, but.... okay, what the heck, here you go:
Slim Pickin�s: Surviving Single Hood, Mormon Dating Rituals, and Myself
It took three days to decide what to wear. An entire week to decide to show up. An hour of sleep lost just to ensure your eyes are awake and un-puffied by the afternoon. But from the beginning it doesn�t matter where you�ve been, what you�ve accomplished, what hair color you�ve chosen that week, or where you live. Nothing short of a miracle will save you from the dreaded �So what are you still doing unmarried? What are the men thinking.� And from that moment, all your careful preparation for this one social event � all the witty ways you�ve planned to sneak your professional accomplishments into the conversation � out the window. �SINGLE� has been tattooed on your forehead and it never matches the shoes you spent months hunting through every mall in the state for the express purpose that they go with everything.
If you�re looking for the perfect comeback, I�ve got them. I�ve used them. I�ve taken with my baby blanket and me to bed and tried to force them to bring me comfort. (They do provide some relief, yes.) But I think there�s a point when you�ve used all of them up and you�re left with the perfect shade of lipstick and a signature scent that has yet to give anyone whiplash. Reasons like �I�m getting a college degree, not a M.R.S. degree,� or �As soon as I find a guy who is as dependable and hangs around as long as my air freshener does, sure� held well when I was 20. But as my friends systematically disappear as if by sniper fire to the other realm that is matrimony, the explanations become less and less convincing.
Be it by choice or by lack of choices, there are thousands of single women in the world. Maybe millions. There is no statistical data out there that proves this because none of us are ever home when the survey companies call. The single woman is most likely out, actively pursuing some worthwhile activity that involves mixing of the sexes, on the off chance that some like-minded male is attempting the same. This is not so say that we (I say �we� because I am finally whole-heartedly aligning myself with this much-maligned group) spend every waking hour dreaming up ways to meet someone. In order to keep from this cycle of thought, we are some of the most productive members of society. Any activity that involves our brain so fully that it would require any effort to allow thoughts to drift toward marital status is not seen as heavy labor, but as an adventure. Since my self-proclaimed induction to this society of sisterhood, I have joined a gym, begun weekly visits to a rest home to do service, and have established world peace. It really is remarkable what you can do while you�re trying not to do something else.
The US Census defines �single� as unmarried. So does the IRS. But to the rest of the western world, single status is defined in much looser terms � do you have a boy/girl-friend? Even these terms are hazy for me. This relationship that my fellow singles are dream of and are working for is not legally binding, and does not share the same definitive parameters that a marital relationship enjoys. A marriage is when the happy couple shares living accommodations, usually a bank account, furniture, china, and a last name, among other things. Eventually, the couple has children together, the children grow up, suck their parents dry of all their fiscal resources, and move on to do exactly what their progenitors did in the grand circle of life. But to get to that point you are supposed to engage in some sort of trial relationship where the male buys presents and the female puts on make-up while both are secretly making mental notes about what they like and dislike about the other person until enough data has been gathered to conclude if a final commitment is possible, or in laymen�s terms, if a lifetime together would get annoying or not.
I find myself at the start of this delicious path. I�ve been loafing around the entrance now for some time. My particular situation is unique because not only am I a single woman, but I am also a single LDS woman � commonly referred to as �Mormon.� This complicates matters. In the real world, or the �non-Mormon� world, the average age for marriage is in the mid-to-late twenties. In my world, a girl beyond 22 begins to loose options. The reason is simple: we marry ridiculously young. My best friend from high school? Married at 18 before her first year of college was through. They now have 2 children and a mortgage. One factor for this phenomenon lies in the fact that young LDS men typically serve two years missions from age 19 to 21. During those two years, women are strictly off limits. It really is incredible to me that at this critical time in a young men�s life, these boys are willing to give up dating, formal education and their personal lives and travel to a new place, possibly learning a new language and immersing themselves in teaching the gospel. My 2 older brothers served in Germany and Russia, and my younger brother is currently serving in Santiago, Chile. But back to my point � these stalwart young men come home from their missions, bright-eyed and ready to re-enter the world of dating for the purpose of marriage. Some waste no time, with courtships that are both are short and to the point. So as I lift my head out of my music stand after 5 long years of undergraduate work and scope out the scene, I am beginning to find many fabulous men with rings on their left hand. A friend of mine once heard a boy in her ward (like a parish) announce, �if a girl is not engaged or married by age 21, she�s dead.� I beg to differ on this bleak statement, but the pickin�s are getting mighty slim.
Before I delve into the LDS dating/mating rituals, here are some word definitions to help understand our many idiosyncrasies. Our church is divided into large areas, called �stakes,� which are comprised of smaller units, called �wards.� These wards meet every Sunday and are determined largely by geographical area. But for my age group, we have special wards for the 18-30 crowd. One of my many claims to fame is that my mother was one of the people who helped established the basis for �singles wards� back in the 1970�s in Orange Country, California. These have many advantages, such as a built-in social circle and no screaming babies, but the main focus for many who attend these wards is to �graduate� by way of marriage. The social possibilities in these wards are almost endless. There are weekly activities, gobs of meetings on Sundays that usually end in mass dinners at someone�s home, and weekly dances. There is also a church-wide program called Family Home Evening, where on Monday nights, families get together to share lessons, games and quality time. Since many singles are living away from their families, singles wards have adapted this to include that �family� of the ward, and every Monday there�s some sort of craziness going on. Lessons are learned, fun is had, but most importantly, numbers have been exchanged and flirting has most likely occurred. Hallelujah.
But the most interesting and complex facet of this realm of Mormon single hood is the weekly dances. To enter one of these is to step into a time machine, back to the illustrious days of junior high school dances, complete with the same venue � a gymnasium and dimmed lights. The only thing missing is Mr. Perry, the lack-luster principal walking around with a half grin on his face attempting to seem �hip.� But he is not completely gone, for his spirit of ungainliness is there seen in the faces of the many dance veterans, sitting in the few chairs placed thoughtlessly on the outskirts of the 3-point line. On the nearby stage, there is a small stereo system set up on a long folding table with gigantic speakers and an antiquated CD collection. Sometimes there are a few disco lights shooting out into the crowd, usually consisting of about 50 or more people. Some are engaged in active conversations, huddled together on the floor, and some strive to appear busy holding up the walls by sheer brute pressure. You will find me in the center of this mass of culture with a few lone wild children, dancing like a crazy person, body swaying and jumping to the music. Unlike most of the girls who are loathe to work up a sweat, I am under no illusion that the perfect man is just about to come through the double doors, see my incredible make-up job and come ask me to dance. Because the men are fickle. I have to yet to configure a theory to what type of girl they will ask to dance (just the slow dances � during the fast dances it�s every extrovert for themselves), but more likely than not, it�s not me. It is not beyond the realm of possibility that this could happen � and does on occasion. But there�s that cute girl in the corner that just stands there during all the fast dances and never seems to be without a partner during the slow ones. Maybe it�s because she�s short� those short girls get all the breaks�
After a few dances, you start to understand the ins and outs of the scene. Even though they technically begin at 9pm, no one is there until 10. And there is only sporadic dancing going on until about 11 until the lights get turned on at midnight and you all make a pilgrimage to Dennys for something unhealthy. There are a few people to avoid � such as that one crazy guy that looks 35 and always wears flannel tucked into his jeans, and the wall-sustainers. Even if pity overcomes you and you go ask one of them to dance, there�s usually a reason why they haven�t been mingling � the opposite sex frightens them and their conversational skills are nil. The typical dance night (Friday) begins late in the evening at some girl�s house where everyone is squealing about make-up and the perfect t-shirt, speculating if HE is going to be there (he won�t) and then it�s off to the races. There�s something about a large group that is comforting, although I�ve heard it has been known to be intimidating to the men. I recall a story a bishop (the head of the ward) once told about the dances in his stake. One Sunday he was in a meeting with the women when they began complaining the men had stopped asking them to dance. The bishop got up right then and went to the men and asked them why they were neglecting the ladies. Well, the men explained, the women tended to travel in large packs, and it was humiliating to edge your way through at least 5 or 6 women before getting to the one you intended on asking and then she�d turn you down and you had to make your way through the same girls and go back to the chair you were keeping warm on the other side of the gym. The bishop then went right back to the ladies, then returned to the men with a compromise � the women were willing to now move in a line, to facilitate easier access to and from the prospective dance partners.
So now faces are known and interest has been piqued, hopefully. The Mormon dating ritual has begun. Dating is key, and rarely involves dinner and a movie until the couple is out of things to do. The age to begin the cycle of dating is 16, and then only in large group settings. As a teenager, my best friend and I would set up large group dates with 4 or more couples, we would all pile into her large van and go do some crazy activity. When we were seniors, we planned a large group event for dinner before the Homecoming dance, where each course of the meal was served at a different person�s house. Quite entertainingly enough, my date was in charge of the entr�e, and to our surprise, his younger brother served us pizza. It was harmless enough, and promises to be a good story to tell our children. If any of us ever get to that point�
Here is where my lack of expertise begins to show. From what I have witnessed, after the initial nervousness of dating has worn off, the boy and girl come to church and hold hands for a few months, and then it is announced that they are engaged. I can�t get close enough to the couples to ask them what exactly happened, because some kind of force field seems to go up around them. They are in the beginning stages of transfiguration from their single form to their married form. Some where during or after this process, the woman begins to turn into what we remember our mothers being. And the man begins to change into the noble breadwinner we regarded dad as. I look at these people and wonder what has to happen to change a wild-child, spontaneous dancing, road-trip planning Mormon girl to a woman with recipe cards, a vacuum and a calling (church job) teaching 7 year-olds about faith as a seed. Maybe they are in there, wondering why the heck this adult has eaten them whole. Or perhaps they�ve just grown up.
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So these are my options. Looking at the real world, I supposed I could try bars or one of those dating shows where the couple discusses their sexual history and ends up in a hot tub somewhere. But I don�t drink, I hate smoke, and I don�t believe in intimate relationships before marriage. And all my sharp-tongued commentary aside, there�s something comforting about a simple date, or dancing in a gym where there�s no smoke, and no fear of a belligerent drunk coming at you. In all reality, meeting new people is probably much simpler for me and my world than for the outside. But life beyond this doorway? I have yet to discover it. And the life of a single woman, though frustrating at times, is far from lonely. We travel in packs, you know.
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SUPERCRACK, signing offf...
ps any input on the paper? I'm turning it in next week....