Taking out of town relatives to the Oyster Bar is one of those New York traditions that actually makes sense. Located beneath Grand Central, it gives people, no matter where they’re from, the feeling they’ve assumed New York should give them. So Josh was slightly dismayed, and not so slightly embarrassed, when his Uncle, just in from Utah, spent the first moments of this classy meal reading the menu prices aloud with shock and disgust.
“This is 20 dollars! For a soup!“, he said, followed by an angry chuckle. “Your parents asked me to see where all their money was going off to, now I know!”
Josh tried to keep smiling. “Have you thought of anything you want see while you’re here?”
“Well,” Uncle Gordon said, still keeping one eye on the prices, “wouldn’t mind much seeing the Temple, and I need to go to the Mission”.
Now Josh wasn’t smiling at all. “Need to? Why need to? You’ve seen a Mormon mission before, yes?“
Gordon was rather taken aback. He’d
never
seen his
nephew–or anyone his
nephew’s age–
get so cheeky. He’d never seen his nephew–or anyone his nephew’s age– get so cheeky. And the way he said ‘yes?’. It scared him a little and he became more diplomatic, “It’s like I said, your parents just want me to have a look around and see what you’ve been up to. That’s it. Nothing much to it.”
“What do they think I’m ‘up to’?” Josh asked.
“Well, nothing bad or anything like that, but…” Gordon meandered, “just…well, how many people have you gotten baptised?”
“Excuse me,” Josh was far too tired to fight this battle (the answer could be counted on one hand). He was exhausted from last night’s outing, and the night before’s, and even more so from sleeping on Rebecca’s tiny, cramped, but wonderful bed. Remembering the soulful warmth of Rebecca’s small apartment, he answered congenially “plenty“.
Gordon buttered one of his rolls, pondering on the strange answer. He too didn’t wish to fight. “You know, my sister met your father while on mission,” he smiled at the young man. “The best time to get married is before you go back to school. You been thinking about that kind of thing at all? Marriage?”
“Have you?”
Gordon stopped buttering his roll.
“Besides,” Josh quickly changed subjects, “I was thinking of doing some kind of a work study program out here. For another year or so, maybe.”
Gordon looked him in the eyes. “You can’t stay here Josh. You’re coming home to Utah when this is over. That’s just a fact. ”
“You know, Uncle Gordon, you don’t always have to run my parent’s errands–”
“Someone has to be responsible for–”
“–Just so they’ll like you and make you part of the–”
“Like me? She’s my sis–”, It got silent as Gordon looked down at the table.
“Uncle, I want to show you the city. I want you to see how incredible it is.”
“I’m not here on vacation, I’m here to–”
“Forget about them for a minute. Think about yourself. That’s what I’m doing, there’s so much to–”
“What you’re doing? We don’t know what the heck you’re doing!”
“You have to stop saying we!“, some people at the next table were staring, so Josh lowered to a whisper, “sometimes I walk past an intersection full of people, where I can look down both streets and see to the ends of the city. And I wonder how I could have ever not lived here. It’s like I start to get dizzy.”, he leaned into his Uncle, “There are things here for everyone. Everyone. Gordon, it’s not like Utah.”
“Well, I’m quite sure of that. Have you spoken to the Bishop here about coming to stay?” he asked, once again trying diplomacy.
“No,”Josh let out a large cathartic laugh. “I haven’t”.
“Well, it may be an idea–”
“Let me show you this city. I think you’ll like it. I think you’ll really like it.”
“No, No, Joshua. I don’t think I would,” he put his napkin on the table like he was going to stand up, “I’m not sure what’s going on here, but something is, and I don’t like it at all.”
“But you will.” said Josh, now staring off beyond his uncle.
“Excuse me? Why?”
“Because. Because, you’re gay,” he tried his best not to flinch. “Right?”
The waitress began to approach, but Josh shook his head to tell her they weren’t ready yet, then he returned to his silent uncle.
“You are, right?,” Josh repeated the question, unnerved by his Uncle’s silence, “This isn’t Utah. I can show you places that you probably didn’t think really existed. You can call it whatever you want, maybe it’s God, but for some reason at-this point in your life you’ve been brought to the greatest city in the world for four days, far, far from the eyes of home. Let me show you this city.” He said compassionately to the tired old man.
The waitress came back.
“Gordon?” His uncle’s head was still down. “Uncle? Let’s find the most expensive thing on this menu and order it. I’ve been working nights at a bar. Between the two of us,” he smiled, “I think we’ll be alright.”
Have you considered Subscribing to all of this madness?
Seth,
I don’t mean to be a downer, but you don’t know that much about Mormons, do you? The veracity suffers as a result.
I like the writing though. And the idea behind what you’ve written is certainly something that does happen, although most LDS Church members would be bothered by it.
The story isn’t really *about* Mormons and I’m certainly not qualified or interested to offer a critique of the church. In the piece I’ve only claimed to know three facts: 1) Mormons go on Mission, 2) Those Missions often happen in places different than where they are from, 3) Utah is not a bastion of Gay-Rights. Beyond that, there’s really little that applies singularly to LDS.
Still, I appreciate both your criticism and your compliment.
Seth and Kent:
I think that this is a fascinating exchange. Kent, the Mormon, makes a remark about the veracity of the piece. Seth, the non-Mormon writer, makes the claims that only three pieces of basic info about Mormons were necessary to the piece.
Now, William, the Mormon and colleague of Kent, is going to use this as an opportunity to discuss something that’s been on his mind for quite awhile. Which means, before I get to the actual work, I’m going to pontificate for a bit ( Get, it? Pontificate? Pontif — Pope. Just a little Mormon/Catholic joke).
The issue of veracity of fiction is interesting because it gets into questions of power, language, ethnicity, appropriation, authenticity — all that stuff that drives thousands of graduate literature papers every year. Who has the right to write about a specific ethnicity (and although the question of whether Mormonism is an ethnies or not is up for debate, the fact remains that it does exhibit many of the cultural products and activities that are found in other ethnies where these arise, including an active market for Mormon literature, music and film)? What level of veracity, experience, and insider-ness does an artist have to bring to a work that deals with aspects of a particular ethnicity?
There are, of course (and as Kent notes), Mormons who would be uncomfortable with any “non-faithful” (faithful here meaning not true to the ideals and standards of Mormonism rather than faithful meaning a realist portrayal), non-complimentary narrative. I’m not one of them. I’m interested in any depiction of Mormonism in popular culture whether the artist be Mormon, ex-Mormon, non-Mormon or Mormon-friendly. So is Kent.
And yet, I think that even Mormons who have, shall we call it, a more cosmopolitan outlook, are disappointed by works that use Mormons as a shorthand for certain things. Who create an easy symbol or tension out of a very shallow understanding of Mormonsim. For example, as powerful a work as “Angels in America” is (and I think it’s one of the major works of the latter part of the 20th century) and as much as Tony Kushner was able to muster some powerful symbology in his use of Mormonism, several Mormon critics (critic as in someone with training in literary or theater theory) have faulted his work for using Mormons when he really meant conservative Christians. That is, the Mormon characters in his play, for all the fact that they wear garments and dream of dioramas, don’t exhibit a real sense of a Mormon worldview and what it means to be a Mormon in a Mormon community (indeed, there is a real lack of engagement with the LDS community in Kushner’s play which while may be true for individual Mormons doesn’t really jive with most Mormons’ experience).
So this — “In the piece I’ve only claimed to know three facts: 1) Mormons go on Mission, 2) Those Missions often happen in places different than where they are from, 3) Utah is not a bastion of Gay-Rights. Beyond that, there’s really little that applies singularly to LDS.” — is exactly the problem. While it may not be true for all your readers, once you invoke Mormonism, you invoke an entire field of cultural products and practices. A literary history. An American history. A doctrine and worldview. A history of depictions in art that go back more than 100 years, that vary widely in their “veracity.” This is not to say that an artist has to have a grasp of the entire field. But in order for a work to be successful, I think it needs to show some level engagement with its raw materials.
Now as I mention above, the same issues come up with depictions of Jews, African-Americans, Hispanics, Armenian-Americans, Pacific Islanders, etc. And some will argue that only those who are in the community should portray it; some that only those who know it should; only those who have studies it should; anyone should who feels like it. But no matter what the stance is, what it really comes down to, in my opinion, is that the characters and situations have to ring true to a certain extent. And how true they need to ring depends on the work. For example, a quick grasp of Mitt Romney via what’s available in the media and on his Web site may be enough for the use of a Mormon political character in a story or novel who is seen through third person limited. It might not be enough if one wants to portray his inner and private life. And it most likely won’t be enough if one wants to portray the inner and non-public life of a Mormon teenager or working mom or missionary.
Now to the specifics.
“I need to go to the Mission”
This is not a Mormon usage. Mormons go on a mission. But they never go to “the Mission.” A mission is not a physical place. It’s a calling, a period of service. And Mission isn’t capitalized.
“You’ve seen a Mormon mission before, yes?”
Again — a Mormon mission isn’t something that can be seen.
Another point. Although there may sometimes be exceptions, in general, relatives and friends do not visit missionaries. And a missionary who was on a mission would never be alone. Mormon missionaries are like socks — they always comes in pairs (okay, sometimes triplets).
“Have you spoken to the Bishop here about coming to stay?”
A Mormon missionary wouldn’t speak to his bishop about coming to stay. He’d speak to his Mission president. A minor detail, perhaps.
Now, I think that this could be an incredibly fine piece of micro-fiction. In particular, I really like this sentence:
“sometimes I walk past an intersection full of people, where I can look down both streets and see to the ends of the city. And I wonder how I could have ever not lived here.”
What I would suggest is that you ditch the mission angle and make Josh a student who is studying for a semester in New York and doesn’t intend to return to Utah. That could work.
Although, the uncle going to save the nephew from the evils of New York City is maybe within the realm of possibility, but Mormons are not the Amish. There are many Mormons living in NY these days. Some of them are estranged from the Mormon community; some are not. Some are having a hard time adjusting culturally; some couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.
But thanks, Seth, for writing this thought-provoking piece. And I’m honestly not trying to start a flame war here. In fact, if you’d like me too, I’d be happy to cross-post this comment to the Mormon arts and culture blog I write for so that if this sparks a major discussion (and it very well might not) you can ask people to take their comments there rather than clog up the comments here. I’m sure that when you wrote and posted this you weren’t looking for a debate on ethnicity and art.
All the best,
Wm Morris
Wow! What a great post, William.
Please Seth, let William post this on A Motley Vision ( http://www.motleyvision.org ). And you should seriously consider William’s suggestions. It would make the story much more believable for anyone who knows Mormons.
Kent
Ok. I got it…