The Second Demise of Our Family Newspaper Delivery Business

About a year and a half ago I wrote a post about our kids starting to deliver newspapers again. When I recently received an email about that post I realized that I had never done a follow up. In short, our second foray into the news delivery business lasted only a few brief months. And then it was over. Maybe this time for good.

The brokered deal was that sons #3 and #4 would split the route. Son #4 was never able to fulfill his part of the deal, owing in part to some medical issues. In addition, we ultimately discovered that he had Asperger Syndrome and major depression disorder. Mornings were (are) not a happening thing for him. The every-morning grind soon wore enough on son #3 that he willingly gave up the route along with its small but useful stream of income.

As I suggested in my post last year, early morning news delivery routes are rarely as good for families as were the afternoon delivery routes of my childhood. Back in those ancient days I would come home from school and spend an hour or even less delivering newspapers. It wasn't too bad.

The more challenging part was going door to door each month collecting subscription fees from my customers. In the five years that I was a news carrier I learned some intriguing lessons about people's attitudes about money and how various families managed their finances. I never did understand those that would lie to a kid over a matter of five and a half bucks that they clearly owed. I also noted that I became so fond of the twenty-five cent tip one guy would give me each month that I would put his paper inside his storm door every day. I enjoyed the tip while he paid less than a penny per day for the service.

Today's news carriers don't worry at all about collecting subscriptions, since they are handled through the newspaper's billing system. If someone doesn't pay their bill, the news carrier simply gets a notice not to deliver the paper to that home. Problem solved. It's nice for the carriers, but they don't get the real life financial education that I got.

While early morning news delivery hasn't worked well for our family, another family down the street has turned it into a profitable business. I think they are up to five or six routes now. These are all automobile routes where newspapers are shoved into tubes on mailbox posts. The family nets more than can be earned from most part time jobs. But they get up at 3:00 AM every day, regardless of weather, desires, family situations, etc. Of course, their kids are older than ours. But I still don't think we'd be able to pull that off even if our kids were older.

Many parents are interested in helping their children learn good work ethic, as this is a gift that keeps giving throughout life. Newspaper delivery used to be one of the kinds of jobs kids could easily do. Once newspapers made the shift from afternoon to morning delivery, news delivery stopped being a natural fit for kids.

Other kinds of job opportunities exist. Last spring my mother-in-law hired an enterprising neighborhood boy to mow her lawn. But the situation ended up being less than reliable, so it didn't work out well for Mom. I think that the young man underestimated the difficulty of the labor and the level of business costs. Kids could earn fairly well in Mom's neighborhood doing yard care and snow removal. But they would have to establish a reliable system. Usually that means having more than one worker as well as parents that will back up the business.

In an effort to eliminate child labor abuse our society has made it increasingly difficult for children to find productive work. Some of this is also simply the result of an expanding economy. Many little jobs that kids used to do have long been overtaken by technology.

While the theory behind jobs for kids can be fodder for discussion, what I can tell you for sure is that early morning news delivery simply doesn't work well for our family. Maybe it's a different story for your family.

The Myths of Social Security

My wife recently expressed anger about something posted on Facebook relative to Social Security and our "thieving politicians." I read it and explained that most of what had been written was false. The trouble is that those inaccurate statements are widely believed among Americans today.

In my view, the Social Security system is sustained by a system of myths and evidentiary short-term results that are extrapolated as sustainable over the long-term. I will explain that jargon jumble later. I believe that the Social Security system would enjoy far less support among the general public if understanding of the system were not founded in untrue or partially true myths. Interestingly, most of the myths are believed by both supporters and opponents of the system. Consider these:

Myth: I have a Social Security account.
Debunk: No individual Social Security accounts exist. In Helvering v. Davis (1937), the Supreme Court ruled, "The proceeds of both the employee and employer taxes are to be paid into the Treasury like any other internal revenue generally, and are not earmarked in any way."

Still too technical? To put it bluntly, none of the Social Security taxes you have paid are yours. Your contributions do not go into an account in your name or any individual's name. They go into a single gigantic holding fund that is accounted for separately from the rest of the U.S. Government's budget. (This Just Facts website is not too bad on discussing how the system really works.)

Myth: I have a right to Social Security benefits.
Debunk: It turns out that no one actually has any right to Social Security benefits, regardless of how much they have paid into the system. In Flemming v. Nestor (1960), the Supreme Court ruled that no one has any contractual right to Social Security benefits and that our politicians can change or even eliminate benefits at any time. Benefits are subject to political whims rather than contract law.

Myth: Social Security would be fine if our politicians hadn't raided our Social Security savings.
Debunk: As Just Facts explains, any amount the Social Security Administration receives in excess of its current obligations must be loaned to the federal government by law. The program was designed this way from the beginning.

There was never a plan to hold a huge pile of contributions in something like Uncle Scrooge's money bin. Excess funds are "invested"* in government bonds because they were deemed to be the safest instrument. Remember that the law was passed in 1935, shortly after the 1929 stock market crash and during the Great Depression, so any instrument with any kind of risk was strictly out. By law the government must repay the loans with interest. It has never yet failed to do so. Of course, it has often incurred debt to make the payment.

*Bonus lesson: Whenever someone uses the word "invest" or any of its synonyms or derivatives in a political manner, it means spending more money on government programs. It's code for unpopular phrases like "tax increase" and "pork barrel spending." 

In essence, everything workers pay into the system today goes to pay benefits to today's beneficiaries. Low interest rate government bonds are purchased with any contributions in excess of benefits paid. Taxpayers (hey, that's us) are on the hook to repay the bonds with interest. When today's workers retire, future workers are supposed to pay enough into the system to cover the benefits paid to the beneficiaries of that day. (See my March 2012 post on why this is a problem.)

Myth: If I retire at the average age and live an average lifespan, I can expect to get back about as much as I pay into the system plus moderate interest.
Debunk: This is somewhat complex. The statement is still true for some people, but not for the average worker. As of 2011, average workers can expect to receive less than they paid into the system. In some cases, quite a bit less. The charts and tables in this Urban Institute publication paint a decent picture of how it actually works.

Humorously (although, I don't think he meant it as such), Dan Kadlec suggests in this August 2012 Time article that you should take actions to extend your life so that you can be sure to collect at least as much in Social Security benefits as you paid into the system. As the character Manny says in Ice Age 4 (one of the many sequel laden animation franchises), "It's the spiteful ones that live the longest."

While Social Security is a bad deal for most of today's workers, most could plan to collect far more in Medicare benefits than they pay in Medicare taxes. Of course, that system's not sustainable. So you probably shouldn't plan on it.

Myth: The Social Security system is broke or soon will be.
Debunk: The government long collected more in Social Security taxes than it paid out. It has now hit the point where that is no longer the case. Unless some change is made, it is estimated that the system will no longer be able to fully meet its obligations beginning in 2033. That doesn't mean that it will be broke. It could afford to pay out about 75% of promised benefits for many years after that. Various combinations of benefit reductions and tax increases have been offered as potential solutions.

Myth: Although the Social Security system will go through a period of much higher payouts than revenue collections, it will once again be on sound footing as soon as the Baby Boomers finish working their way through the system.
Debunk: Although this might be technically true, it cannot work that way in reality because Social Security doesn't exist in a vacuum. The amount of debt the government would have to incur to pay full benefits until after the Baby Boomers die out would put the country so deep in hock that just paying the interest (like having a huge interest-only mortgage payment) would swamp the government (and likely wreck the economy).

Reality vs. Myth
There are many more Social Security myths that are widely accepted. The few I have presented are among the most common. If most workers today understood that:

• Nothing they pay into Social Security is theirs (either now or in the future)
• They have no contractual right to Social Security benefits
• There won't be enough future workers to support future retirees
• They will likely pay more into the system than they will receive in benefits
• The benefits they plan to receive must be trimmed and the taxes they pay must be increased to keep the system functional

it is likely that support for the system would drop off dramatically. No one willingly invests in something on which they know they will lose money. On the other hand, the system isn't in as dire of financial shape as some believe it to be. My debunk comments are too brief to be completely accurate. But they are far more accurate than the myths they debunk. Grasping the realities of Social Security may leave some feeling relieved. Others will be more angry than they were.

The description of Social Security as a Ponzi scheme is at least somewhat apt. That is, it depends on a continual supply of new contributors to pay off earlier contributors. The difference is that Social Security is not fraudulent. The government has been completely up front about the matter, although, Americans' perception is otherwise. At the time the system was designed, few thought much about what would happen if birth rates declined and life spans increased in the future, as has been happening for more than a generation.

People believe in Social Security today partly because it has successfully provided benefits for two generations of retirees. When it comes to lifespans, however, this is a short-term payout, similar to the way Ponzi schemes work. Given current birth rates, the system is unsustainable in the long term. We are rapidly approaching the point where there won't be enough revenue from new contributors to pay off older contributors.

Although the Social Security Administration is quite forthcoming about the fact that Social Security was never meant to be any retiree's sole source of retirement income, it is well known that it is the only retirement plan many workers have. Unsurprisingly, this is particularly true of lower earning workers. Due to earning capacity and/or life choices, these workers would never be able to retire without Social Security or something to replace that planned revenue stream. Any future solution to the program's woes would have to address the situation of those with no retirement savings.

The chief myth of Social Security—that people 'own' their contributions—makes reducing benefits a hard sell politically. When an article recently appeared in the Wall Street Journal arguing for cutting all or most Social Security benefits for the top quarter of earners, one reader responded that in that case it would only be fair to refund these people their contributions. This makes a salient emotional point, but it fails to appreciate the facts that no one owns their contributions and that such a refund would constitute a greater benefit than they would otherwise receive if benefits were not cut.

Our Social Security system has long presented significant political problems, many of them based in myths that politicians are loath to expose. Exploding myths in a way that resonates with the public would destroy public support for the system. But the system is on its way to a publicly unacceptable condition anyway if it isn't revamped to some degree.

Unfortunately, all of the potentially effective solutions for these problems are politically painful. Politicians that go seriously after such solutions tend to get punished. So politicians are more likely to let things go along as they are until matters get so bad that the public broadly demands action. Another common approach is to use class warfare to target the least politically powerful segment in order to pass various changes.

This nation needs a serious discussion about Social Security. But such conversations need to be guided by realities and not by myths.

Left Behind: The True Story of a Boy Playing Football (sort of)

Excitement surged through me as I stuck my hand out so that one of the coaches could write "4RG" on it with a green marker. Standing there in my football uniform I felt manly, although, I was only eight years old. I had admired the football trophies that my older brothers' had received from playing on winning teams. Now it was going to be my turn to gain such a coveted icon.

I glanced around at my teammates, a huge group with whom I had practiced in the heat of many late summer evenings. Almost every boy I knew played football in the autumn back in those days because there were few other activities available. The excitement among the group was palpable as we got ready for the start of our first game.

That was pretty much the high point of my football career. The "RG" part of the monogram on the back of my hand meant that I was assigned to play right guard, an offensive position. I didn't know much about it. We did a lot of running and calisthenics at practice. Sometimes we chucked balls. We hadn't done much scrimmaging. Or at least the squad to which I was assigned hadn't.

It turned out that I needn't have worried about knowing how to play my position. The "4" on the back of my hand meant that I was part of the fourth string. The coaches had ranked the team members and they (rightfully, I later understood) placed me among the dregs of the team. Heck, the kid that still sucked his thumb was on third string. But he could play football better than me.

The only way the fourth string offense would hit the field was if the team was way ahead. Not like one or two touchdowns ahead. So far ahead that the other team had no chance of catching up. Well, that never happened. I'm not talking about the first game. I'm talking about the whole season.

As the autumn wore on and evening practices went from hot to warm to cold, I showed up Saturday after Saturday in my perpetually clean game jersey. One of the coaches would write "4RG" on the back of my hand with a green marker. And then I'd sit on the sidelines, something at which I became very proficient.

The way our team played, the defensive line saw most of the action. Our offensive line spent so little time on the field that the second string rarely played. The third string offensive players occasionally saw a little action toward the end of a game. But the flotsam and jetsam of the fourth string were confined to the sidelines game after game.

One time our coaches promised to buy us milkshakes if we won the next game. Amazingly, we did. It was the only game we won all season. And when I say "we" I mean "they," because I never played. Or maybe my not playing helped the team win. At any rate, I was excited about getting a milkshake.

After the coaches broke the news, I ran to tell my dad. I sent him home and went back to the team gathering. Only nobody was there. I later discovered that I had failed to listen to the rest of the news. The milkshake party would happen after practice on Monday evening.

I looked around at the people that had gathered for the next football game. I didn't see anybody I knew. I had no money. I was dressed in an uncomfortable football uniform with cleats that made walking a chore. I looked north and could see the prominent mountain that was north of my home. Not knowing what else to do, I started walking in that direction. I didn't realize that I was more than 10 miles from home. Hey, I was only eight.

I lost track of time as I trudged through the urban area of town. People looked at me oddly, but nobody said anything to me or offered to help. Eventually I saw a building with which I was familiar, so I knew I was going the right way. I knew how to get to the main drag from there, so I was soon headed north on the busiest street in town.

For some reason it didn't cross my mind to duck into a business and ask to use their phone. Maybe I figured that kids weren't allowed inside businesses without their parents because I had never been inside a business without an adult. I was just a kid doing what I thought I could do. I never thought I was actually lost because I had a general idea of how to get home and figured that I'd get there at some point.

Unbeknownst to me, my parents had eventually wondered where I was and had called my coach, who had been home for hours. He had no clue where I was either. There was a lot of area between my home and the school where the game had been played. Where would they look?

I was still several miles from home when a car passed me and then pulled over to the side of the road. One of my friends from school and from the team (a really good kid that played good football) leaned out of the window and called to me.

Soon I was in the backseat of the car as my friend's mother listened to my tale with noticeable shock. A few minutes later she dropped me off in the driveway of our house just as my dad was about to pull out of the driveway to start looking for me. He was both relieved and angry.

To top it off, I missed the milkshake party two days later because my family had some kind of conflicting commitment that caused me to leave practice early. So I never got the treat that had been the impetus for the whole debacle in the first place.

The weather was rather chilly for the last game, which was played at a field not far from my home. Dad watched the game from the car so that he could stay out of the cold. Again I commanded a spot on the sidelines throughout the game.

Suddenly the coaches called for the fourth string offensive players to go to the line of scrimmage. Was this for real? We were losing and there was little time left in the game. So I guess the coaches figured that they had nothing to lose by sending in the goof squad.

I was soon lined up opposite another player. A whistle sounded and I heard the quarterback call some numbers. I wasn't cognizant of when the ball was snapped, but everyone started moving. I briefly pressed up against the guy I was supposed to block. Another whistle sounded and the play was over almost before I realized what had happened. Somehow we had kept control of the ball so we were to remain on the field.

We lined up again. Just as the quarterback was about to begin calling numbers the final whistle of the game sounded. I had spent an entire season practicing football and attending football games so that I could play in one single down of an official game.

After the team broke up, I excitedly ran to the car at the edge of the field to hear what my dad had to say about my play. He was asleep and had missed seeing me on the field. I never received a football trophy to put on the dresser in my bedroom. Back in those days trophies only went to the top placing teams. There was no such thing as a participation trophy.

Perhaps it's not surprising that I declined to play football during subsequent seasons and that I never developed much of an affinity for the game. But I did learn some valuable lessons. Like what to do when you get left behind.

My Mission Was a Failure, Until ...

Recent communications with our missionary son have brought back a complex mix of thoughts and emotions. He's in a challenging situation right now. It seems that his companion suffers from some kind of disorder that keeps him in bed for up to 12 (or more) hours a day. So he's often not ready to leave the apartment until lunchtime. The work is suffering. They have no steady investigators. The church's new missionary technology program has not yet reached our son's mission, so his ability to do any kind of effective work while his companion slumbers is quite limited.

The mission where our son serves is notoriously challenging. It is very similar to Norway, where I served. There is a general apathy about religion. Finding people to teach is difficult. Getting those that will listen to the point that they become interested in joining the church is exceedingly more difficult. It is quite common for missionaries in our son's mission to return home having not contributed directly to any convert baptisms.

I sensed the level of our son's discouragement when he recently wrote that he couldn't imagine ever saying that his mission was the best two years of his life. That hit home with me because my mission experience was not much different.

At the time I returned from my mission I could not say that my mission was the best two years of my life. Nor have I ever been able to honestly say that. I had some amazing experiences on my mission. I am ever so grateful that I served. I held every leadership position that any young elder in my mission could hold (whoop-te-doo), but I still came home feeling like I was a failure as a missionary. It took years for me to see my mission in a different light.

My son recently wrote that he feels ineffective as a missionary. He regrets his lack of boldness. Well, he is his father's son. We were supposed to make something like 125 street contacts per week back in the day. I averaged more like 5-6. I just did not like getting into people's faces. It was one thing to have people walk up to a street display to talk to (or heckle) us. It was quite another to initiate the contact. Once I got used to people rejecting us on the doorstep, I didn't mind going door-to-door so much. But I hated street contacting.

All of these contacting activities seemed horribly ineffective to me when I was a missionary. It turns out that I was right. At least from a direct viewpoint. One non-LDS researcher has studied the purpose of LDS missionaries. He says that in reality, young missionaries serve the same purpose as billboards. They are the most public face of the church. While their finding activities may be directly ineffective, it is important for them to be out there interfacing with the public. He says it has great indirect marketing value.

Other research has shown that LDS missionaries help bolster the faith and function of members where they serve. Returned missionaries also make up a significant and important part of the church infrastructure, even when they weren't very successful at baptizing new converts. Some researchers have gone so far as to say that these elements are the real products of LDS missions and that the focus on teaching and baptizing is really just a side light. The rank and file members are more important as far as that goes.

I think that repeated training, cultural imprinting, and years of direct and indirect messages convey an idea of what an LDS mission should be like. There is a lot of good in this. But the problem with the 'one true mission' (OTM) paradigm is that if your mission doesn't closely match that picture, it's easy to see your mission as a failure. In reality, each missionary has a unique blend gifts, talents, abilities, and shortcomings. Only a certain percentage of them are likely to match the OTM model.

For example, I have a brother that is the COO of a multi-national company. He says that he is always concerned about the educational credentials of any job candidate, except for when he is interviewing a candidate for a sales job. Then he doesn't give one iota about education. He says that salesmanship is inborn. You either have it or you don't. If you have it, much can be done to hone and build upon that talent. But if you don't have it, no amount of training will help you get it. He only needs 10 minutes with a candidate to know whether they have it or not.

There are lots of opinions on this matter and my brother's is just one of them. But behavioral scientists know that every person falls somewhere along the introversion-extroversion scale. Salesmanship comes far more naturally to those at the extrovert end of the scale. If you're toward the introvert end you will always find the sales element of missionary work to be difficult and challenging.

That's how it was for me. But it turned out that I had a lot of administrative skill. I ended up serving nearly a year in the mission office, where I excelled at the various administrative tasks I was assigned. We did regular missionary work in the evenings and on the weekends. That went pretty much like the rest of my mission.

I was no slacker while on my mission. But I knew that I wasn't very effective. I often filled time with less productive activities. We would stop by nonmembers that would reliably talk to us but that had no interest in improving their spiritual lives. We weren't immune to ducking into shops instead of doing street contacting. Or we'd schmooze members.

But frankly, the 'productive' activities weren't very productive either. We generally managed to keep a small pool of investigators, but none of them would make it past the third lesson. Most of the time I felt like we were spinning our wheels trying to look busy.

I spent five months with a companion that had some serious problems. The longer we were together, the less well we communicated and worked with each other. He wouldn't study. His Norwegian skills were so rudimentary that people simply couldn't understand anything he said. It was a tough time for both of us. Only years later would I gain some compassion when I realized the tremendous challenges this young man faced.

By the end of my mission I had stood in the baptismal font exactly one time. The young lady I baptized stopped attending church three weeks after her baptism. I had made a handful of street contacts and countless door-to-door contacts. I had taught a number of lessons, none of which went anything like the lessons I had memorized in the MTC. (Exact memorization of lessons was the way we did it back then.) I had acted in leadership roles and had seen much of Norway. I had done a lot of administrative work. But because my mission didn't match the OTM picture, I felt like a failure for many years after my mission.

Through much prayer and years of maturation, I eventually gained a different understanding of my mission. The Spirit has warmly whispered to me that the Lord is very pleased with my missionary service. Not that I did any great thing. He is pleased with my service in the way that parents are pleased when their kindergartener comes home with a pencil holder made of a can decorated with dry macaroni and spray paint. This is an apt analogy, because President Dieter F. Uchtdorf tells us that we are all spiritual toddlers.

If God is happy with my inept missionary service, what right have I to be unhappy about it?

Not everyone that serves a mission can excel at salesmanship. Missions don't run without administrative work. Not every missionary can do that effectively either. Many different skill sets are needed (see 1 Corinthians 12:20-21). Only a narrow percentage of missionaries are going to have OTM experiences. But the rest need not view their missions as failures. I suspect that many that now feel like missionary failures would be surprised to learn how God views their service.

Of course, this perspective likely won't help my son much in his current situation. It seems that we are destined to learn some lessons first hand. Some lessons can only be realized after many layers of perspective are added to the original experience.

I would like to reach across the world, embrace my son, and tell him how much the Lord loves him and appreciates his meager efforts. But I can't. I can pray and hope that God will somehow convey this important message to my son. But if he's as thick headed  as me, it may take years.

Autumn Comes to the Mountains

I drove through the mountain valley in the afterglow of a ripe autumn day, anticipating the unmistakable pleasant scents of the season that would reach me as soon as I climbed out of my vehicle at the scout camp that was my destination.

It's not just the glorious explosion of leafy colors that distinguish this time of year. Nature has its own rich set of smells that are specific to early autumn; a mellow cornucopia that for whatever reason just makes me feel good.

These scents come earlier to the mountains than to my home near the foot of the mountains. But I don't always recognize when autumn smells arrive at home. They come on so gradually that they are almost seamlessly woven into my awareness. But a trip to the mountains results in an abrupt change that is wonderfully noticeable.

Not everybody likes the spectacle of fall time. A friend tells me that it reminds her that the year is dying away to the bleakness of winter. The same sights and smells that lend a kind a wholeness to me make her feel cold and apprehensive.

But I cannot deny what I feel. I have always loved early autumn.

My drive had already taken me past a ridge of bright yellow quaking aspen nestled among a mountain side of evergreens, making for a striking contrast that almost seems unnatural. Several eye catching gorges I had passed were filled with the whole spectrum of fall colors ranging from deep greens to fiery reds. Yes, there were plenty of dull browns, but for now the brighter colors held sway.

In the dusky light following the setting of the sun, I glanced at an adjacent field where about a dozen animals were peacefully grazing. The two horses were unmistakable, despite the visual flatness of twilight. Then I suddenly realized that the smaller creatures were deer, seemingly unperturbed by my presence.

My vehicle soon came to a stop on the scrabble that makes up the parking area of the scout camp. I climbed out into the mountain air and deeply inhaled the bountiful autumn surrounding me. Many colors were still visible in the dim light. The hillside across the mossy babbling creek ascended on a steep angle painted in myriad colors more beautiful than any human artist could mimic.

Before long it was dark in our tight valley. So dark that, despite the first quarter moon, it was difficult to make out the identities of other people until I was only few feet away from them. The nearly breezeless night soon filled with the sounds of insects, but far fewer that you'd hear at high summer.

I trudged half a mile up a rocky trail with a friend to show him how to get to a part of camp with which he was unfamiliar. As I walked back in solitude, I considered the water running seemingly black in the creek and thought how that for a drought year it seemed like a high volume for this late in the season. I recalled how walking through that canyon at night had given me the creeps when I was younger.

The following afternoon I sat on a hillside watching the dappling of the fall colors. I knew that the sun would still be up for nearly an hour down in the valley as it slipped behind the high walls of the canyon where the scout camp was located. I looked forward to returning home, maybe even with some light to spare. But I had thoroughly enjoyed my trip to the autumn mountains.

Winter will soon fill the mountain canyons with its deep chill, even if snow is sparse. But for now it is enough just to enjoy nature's autumn grandeur.

Restaurants and the 'Can't They Control Their Kids?' Syndrome

Not long ago I dined in a restaurant with my wife. I was about to write "...a fancy restaurant..." in that sentence, but I stopped myself. You see, to us, any eatery where you don't have to order your food from a counter or a window and/or don't have to get the food yourself is a fancy restaurant.

So, although it was fancy to us, this place would probably be classed by others as ... let's see ... an affordable restaurant. That's probably a good way to put it. A local place that's not part of some big chain. Reasonably popular.

I find it impossible to completely ignore other diners in a restaurant setting. I try to be circumspect about my people watching. But on this occasion my wife eventually noticed that I had been paying attention to family with several young children seated nearby.

My Lovely Wife: "What are you looking at?"

Me: (in a tone of disbelief) "Their kids."

MLW: "What about them?"

Me: (amazed) "They're, uh, remarkably well mannered. I mean, they're being pretty calm. They're actually eating the food and they even seem to be enjoying it. Nobody's pestering anyone else."

My wife immediately understood. Each of our five children is a remarkable individual and we love each one dearly. But to be frank, our family never experienced a restaurant scene the likes of which I was seeing when our kids were the ages of those kids.

Let's start with the food. You might think that most restaurants offer sufficient menu choices that every member of our family could find something they would enjoy eating. If so, you'd be wrong.

Between my special diet (yes, I'm part of the problem), one child's coconut allergy, the stubbornness of our Asperger's child, the relatively narrow palates of two children, and the extreme pickiness of another (by my calculation, this child is two standard deviations pickier than the aforementioned two), family dining tends to be traumatic, whether we're at home or out in public.

Consequently—and owing to the fact that, given our budget, taking the whole family out to eat runs into real money even at "affordable" restaurants—we don't often take the whole family out to eat. So maybe we just don't have enough practice dining out as a family.

Both my wife and I have studied plenty over the years (and have been given much advice by well meaning relatives and friends) about how to get our children to expand their palates. But I guess we're defective parents when it comes to kids and food, because we can't ever make it work in our family. We cringe every time we are admonished to have more family meals. To us, this advice sounds like someone saying, "Let the food wars begin."

But food attitudes are only part of the problem. I sat in the restaurant that day marveling at how a half an hour passed without any child screaming or bawling. No poking or hitting. No nasty insults or thoughtless observations about a sibling's behavior. Nobody taking this or that that doesn't belong to them. Or shoving something they don't want into someone else's space. Or flipping pieces of food at someone else. Or.... Well, you get the idea. Just good natured eating and conversing. To me this seemed exceptional.

Heck, if our family was more like that, we'd probably take our clan out to eat more often. I suppose having a lot more money would have to be part of the mix too.

In the restaurant that day I started to wonder if perhaps the young family I was watching was more normal, while our family was exceptional. Or maybe there should be a word like 'inexceptional' that is to 'exception' what 'infamous' is to 'famous.' That is, exceptional in a not-so-good way.

Fortunately, I soon heard a child screaming from around the corner. I couldn't see the family whose child was making such a fuss. Maybe our family wasn't so abnormal after all. The wailing child reminded me of what other restaurant patrons experience when they happen to be stuck dining near our family. Even if they don't say it out loud, they're thinking, "Can't those people control their children?!" They're just glad when we leave. Unless they leave first, having been driven out early by our family's behavior.

A buffet pizza place opened in our town last year. It's a very popular establishment. We can take our whole family there and everyone can find something to eat. (Even relatively healthy salads.) No need to worry about making selections from the menu. No need to worry about getting something a child doesn't end up liking. They can just get up and go find something else. All of the kids are now old enough to find whatever they want to eat without help from somebody older.

Of course, this place doesn't fall under fancy restaurant in our lexicon, because you still have to fetch your own food. If you go to one of these places with your family, you will want to sit at a table rather than in a booth. When you're in a booth, people are constantly needing to slide in and out from the bench. A table works better for the 'jump up and get more food' style of dining.

Now if we could only do something about the poking, hitting, kicking, insulting, blowing air on others through straws, chucking food, flipping boogers ....

When Family History Isn't Pretty

My mom has one of those big flat plastic tubs (the kind that can fit under a bed) that is full of family history stuff. My wife and I (OK, mostly my wife) have of late been helping to sort through this collection.

Some of what we have found is pretty mundane. Most of it is not new to us. The volumes of pedigree charts and family group sheets (Why in the world are there six or seven copies of each?) have long since been digitized.

Then there are the documents and copies of documents. Many of them aren't as legible as I would like. I'd like for all of that stuff to be scanned and digitized. But if that's going to happen, it's going to be me that does it. We're talking months of work. Unless I suddenly develop more free time and more motivation, the documents will probably still languish in that box a decade from now. Undigitized.

Still, there have been some surprises in the box. We found several sheets of paper in my German grandmother's handwriting, dated the year before she passed away. I can get by reading the German, but Oma's handwriting isn't easy to read. Thankfully, we also found pages where my mom transcribed Oma's writing into typewritten English. On these sheets are some stories I had never heard and names of people I had never heard of.

For example, Oma wrote about how her father-in-law (my great-grandfather) met his demise on the way home from a funeral at a time when my Opa was still a baby. (I don't know whose funeral it was.)

Urgroβvater was on a ferry boat with friends. The way Oma tells it, Urgroβvater usually didn't drink much. (Which, judging from common German practices, might mean that he usually didn't drain an entire keg by himself.) But in this case, his friends succeeded in prevailing on him to imbibe.

After a while, the well lubricated men began taking bets on who could jump into the November chilled fjord waters and successfully swim to shore. In what was assuredly a "hold my beer and watch me do this" moment, Urgroβvater was among the men that took the bet and jumped overboard.

Per Oma's telling, Urgroβvater's heart failed to withstand the shock of the cold. It seems far more likely that a fully clothed drunk man jumping into the icy ocean simply drowned. Although he had life insurance, the insurance company ruled his death a suicide; a condition not covered by the policy. So his widow received no insurance benefit.

I also recently learned of a Gypsy ancestor that came to New England in the early days of  European settlement. Unable to find a bride among the Puritan settlers, he married a native girl. Her ancestry has been traced back another five generations. There appears to be a good deal of inbreeding in that line, something that might have been quite normal for the native peoples of that region.

When I showed my oldest son the pedigree chart and indicated the inbreeding, he noted that a bit further back in our British and European ancestry there was also plenty of inbreeding, especially among the nobility. This was apparently one of the methods commonly used to keep ownership of land, and therefore power, in the family.

Well, you don't get to pick your ancestors. But regardless of ancestral practices of which our modern sensibilities may cause us to be less than proud, we ought to be grateful that our ancestors are the means by which we have life today. That gratitude is part of why I do family history work. Like others, I also crave to know from whence I came. Perhaps understanding our past help us understand where we are headed.

Email and Tender Mercies

I recently received a handwritten letter from my missionary son. How times have changed since my missionary days. We don't often communicate with our son via snail mail.

Back in the dim ages when I was a missionary in Norway, I used to get letters from home roughly six to eleven days after they were postmarked. (My mom was very diligent about writing.) On rare occasion letters came more quickly or more slowly.

We would write back and forth. But by the time one party responded to a query by the other party, two, three, or even four weeks had passed. It was difficult to remember what had been asked.

It's not like that now. Once each week we email back and forth with our son for about an hour, discussing all kinds of things. Responses are rapid. I usually only have to remember what I asked a couple of minutes earlier. I have found myself getting impatient if my son fails respond within a minute or two.

A couple of days ago I got an email from a guy that (I now realize) lives in my son's mission. He said that my son was having dinner with his family that evening. He asked if I remembered him from when we both served as missionaries in Norway many years ago.

What a pleasant surprise. While the miracle of modern technology makes weekly communication with my son half a world away a breeze, it's always nice to connect with somebody else that has had personal contact with my son 'over there.' It's refreshing to get a third party perspective on how he is doing.

This particular communication had the added benefit of renewing an old acquaintance. How marvelous. I am thankful for tender mercies.

Wednesday at One O'Clock

A young man, whom I will call Elder M. related this story to me. Upon arriving in a new mission area, Elder M. found that the missionaries had a standing appointment each Wednesday afternoon at 1:00 pm with Brother T., who would take time off work each week to go with the missionaries to visit less active and prospective church members.

One Wednesday afternoon after completing their visits, Brother T. drove Elder M. and his companion back to their apartment. As was customary, they concluded the session with prayer in Brother T.'s car. As he fervently prayed, Brother T. became very emotional.

"Dear Father," prayed Brother T., "I have taken off work every week for 15 years to minister to thy lost sheep." Elder M. was shocked. He had no idea that Brother T'.s standing 1:00 pm appointment with the missionaries had continued over a period of a decade and half.

Brother T's poignant prayer continued. It was clear that he was frustrated. "I have worked and prayed tirelessly for these people, but in all my years of work, I have seen no success." The prayer continued as Brother T. prayed for the souls of those that were lost, as he once had been.

When he finished, Brother T. looked at the missionaries with tears in his eyes. "I am going to have to pray much to know whether to continue working with you each Wednesday," he said before bidding them farewell. Elder M. and his companion didn't know what to think. They prayed for Brother T.

Two days later, Elder M. received a phone call. "Elder M., Wednesday at one o'clock, as usual, right?" rang out Brother T.'s cheery voice.

Elder M. wasn't sure what had changed. But over the six remaining months that Elder M. spent in the area, Brother T. did see success from his labors. He was grateful that he had not given up.

Retire According to Your Bank Account, Not Your Age

"You guys have a financial planner?" my high schooler asked in surprise. "Well, yeah. He's been our planner since about a decade before you were born," I responded. My son was apparently amazed that we had enough finances to need planning. I said something along the lines of financial planning being necessary if one ever hoped to retire.

A short time later we sat across the desk from our longtime friend. I noticed a piece of paper sandwiched between the wood desktop and its glass covering. I read the title The Rules of Retirement (or something to that effect). There were nine 'rules' in short bold statements. Each was followed by a sentence or two. The whole thing was pretty concise.

As I quickly perused the rules, I realized that most of them weren't directly tied to finances. There was advice to "Retire to something not from something" and admonitions to avoid getting too wrapped up in yourself. After all, service to others has been proven to produce much happier and healthier retirees.

The only direct financial rule I saw read, "Retire according to your bank account not according to your age." This caused me to think back to early in my career when I worked for a government agency. I ended up in a group with a large number of men that were in their 50s. Given the rules at the time, most of them would technically qualify for retirement at age 55 or within a couple of years after hitting that mark. I thought these guys were ancient. Early 50s no longer seems very old to me.

The agency instituted a rule that required everyone within five years of retirement eligibility to attend a retirement planning seminar. As each of my coworkers hit the specified time, I watched them go buoyantly off to learn about how wonderful their upcoming retirement would be. Every last one of them returned looking as if they had been punched in the stomach. Mutterings like, "I'll never be able to afford to retire" were common.

The odd thing about this whole episode was that all of these men were trained accountants. Many of them were CPAs. I couldn't understand how they could have gotten to that point in life without doing any serious retirement planning. They all seemed to think that they could simply retire the moment they hit the minimum qualification and that everything would just work out hunky-dory.

By the time I left government employment, I had migrated from accounting to software development. Several of my coworkers were stunned that I would give up the opportunity to retire in my mid 50s. Having actually done some planning (and a lot of saving) by that time, I bluntly told my friends that regardless of whether I worked for the government, I wouldn't be able to afford to retire in my mid 50s, nor would they be able to do so unless they planned on retiring to Skid Row.

For many years I have planned to heed the rule about retiring according to my bank account rather than my age. Of course, fate can twist the best of plans. Some end up retiring due to neither savings nor age, but due to health problems, family situations, or employability challenges. You plan for the most likely scenario and then deal with reality as it comes.

And reality might not be much fun. Retirement savings are built on the future. As I noted in this post, the U.S. economy's "3-D hurricane of deficit, debt and demography" will likely produce suboptimal investment returns over time, meaning that most of us will work longer and retire later than we'd like. But we will probably be better off than our kids and grandkids, whose futures we immorally insist on mortgaging for the immediate gratification of today's government supplied benefits.

Experts tell us that most Americans aren't really doing any retirement planning. This includes the majority of people in my age bracket, not just the twenty-somethings. They are simply planning on crossing that bridge when they get there, assuming that it will somehow work out. The non-planners might be right. At least for awhile. Until we hit the wall we will continue to insist on generous government subsidies for most of these folks.

My wife and I are working to afford to retire some day in the distant future. We don't expect to receive government benefits. Our years of careful prudence will likely be repaid with "needs testing" that will prevent us from receiving Social Security or other socialized benefits. No matter. We are planning for it. But I expect to work many more years than either of my parents did to achieve this goal.

Our kids are a different story. There's little I can do to turn off the government's debt and deficit spigots. My family's ability to change the nation's demographic future is very limited. We are blessed, but we aren't wealthy. We won't be able to fund our kids' future retirements. They will simply have to deal with the realities faced by their own generation.

Hopefully everything will work out for us. We will simply deal with whatever really happens. But I pray for my kids and their future.

What B.S. Really Means According to One Apostle

While writing my father's biography I revisited a story that Dad used to tell. Many years ago Dad was attending a priesthood leadership meeting where the presiding authority was Elder Joseph Fielding Smith, then a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.

I wasn't present, so I can only share the story as Dad told it to me. Elder Smith struck Dad as a very serious and austere man. He wondered if the man had any sense of humor at all.

Back in those days the scope of non-official publications aimed at the Latter-Day Saint population was fairly limited. Almost anything published in this genre was quickly gobbled up by interested Latter-Day Saints. Among the publications offered during that period of time were several works by W. Cleon Skousen. I recall seeing these books in our home as well as in many other homes.

As was (and still is) customary at priesthood leadership meetings presided over by a general authority, Elder Smith eventually opened the meeting for a question and answer period. This was a rare opportunity to have gospel and church related questions answered. Joseph Fielding Smith was considered not only a religious authority figure, but also a religious scholar.

During this session, one brother in the congregation asked Elder Smith a question about Cleon Skousen's books. Elder Smith responded, "I know Brother Skousen and I read his books. As is my practice, I make notes in the margins as I read. When I come across something in one of Brother Skousen's books that I believe to be his private interpretation, I write 'B.S.' in the margin..."

Elder Smith appeared to be completely serious as he delivered this line. After a handful of nervous chuckles from the congregation subsided, Elder Smith continued in total deadpan, "...which, of course, stands for 'Brother Skousen.'"

The congregation roared with laughter, but Elder Smith stood at the pulpit stony faced and seemingly unperturbed. Dad then realized that he had misjudged Elder Smith's sense of humor.

Looking Back on My Silent Crisis of Faith

The first anti-Mormon I encountered was a guy on my high school campus handing out legal size flyers, both sides of which were covered with questions about Mormonism. The man truly looked like a drug addict. Most students that took flyers tossed them in the nearby trashcan. Before long, the school's resource officer ushered the guy off campus for violating public policy regarding distribution of materials at a school.

Later that day a couple of students brought copies of the flyers to seminary class. My seminary teacher admonished students to disregard and not even read anything written on the flyers. Most took his advice. But after class I talked with one classmate that had some real concerns about some of the items on the paper. A couple of other students slammed him for even entertaining such questions. I could see that he was frustrated. Was there no room in the religion for honest inquiry?

Since that time, I have known a number of people that have experienced a crisis of faith. Many of them have grappled with doubts based in the church's claims to truth. Many that know me—even my most intimate associates—might be surprised to learn that I too have struggled through a crisis of faith. Although I am a habitual journal keeper, I kept the matter so close that I didn't even write much about it in my journal.

The recent FAIR conference addressed doubt, shaken faith, the ways people leave the church, and even some of the ways that people return to the church. Some of the addresses I found interesting included Michael R. Ash's presentation about his book, Shaken Faith Syndrome; Seth Payne's talk about ministering to those struggling with doubt; and a discussion among four scholars that each had gone through a major faith crisis. At least three of those in the discussion had left the church but had subsequently returned.

I also found Rosalynde Welch's Disenchanted Mormonism presentation quite captivating; although, my own experience significantly differs from hers. Welch paints herself as a faithful Latter-Day Saint that has gone through life with little connection to the spiritual and mystic elements of the religion. She admits that her case might seem odd, given that the church is founded on and emphasizes the modern importance of spiritual events. But she seems to revel in the earthly value of various church practices and sociality.

Welch floats an intriguing idea about belonging. Namely, that individuals already either belong or do not belong to various groups and organizations, whether they know it or not. Their job is to discover where they fit. In this scenario, individual will is somewhat reduced from the modern Western understanding of individuality. I'm not sure where I come down on this idea. It's just a provocative thought.

Although Welch says that she does not discount the doubt->crisis model, she seems to suggest that it is too self-centric. The individual becomes his own god (my words, not hers) rather than humbly accepting "the limits of our intellectual and moral mastery." (Incidentally, Ralph Hancock provides a compelling argument against currently ascendant ultra individualism in this presentation.) Indeed, Don Bradley, who left and then later returned to the church, says in the round table discussion, "I am content now to let God be God and I’ll be Don."

My description may sound as if Welch is arguing for an uncritical approach to faith. I think that is not the case. Her presentation paints a more complex picture than that. It's worth reading and thinking about. At any rate, her presentation helped me better understand fellow worshipers that do not experience the spiritual as I do.

Several presenters asserted that too much rigidity in one's views of the church, its history, its people, and its doctrines lies at the root of most faith crisis situations. Even the most scholarly individual has some inflexible views that are founded in partial truths and faulty assumptions. When presented with evidence (or even supposed evidence) that seems to directly challenge views that underlie critical foundations, a faith crisis can result. (Note that presenting challenging information is fairly easy, while delving into a proper answer is often very complex.)

Many that experience such a crisis deal with it silently, as I did. They may be unaware that others have already grappled with and have expertly answered many of their questions. (See FairMormon.org, for example.) Since a significant part of their identity and position in life is tied to the church, many are reticent to expose their doubts to others. They may (with some justification) fear that they will be treated in alienating rather than loving ways. Other church (and even family) members may naturally react with revulsion in an effort to inoculate themselves against the faltering faith of the doubter.

While my experience includes some common elements of shaken faith, I eventually came to understand that my doubts were secondary to my real crisis.

I had over a period of several years explored my personal political philosophy. During this period, I assumed alliances with some groups that seemed to share some of my understanding. As I did so, I uncritically adopted other views espoused by these groups, as if this was required of one with my political identity. (Faulty reasoning: if I agree with group X about A, and group X believes B, I must also believe B.)

As I increasingly became involved in debating this constellation of political views, I developed very un-Christ-like sentiments toward some with opposing views. The more I did this, the more I experienced seemingly imperceptible changes in my private religious practices. My prayers became less fervent and more rote. Personal scripture study suffered. Efforts to repent became less frequent and less sincere. Those with whom I disagreed became objects rather than children of God. (See 1 John 4:20.)

Although I was still doing all of the outward things that good and worthy members of the church do, fulfilling my callings, serving others, etc., I had allowed some significant chinks in my armor to go unaddressed. About this time I was exposed to some historical information that didn't fit with my (fairly well studied) view of church history. This even came from friendly, relatively orthodox sources.

I was weak, so doubts were more easily sowed. The more I mused on these doubts the more I felt like I was just going through the motions of church membership with a kind of internal emptiness. But my concerns felt very real and very significant.

I can't really say why this happened, but one day I experienced a moment of reflective clarity. I realized that I had become more certain about my politics than about my religion. I had been defending political ideas that I didn't really believe. Maybe politics was even becoming my religion.

Somehow I was able to step back and look at what was happening to me. I didn't like what I saw. I considered what I really knew deep within and what was really important to me. There were some bedrock matters that I could not deny that made my doubts pale into insignificance.

In a flash, I divorced myself from political debate. (I'm not suggesting that this would be the right step for anybody else.) I began re-examining my religious faith and my political views, giving the former preeminence over the latter. My relationship with God and with others began to improve at that moment. That was only the beginning. Over time my religious understanding has gained new stability while my political views have evolved significantly.

Although answers to my religious doubts did not immediately appear, I felt the Spirit prompting me to be still and patient. Over time I found answers to some concerns. I am still waiting for others. But that doesn't bother me at all. I have become reconnected to God in a way that puts these matters into perspective.

Like Janet Eyring said in the linked round table discussion, scripture study and the sacrament have become richer experiences for me because "you see your own self, you know you’re fallen. You know your flawed self in scriptures that you didn't see when you were younger." She is saying that you better understand how much you need Christ. Although they're not in the current version of the LDS Hymnal, I experience the hymns Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing and Amazing Grace with personally poignant insight that was previously lacking.

Seth Payne's ideas about reaching out to those struggling with a crisis of faith are valuable. Unfortunately this kind of internal strife may not be readily apparent to us, just as my struggles were likely invisible to others. This kind of care and ministering requires spiritual discernment that is rarely experienced unless diligently sought.

The validity of Rosalynde Welch's postulation on belonging might be questionable, but it has been made powerfully clear to me that I am where I belong. And I'm happy; much happier than when I was excessively focusing on real and imagined flaws.

I am not the last seemingly stalwart church member that calls his own basis of faith into question. I pray for those that are dealing with or that will deal with this kind of thing because I know that, as the hymn says, "Dear are the sheep that have wandered Out in the desert to pine."

Should a Child be His Parent's Biographer?

A few years ago after my dad passed away, I wrote a series of blog posts about him. The posts were not really planned. I just dashed off what came into my head at the time. At the request of family members, I put the posts together in a PDF document and shared it with family members.

I never felt that the document was well received. My mom said that I had some facts wrong. A number of times I pressed her for help in remedying any factual errors, but she would always change the subject. Eventually I came to sense that Mom didn't really have issues with my facts; just with my tone, tempo, and treatment.

This is to be expected. After all, even the best biography is strongly colored by the biographer's personal view. And that view is bound to differ in significant ways from the views of others that knew the subject well.

Other family members provided little feedback on my document. Most of them probably never bothered to read it. I'm not sure I can blame them. One of my cousins spent years putting together a book about my grandparents. My several attempts to read it have always ended in an evaporation of interest.

Still, I have long thought about writing a more detailed biography of my father. He was a unique man with an interesting life story. Earlier this year I told of several events from Dad's life at a family gathering. Some family members encouraged me to write them down. Most of these episodes are recorded in my personal journal, but I have (understandably, I hope) not made that publicly available.

Dad refused to record a personal history during his life. He claimed that all such works he had seen were entirely too self serving and unbalanced. I'm not sure whether he lacked confidence in his ability to overcome this common error. But he certainly saw no value in writing a history.

My father told me more than once that most people's histories should be embodied in what is personally experienced by those with whom they have contact. The personal history thus becomes a diffused thing that necessarily dies out with the passing of those individual memories. Dad noted that most of our ancestors had, like most people that have lived on this earth, passed into anonymity. He saw no reason that he should be so arrogant as to think that his story somehow merited more attention than theirs. "No one will care about it after two generations anyway," he said.

Still, I felt compelled to write Dad's biography. I undertook the task a few months ago. I finished the 60+ page text over the weekend. I asked my wife, who is an avid reader, to proofread the document. "A fool" I told her, "is his own proofreader." She helped me ferret out some errors and fix formatting. But she didn't provide a lot of feedback on the content.

Is it balanced? Did I forget anything important? Does it have offensive passages? "It's fine," my wife assured me. Perhaps the best feedback I got was when I walked into the office while she was reading and saw her wiping tears from her eyes. At least some sections of the work are poignant enough to elicit such a response.

I have included a few photos. But I want to add more photos before I complete the work and send it out to family members. Most of the pictures are in Mom's possession. It will take some time to go through volumes of photos and determine which ones to scan and include.

Although I am happy to have completed the initial draft of the text, I must admit that I am somewhat reticent to share it with family members. As noted above, each family member has his own view that necessarily differs from mine. The work also contains personal information about people that are still living. Some of this could be rather sensitive, such as how Dad dealt with my brother's failing marriage. Will some want me to redact such information? Would Dad's story be sufficiently complete without it?

In response to these concerns, my wife suggests that each family member is free to write his own biography or to record his own memories of Dad. True. But I don't wish to unnecessarily cause familial disharmony. In fact, my goal is to help others remember and appreciate Dad.

Some have claimed that children tend to make very poor biographers for their parents because of the complex relationship that tends to exist between parent and child. This may be true and I may be unable to escape this curse. But frankly, I am likely the only one that would ever undertake writing Dad's biography. It's either this or nothing. And in my opinion, the biography I have written is better than nothing.

Football Season Returns: Spare Me!

Gaaaa! It's that time of year again! I was starkly reminded of this fact last Saturday when I was out with one of my sons. He happened to be wearing a bright red Utah Utes T-shirt. Now, this boy happens to know nothing about University of Utah athletics. The shirt is an artifact of a successful bargain hunt.

My magnificent wife has done yeoman's work over the years making sure that our family has regular portrait photos taken. During their formative years each child has portraits taken near his or her annual birthday. This makes for a good family history record.

Family portraits are a bit different than individual photo sessions. My wife carefully plans what each family member is to wear to ensure a visually pleasing collage. Sometimes we're casual; sometimes formal.

Last year my wife planned for our final family portrait before shipping sons off on missions. One son that is currently serving a mission was studying nuclear physiology at the U of U. Why the U of U? It's the only university in Utah that has a nuclear reactor. He considered out of state universities but opted to stay in Utah.

Our aspiring nuclear physicist enjoyed his time at the U, but he cared not one whit about U of U sports. "Could somebody explain to me again how the university's sports program improves my education?" he would ask.

One fine day my wonderful wife was perusing the clearance offerings in a store. It seems that she cannot pass a rack or a shelf labeled "Clearance" without stopping to look for deals. Suddenly the answer to her dilemma about the wardrobe for the family's upcoming photo session presented itself in the form of Utah Utes T-shirts for only $4 each. The bright red background with the bold white letters and logo would look perfect in the outdoor setting. And besides, we did have a son attending the university.

I'm afraid that I failed to act sufficiently enthused when my wife showed me her frugal find. I'm not a sports guy. I just don't understand it. I can't figure out why I'm supposed to feel engaged in games played by people I don't even know. How is a sports team's performance supposed to impact my life in any functional way? The fact that some of these people are athletic celebrities sways me not one bit. To me the whole thing seems like a modern throwback to tribal brutality. It's like some kind of bizarre state sponsored religion that has its own rituals, holy days, and forms of worship.

But I didn't put up too much of a fuss. For months now I have had on my desk at work a lovely portrait of all seven members of our family clad in Utah Utes T-shirts. Although, to be honest, it kind of galls me to have co-workers think that I am somehow a U of U fan.

Back to last Saturday. My son and I were approached by one of the workers at the establishment we were visiting. She kindly asked about my son's T-shirt. He replied, "I'm not really a fan. It's just the shirt that came up in the rotation this morning."

The worker pushed aside her apron to reveal a BYU logo emblazoned on her dark blue T-shirt. "Well, I'm wearing this shirt to support my team today," she proudly announced.

Dread crept over me as it suddenly dawned on me that it was football season. I guess I should have had fair warning. School has started and the fall colors are coming on. But with my high degree of apathy for football coupled with the fact that I have no kids involved in the sport, I had been going along blissfully ignorant until I found myself in the middle of a tribal rivalry.

I looked around and realized that several other patrons of the establishment were clad in various styles of officially licensed BYU clothing. I wanted no part of this rivalry. I wanted nothing to do with football. I wanted to get out of the place.

By the way, exactly what is wearing something devoted to 'your team' on game day supposed to do? Is it supposed to help the team perform better or something like that? Whoa, that's superstitious. Or is it merely stating one's tribal affiliation so that you know who to like and who to dislike? Which circles back to the whole tribal mentality thing. Maybe I'm just sports impaired. I just don't get it. Moreover, I don't want to get it.

Anyway, my son and I were soon on our way. It's not like we were bullied or beat up by cheerful BYU fans. Neither of us knew nor cared about which games were being played that day. But after getting home I went to my closet and shuffled my portrait worthy Utah Utes T-shirt in the stack to make sure that it won't come up in the rotation until after football season is over.

Trail Life USA Offers a Scouting Alternative to the Boy Scouts of America

In a June 3 post about the BSA's decision to stop excluding gay Boy Scouts, I opined that some conservative churches that have traditionally sponsored BSA units may opt to start their own scouting organization. The Deseret News is reporting that this took place last Friday when "a group of Christians ... formed an alternative, faith-based scouting organization called Trail Life USA."

The Christian Post reports that "Trail Life USA is modeled after the American Heritage Girls." AHG was founded by a group of Christian moms in 1995 to offer a "Christ centered" alternative to what they saw as an increasingly secularized Girl Scouts program. Per Wikipedia AHG now has units throughout the United States with a total membership of just under 21,000 youth and adults.

The Christian Post reports that TLUSA was launched by more than "1,200 former BSA officials, parents and youth representing 44 U.S. states," and that the organization expects to have a nationwide program up and running by next January. But founder John Stemberger admits, "Most of us are coming from a highly-structured environment that has 103 years of culture and language and program and symbols … and we are starting from scratch."

The D-News article bears the attention grabbing headline, "End of Boy Scouts? Christian coalition creates new scouting group." That's more than a little over the top. Consider, for example, the fact that Girl Scouts of the USA boasts more than 3.16 million members (see Wikipedia article). If AHG is TLUSA's model, the BSA will see little competition, given that AHG's membership is less than 1% of GSUSA's membership.

Moreover, TLUSA will find tremendous recruiting challenges unless it can successfully differentiate itself from the BSA. TLUSA founders note that the organization was developed in response to the vote by the BSA this past June to drop its longtime ban on gay Boy Scouts. But TLUSA's admissions policy is almost the same as the new BSA policy. It admits gay youth as long as they refrain from engaging in sexual activity or promoting a homosexual agenda. It prohibits homosexual adult leaders.

So what can TLUSA offer to get churches to drop more than a century of tradition? Stemberger says that TLUSA will offer "a masculine outdoor program" that aims to be "stronger, safer and more principled in every way" than the BSA's program. Sounds great. But many are going to want more than mere promises before making the jump.

My understanding is that AHG gets support from evangelical churches by offering a program that is doctrinally structured to dovetail with evangelical teachings to which many non-members do not subscribe. The religious element of AHG would not seem to work well for non-evangelicals.

TLUSA's Stemberger says, "I want to have a prominent faith component that will be weaved in every fiber of the program. But at the same time, we are not going to become religious and churchy. This is not another church program." I could be wrong, but this sounds rather different from the AHG model. It will be interesting to see how the TLUSA program develops.

Although TLUSA may garner only a few thousand members, I think that competition in American scouting programs can serve to strengthen scouting in general. Offering alternative scouting programs for those that feel out of step with large scouting organizations will likely serve youth better than insisting on huge scouting monopolies. What do you think?

To War Again? What Think Ye?

American life in the early part of this century was indelibly affected by the 9/11/2001 terrorist attacks and their aftermath. Many facets of life today are still colored by these horrific events. So I can't help but reflect on the past dozen years as I consider the current push to take the U.S. to war in Syria.

To war? Yes. Although the administration describes its military ambitions in Syria as a very limited affair, one cannot deny that such intervention would be an act of war. Nor can anyone guarantee that the conflict would be short lived and would require minimal American blood and/or treasure. The most prescient among us cannot see where this will lead.

Like most Americans, I supported going to war in Afghanistan and Iraq. In retrospect, I see that no one can really say whether we or the world are better off for having engaged in these conflicts. Effective arguments can be made either way. But all such propositions rely on projected might-have-been scenarios that are impossible to prove.

The entire reason behind engaging in any military conflict is to make life better than it would be otherwise. No serious person considers war a panacea. We all pretty much know war produces unsavory and often unexpected outcomes. But it is proposed that those outcomes are preferred to what would happen if we didn't press the matter.

How do past conflicts rate on this scale? Perusing this list of wars involving the U.S., it seems that clear victories have been pretty sparse as of late. Some of the listed victories are questionable. The 12-year Iraq no-fly zone was a victory? Then why did we end up going to war in Iraq?

Numerous conflicts are ongoing. Almost no one thinks that Afghanistan is going well. Have our efforts there improved American lives? Foreign lives? Most Americans can't tell you what our objectives in Afghanistan are. Many military people wonder the same.

After a quick victory in Iraq we had a very bad time before wrapping up the operation somewhat favorably. We no longer have a blustering dictator there. The government isn't overtly challenging the U.S. But the security situation there is a shambles and there are reports of operational terrorist training camps in the country.

Many Americans don't even remember the 2011 Libyan Civil War because U.S. involvement was relatively brief and low key. We went in, did quick work, and got out, while other governments did most of the high profile work. And the conflict ended fairly rapidly.

Administration supporters are suggesting that the Syria incursion would be more along the lines of Libya 2011 of Bosnia 1993-95. Lots of air support. Make things go boom. Then leave.

Maybe. But the Pottery Barn rule warning given to the Bush 43 administration on Iraq applies here too: If you break it you own it. Unlike Libya, the U.S. would not be simply playing a supporting role. Unlike Bosnia, the U.S. would not be just taking part in a mission championed by the U.N. and carried out by NATO.

Just as no one doubted that Saddam Hussein was an atrocious and obnoxious dictator, no one doubts that Bashar al-Assad is a murderous despot. Nor is there much doubt that he has used internationally forbidden chemical weapons against his enemies in the current civil war.

President Obama insists that the objective of any U.S. attack on Syria would be to simply eliminate Assad's ability to use banned weapons of mass destruction, not to effect regime change or even affect the balance of power in Syria's civil war. Go in, blow things up, and then leave the warring parties to continue their fight.

Some are asking why the U.S. should do this. As one Democratic senator put it; while Syria has been meddlesome, it offers no direct threat to the U.S., nor do we have any allies there. Why should the U.S. get involved in a war where it's a shame that both sides can't lose?

Some suggest that since Russia and China have been supporting Assad, the U.S. must support Assad's enemies, even if they are also our enemies. Did we learn nothing from using the Vietnam War as a proxy for the Cold War?

President Obama insists that the action is necessary to bolster faith in international law. If one state can flout broadly agreed weapons prohibitions, what will prevent other states from doing so if there are no resultant negative consequences? The administration also argues that Assad could easily use these weapons on our allies in the region; although, he has not yet moved to do so. So the strike would be both punitive and preventative.

Of course, this only works if it produces the desired results. We will only know in hindsight if it was worth doing. We might well ask what might be the worst possible outcome if we did not attack Syria? What might be the worst possible outcome if we did?

Also, there are those pesky voices echoing all the way back to the Spanish-American War asking why the U.S. should play the role of being the world's police force. How well has this served us? Others are asking whether this would be both a just and a necessary war. Just, perhaps. But necessary? I will leave that to your judgment.

Given our recent track record, Americans spanning the political landscape are justifiably reticent to become involved in another Middle Eastern war. No doubt there is plenty of domestic political gamesmanship involved in the matter. But that ought to be a tawdry sideshow to the important moral and security questions before us.

Is this the right thing to do? The answer is simple for both staunch libertarians (no) and defense hawks (yes). For everyone else it is not so cut and dried.

Some will choose apathy, reasoning that the government will do whatever it will do regardless of their opinion on the matter. Some will choose a shallow response based on what their perceived political allies are saying.

But I think it matters how one feels in one's heart on the matter. A reasoned and even prayerfully formed opinion is worth pursuing, because doing so will reveal more of your own true character. Honest people can come to different conclusions. But no one can rob you of the qualities developed through this process. And should anyone ask your opinion, you will be able to answer from a solid mooring deep within your soul.

Politics May Be a Religion, but Religion Need Not Be Politics

I found this D-News article about religious progressives interesting. I think that some of the assertions made or alluded to are faulty. For example, the article notes that among religious people, conservative views increase with age and progressive views increase with youth.

It is suggested that this means that progressives will overtake conservatives on the religious landscape in a few years. No account is taken of the well documented fact that people in general (not each specific individual) tend to hold more progressive views in their youth and more conservative views in their golden years. They don't remain static in their views.

Each of us is continually on a journey where our understanding is undergoing change. Hopefully this means that we are being educated and are developing. It seems to me that remaining completely unchanged in one's views would indicate being damned; that is, being stopped in one's progression. Eternal principles do not change, but our comprehension of them and how to apply them should be constantly improving.

I am not the same spiritually as I once was. Nor do I hold the same political views that I once did. In fact, I like to think that I have grown tremendously in both areas. The change of which I speak is not always in the forward/upward direction for each person. Some people choose to regress. I think we all do from time to time. That's OK if it's part of a long-term pattern of improvement, but that's not always the case.

The article says that it is far easier for religious conservatives to work as a group than for religious progressives because the latter hold such a broad variety of views as to defy easy categorization. I'm not sure religious conservatives are really as monolithic as suggested. Perhaps more instructive is the fact that progressives tend to be "less involved in their local congregations than conservatives, making it more difficult to communicate" and organize.

As much as some would like to separate religiosity and politics, that's never going to happen. We are whole individuals. Very few of us are so successful at segmenting and compartmentalizing our lives that our religious, business, social, and political lives don't heavily influence each other. Indeed, that would seem unhealthy. What is the use of religion if it is not lived when you aren't at church and if it doesn't color your approach to the rest of your life?

That being said, I bristle at those that would pigeon-hole me into this or that political category based on my church membership or when people wrest religious teachings to promote a political agenda. My political views have evolved to become rather complex, especially in recent years. I find no coherent party, movement, or political ideology into which I fit well. But along my journey I have also gained a certain degree of tolerance for other views with which I do not presently agree.

I very much appreciated President Dieter F. Uchtdorf's discussion of this topic in the April 2013 general priesthood meeting, where he said:

"But while the Atonement is meant to help us all become more like Christ, it is not meant to make us all the same. Sometimes we confuse differences in personality with sin. We can even make the mistake of thinking that because someone is different from us, it must mean they are not pleasing to God. This line of thinking leads some to believe that the Church wants to create every member from a single mold—that each one should look, feel, think, and behave like every other. This would contradict the genius of God, who created every man different from his brother, every son different from his father. Even identical twins are not identical in their personalities and spiritual identities.

"It also contradicts the intent and purpose of the Church of Jesus Christ, which acknowledges and protects the moral agency—with all its far-reaching consequences—of each and every one of God’s children. As disciples of Jesus Christ, we are united in our testimony of the restored gospel and our commitment to keep God’s commandments. But we are diverse in our cultural, social, and political preferences.

"The Church thrives when we take advantage of this diversity and encourage each other to develop and use our talents to lift and strengthen our fellow disciples."

I liken our current telestial existence to a two-dimensional plane. We struggle to make sense of things according to our two-dimensional understanding. God's celestial realm in this analogy would be like a three-dimensional universe. Some people occasionally get glimpses of the three-dimensional, but they can't fully describe it in available two-dimensional terms. This explains some scriptural terminology.

In our two-dimensional world it is very easy to get tied to linear political thinking. It is difficult to comprehend the three-dimensional view that the political dominions of this world "are as nothing" and "are accounted to [God] as less than nothing, and vanity" (Isaiah 40:17).

My telestial political understanding may appear to me to fill my entire two-dimensional plane, but it would seem more like a spec in God's three-dimensional space. It might intersect with other people's political viewpoints or be on a completely different non-intersecting plane.

Having had a glimpse of the eternal from time to time, I think that my current political views are extremely limited and that this is likewise true of the vast majority of my fellow citizens, regardless of how well informed they believe themselves to be.

Yes, my religion affects my political views. But, no, politics is not my religion. Nor am I required to hew to certain man-made political views because other members of my church choose to do so. I will try to be tolerant of others' political views up to the point that I think that they violate God-given liberties. But please excuse me for ignoring those that wish to use scriptures and religious quotes to badger me into adopting their political views.

Resolving Family History Dead Ends

His name was Knud Jonsen. Born in 1760, he hailed from a little farm called Erland not far from Arendal Norway. All that we know about him comes from the birth records of his four children.

Knud's father's first name was obviously Jon. I have been searching for information about Kund's parents and siblings for more than three decades. I can show you on an online satellite map exactly where he lived, but I have yet to find any more information about him or his family.

Why am I interested? Because he is one of my ancestors. One of his descendants moved to Germany. One of that man's descendants moved to America and became my father. I began researching information on our Norwegian line even before being called to serve as a missionary in that country. Once I learned to speak Norwegian, I took responsibility for this line.

Progress was rapid at first, even before the Internet was commonly used for family history work. I was thrilled to discover that one of my ancestors who we thought was an only child had five siblings. But the names of my ancestors are extremely common. Finding a birth record of someone where year, name, and place match closely does not guarantee that they are the right person.

The truth is that most of our family history lines have long run dry. Almost every one of them has been at a dead end for a long time. This D-News article suggests that if you've been stopped on your family history research for some time, now is a good time to begin researching again, because oodles of historical records have been digitized and have become available since you last set your research aside.

I have done family history indexing to help make more records electronically available. And I keep searching to see if I can find more information from the records that have come online. But I continue to hit dead ends. Someday I hope to find more information about Knud Jonsen's family. Maybe it will work like this:

Voting Most When Your Vote Matters Least

Last week my town held a primary election to winnow a field of six candidates vying for two city council seats down to four. The final election for the two open seats will be held in November, when we will also select our next mayor.

There are some fairly significant disagreements among the candidates about how the city should be run. I may be putting too fine a point on the matter, but in general, some of the candidates seem to be more government centric and some seem less so. The former say that they are in favor of prudently planning for the city's future, while the latter say that they are all about keeping taxes and government encumbrances low.

Of the nearly 10,000 registered voters in my city, exactly 829 bothered to show up and vote. Despite the impact future city council members will have on the lives of citizens, slightly more people voted in this election than voted in last spring's student body elections at the local junior high school. The city's paltry 8.3% voting rate is actually pretty standard for municipal primary elections in our area; although, about 10 times that many voted in the November 2012 general election.

So why don't people bother to vote in municipal elections? They can't really complain about inconvenience. Early voting was offered for nine business days in advance of the formal election. Yet turnout was not any better than before the advent of early voting. I love the convenience of early voting, but I can't help but wonder whether it makes much sense to spend funds to offer this accommodation.

A personal survey of neighbors reveals that most of them felt uninformed about the election. Only two of the six candidates bothered to campaign much. Their campaign materials were so general as to leave potential voters scratching their heads as to their actual positions. What does a candidate mean when he says that his major issue is favoring more civility in city government? That people that don't agree with him should just shut up? Or that he is a pushover if anything controversial comes up? Nobody knows.

It seems paradoxical that voters in my city would turn out in droves to vote in general elections, where each vote carries very little weight, while ignoring local elections where each vote actually matters.

The outcomes of last year's presidential, congressional, and state level races would have been completely unaffected had no one in my city voted. Some of the county races might have been impacted and some legislative representative races would definitely have been impacted. But to be honest, the vast majority of those that voted can't even name the county and legislative office holders for whom they voted.

People will vote if their emotions are tied up in it. Voters in my town will come out to local elections if there is a tax or spending related issue on the ballot. They can be reliably counted on to vote against tax and/or spending increases. They vote in presidential elections because they sense that who they vote for says something about themselves.

But when it comes to voting for city council members that are likely to have a disproportionately large impact on their lives and community, people in my city are pretty much ho-hum. They've got better things to do than to learn about the candidates and take a few minutes to vote. It doesn't matter that their votes could actually change the outcome of the election.

Perhaps voting patterns are somewhat information and emotion related. The average citizen can't avoid being harangued mercilessly for months in the run-up to a presidential election. They can't avoid the information stream; although, this says nothing about the quality of that stream. After being force fed, people become emotionally engaged and vote accordingly.

As stated above, there was little information available in the city council primary race. Interested voters had to go out and gather information on their own. It didn't flow to them endlessly through every form of media and in private conversations. The low information flow resulted in few people becoming emotionally invested. So they didn't vote.

One school of thought says that the modern state of voting is absurd because there is so little connection between how you vote and how candidates actually act in office. Nor does your vote in any way provide balance against the kind of control government exercises over your life. Yet regardless of the outcome of a race you are assumed to have acquiesced to the results. If 50+% of those that bother to vote choose to increase your taxes, you are assumed to have assented. At any rate, the victors have the coercive power of government at their disposal to forcibly ensure your obedience.

Another school of thought says that the ballot box is the best way we have in a democratic republic to keep the ruling class in check. So that your vote is valuable in the aggregate even if ultimate outcomes would have been unaffected by whether you cast a ballot or not.

Yet another school says that voting is both a right and a civic duty. It is something that responsible citizens do to maintain a civil society. Political power has always been traded throughout human history and such will continue to be the case. Violence and brutality has commonly been central to these transfers. Voting is part of a system that allows for the peaceful transfer of political power, thus, helping promote stability and prosperity. This view must, of course, be tempered by the reality of despotic regimes that hold elections. Sometimes these are stable, but at what cost?

The average voter likely senses some mixture of all of these philosophies plus more. But they're not consistent. Most voters in my city certainly feel that failing to vote in a general election would represent civic irresponsibility, yet they obviously don't feel the same way about local elections.

None of my observations are going to change voting patterns. Nor am I sure that I really want these patterns to change. I don't want people to vote just to vote. Increasing the number of uninformed and unmotivated voters that cast a ballot hardly seems likely to increase or preserve liberty. Maybe it could diminish the sense of disenfranchisement that many citizens feel, but I'd like to see evidence for that.

I doubt that people are suddenly going to decide to go out and become more informed about elections and political matters than they are at present. Indeed, the increase in political information over the past several decades seems to have turned the field into a specialty niche for wonks and political animals. Many average joes and janes are more than willing to stay on the sidelines rather than feel out of their league in the pro/semi-pro fray.

The upshot is that I think it's reasonable to expect to continue to see lackluster municipal voting patterns in my town. Oh, there will probably be a hot issue that causes a spike now and again. But for the most part people will go on being uninformed non-voters.