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  My parents felt like they were sinking in quicksand. They felt that their entire lives had been based on a lie. They had no firm foundation. What could they now have faith in? Could they trust their own instincts? How were they supposed to lead and direct their own children? Luckily, at this time, in Utah, they were befriended by several born-again Christians while trying to find some kind of anchor. As Mom began tearfully explaining to one of these new friends that their life was a lie and they had nothing to stand on, the friend said, “You stop right there. You have a remarkable marriage. You have five amazing children. That isn’t a lie. That’s where you start.” Mom took one gasping breath, and her world was steady again. That was exactly where my parents started. With us five kids and each other.

  Aunt Sam and I had only one clash. We argued for a good three hours in the car while we drove to Idaho one time, but it was just the two of us, and we were able to hash out our differences. I saw that she was trapped. Though she saw the fallacies and inconsistencies, what was she to do? Say good-bye to Pax? Or make Pax choose between her and Sarah? Between her and Sarah’s children? She loved Pax too much to do that.

  That day we both promised each other that no matter what, we were going to be spiritual, that we were not going to let the label of an organized religion determine whether we were God’s people or good Christians or simply just good people. We were going to always remain Christians, first and foremost, and the rest was just details. God and Jesus could sort that out.

  I feel that the greatest sin is simply being unkind. You can follow the letter of the law of the Gospels to a T and still be an asshole. Being unkind is the gateway to all the sins: murder, theft, lying, adultery, and so forth. There are people I know who are just wonderful and live a different lifestyle from mine, and I’d rather be in heaven with their pleasant company than with a broody, condescending, “perfect” individual who lived life by the book and felt himself superior for having done so.

  Do you really believe God runs in cliques? If so, then you can have that God.

  The God I know loves me and knows my strengths and weaknesses and knows my flaws and knows the hand I was dealt in life. I believe God judges us equally with regard to the hand that each of us was dealt and whether we each individually are doing the best we can. Someone is born with bipolar disorder, someone is born into a violent home, someone is born an orphan, and so forth. We don’t all have the same start and finish lines. We all have our own crosses to bear, and God will know whether we did the best we could with the resources he gave us and whether we tried to help as many people as we could along the way. Were we good Christians? But more important, were we good people?

  Religion divides us. Spirituality unites us.

  7

  “Don’t go into the kitchen. Raphael is studying.”

  This was the theme in the Allred house my seventh-grade year. Why, as a college student, Raph had to always study in the most trafficked room in the house was beyond me. Well, no; quite frankly I do know: it was empowering for her, and she liked to hold us—especially me, a hungry thirteen-year-old boy—hostage in our own home. Raph never made it a secret—her disdain for me, her thinking I was a spoiled brat. And for some reason, she couldn’t understand why a thirteen-year-old boy wasn’t as mature and sophisticated as she had been at thirteen. She thought I was a little hellion because Mom and Dad would from time to time let me behave like a typical thirteen-year-old in our home, which was still my home.

  When finals rolled around, we had to forgo the basic human ritual of dinner and were escorted into our rooms with Cream of Wheat by our parents, themselves wary of the monster they had created. I sat in my room, my growing body grumbling for some food, until finally, at 10 o’clock at night I’d had enough. With frail limbs that couldn’t help but tremble with every step, I walked out into the kitchen, the rest of the house silent with trepidation, my trembling, shallow voice complementing my emaciated features, and said, “Please, dear sister, may I have a piece of bread?”

  She looked up from her book, hissing at me, “Fine, but make it quick.”

  I walked into the kitchen, doing my best to make the least amount of noise possible, which consequently only magnified each sound I made. Every time I slowly closed a cupboard with a soft thud in the dead silence, it seemed that I was being more obnoxious than if I had slammed it shut. I noticed this truth at the very same time Raph did, at which point she looked up at me with a Why do you choose to live? look on her face: “You’re more annoying when you do that. Just hurry up.”

  Even when Raph finally moved into an apartment, she still came home and studied in the kitchen during midterms and finals, hell-bent on making sure we couldn’t have any fun with or without her, needing us all to acknowledge the sacrifices she was making in order to get into medical school. We should all have to suffer right along with her. If she wasn’t having fun, she couldn’t suffer it alone in her apartment; nay, she needed to come home and exert herself to make sure none of us could have fun, either.

  One day, it all changed. Following her interview in pigtails, Raphael got a letter from the University of Utah telling her she had been accepted into the medical program. Suddenly, Raphael became a nice person. She had finally achieved her goal. After so many people had told her to stop wasting her time and everyone else’s and start a family, she now could allow herself some kindness and credit. Now, looking back, realizing the pressure that she placed on herself to be successful when so many from the Group told her not to try, or belittled her, or judged her as being selfish, or simply laughed at her, I understand why she was quite removed from us. She wasn’t at peace, as she wanted more; she didn’t want a life of confines. Knowing she could do more, she wanted more.

  In my seventh-grade year I didn’t fit in anywhere and wasn’t doing well in school. I was still not LDS, and I was no longer a “polyg” kid hanging out with my cousins, running in a clique. I had no friends other than Court. I still spent time with Levi, but the tension was there. Steven wasn’t talking to anybody, such was his mental state following his mother’s departure. My whole family just seemed to be coasting, waiting.

  At this time Mom finally approached Dad as he was playing solitaire in the kitchen one spring afternoon and said, “I think we need to join the LDS church.”

  Dad replied, “I was just thinking the same thing.”

  Raphael came in a few minutes later: “I don’t know about you guys, but I’m joining the LDS church. Anyone else who wants to join is welcome to come along.”*

  As a family we would soon begin taking missionary lessons at Grandma Ripplinger’s house in Salt Lake. She was Yaya’s stepmother, who raised Yaya and her four siblings after Yaya’s mother, Tannie, passed away from cancer. Grandma Rip and the rest of Yaya’s siblings were mainstream LDS. And though they vehemently disapproved of Yaya’s decision to up and join the Allred Group, they still loved her and always welcomed her. It says a lot about them, especially when you consider that one of Yaya’s younger brothers, Don Ripplinger, was a well-known figure in the LDS church as one of the Tabernacle Choir directors. They always let her come back and were never ashamed of her at family reunions. Uncle Don, whenever he was asked in church meetings if he knew or consorted with any who practiced plural marriage, would proudly answer without hesitation, “Yes. My sister is one. And I love her.”

  Yaya’s grandfather John Baptiste Ripplinger was one of the first homesteaders in Driggs, Idaho, in the Teton Valley. There was a family cabin on the property that her father, John Henry, farmed during the summer and harvest seasons. It had been built in the 1940s, no more than fifty square feet in size, on the edge of the 160 acres he harvested. It had two tiny rooms that encircled a tiny kitchen. The place smelled of sticky flytraps mixed with mice droppings and old paint chips. But it smelled great in the mornings with fresh eggs and pancakes grilling on the wood-fire stove.

  This place is a part of my heritage in a land I call “Wydaho,” right on the Idaho/Wyoming border, on
the western side of the Grand Tetons. The cabin was old-fashioned; its only plumbing was the outhouse, twenty yards from the cabin. It was fun to step from the cabin to see a full moon lighting the Tetons, and though it was always chilly, even on summer nights, you couldn’t help but appreciate the beauty of the place—and then hold your breath as you went into the outhouse. I loved to look out over the valley, be it under a full moon or in the light of day, and notice how it looked like one of Grandma Rip’s quilts, with patchworks of different material, grains and patterns making up the body of work.

  The mice ran the place. That was the deal. They were fearless. They’d come out and stare at you while you tried to sleep or as you read a book. It was the living incarnation of Brian Jacques’s Redwall book series.

  When Pax and Sam were dating, he accompanied the family on a trip to the cabin. Yaya, being the classy, old-fashion gal that she was, made Pax sleep in the bed next to her and not with Sam. Pax, being the seventeen-year-old that he was, and restless to be with Sam, the warm and luscious twenty-two-year-old that he longed for in the room next door, couldn’t sleep while Yaya read with the lamp on. He observed and stared down the mice that came and mocked him, daring him to do something. They literally came next to the bed and stood on their hind legs, sniffing and staring. Pax, being the chivalrous man that he is, felt his honor being mocked. He would state it so eloquently via e-mail:

  As for the mice in the cabin incident, I shot several of those little buggers with my 22 cal. pistol from bed. In order to keep the bullets from ricocheting, I’d have to wait until they were between the door jamb and the north exterior wall so I was hitting wood floor instead of the concrete slab in the kitchen area. Good times. Talk to you later.

  Pax

  There they were: Yaya in her in curlers, reading a novel, and Pax in bed next to her, gun loaded and poised.

  When you meet the children of John Henry, you have to admire and love their spunk and backbone. They each have an opinion about everything and love to share it. They love to sit around a table and argue and debate, but not rudely, just matter-of-factly, like civilized folk at a book-club meeting.

  Yaya’s sister, Aunt Jeanette, deserves her own paragraph. As a child, I saw Aunt Jeanette as a miserable, bossy miser. She told everyone what to do. But to her credit, she engaged in the labor as well. She wasn’t a bureaucrat by any means. She has a love affair with England and has lived over there and frequently returns. She behaves like an English lady. She has picked up their mannerisms and terms of speech and expects everyone else to behave as such.

  Aunt Jeanette has emerged as more than just another grandmother for us; she is my mother’s mentor and guide, a financial contributor and investor in all of us kids, helping us in times of need. She has been, and I mean this with all of the love and respect I have for Yaya, a true mother to my mother.

  Aunt Jeanette proved to be a fanatic for my basketball games. She became my number-one fan. She considers herself an investor in my future, and she truly is. She was always a fan of the game, but when I began playing in high school, she attended all the games she possibly could. Aside from my parents, who made the road trips in college, Aunt Jeanette has seen more of my basketball games than anyone else.

  This lovely lady loves to horde things. There isn’t anything she can’t salvage. She is a squirrel among acorns who loves to shop at flea markets and secondhand stores. Aunt Jeanette will often appear at Mom and Dad’s house to drop off a box of assorted books, board games, and other miscellaneous items—things that Mom doesn’t have any room for. “I was at the store and saw these things, and I thought you and your kids might like them,” she’ll say.

  Mom will breathe in through her teeth: “Um, maybe.”

  “OK,” Aunt Jeanette will say. “You owe me ten dollars.”

  Grandma Rip did a wonderful job raising Tannie’s kids and would give John Henry another four, one of them being Valeen. Valeen suffers from Down syndrome and is still alive and kicking at sixty-seven. She must be setting some kind of record. Valeen frightened me as a child, and to be honest, she still does to this very day. And I must tread carefully here on the topic of Valeen, for her siblings are very protective of her.

  Valeen does not have teeth. And I need people to have teeth if I’m going to be able to read lips and to understand what they are saying to me. Plus, Valeen has a very high, croaky voice to accompany her lack of masticating utensils. This makes me nervous, because when I can’t understand someone, I instinctively think it’s because of my hearing loss and I grow paranoid and self-conscious.

  Valeen is bossy as hell. She would tell the queen of England to pick up after her own damn self. Through the years, whether at the cabin, or when Valeen is visiting Yaya in Montana while I am, or when she is stopping by to say hi at Mom and Dad’s house, tagging along with Aunt Jeanette, whose head is hidden behind yet another box of assorted abandonments, I quickly give my obligatory but affectionate hug and then run for the hills.

  Many times Valeen would just come into my room, without knocking, to look around, raise her disapproving eyebrows at me, her chin flirting to touch her nose, as again she does not have teeth, and say, “Aafsdo uh aewliugfhafi.” Or at least that’s how I’d hear it.

  I was usually so perplexed that I couldn’t even muster a dumb “Huh?” and could only validate her verbal output with a petrified sideways stare that one might have upon waking from a terrible dream only to discover that there’s a one-legged clown in the room.

  She would then repeat herself, speaking a little slower: “Aosdfaakjfh akjha fskdkl jgha ilu.” And I’d say, “Yes. OK.”*

  One time while I was relaxing in bed, Valeen gestured for me to do some physical act, and I just nodded, not knowing what she was getting at. Irritated, she came over, grabbed my arm, and physically tried to force me out of bed. And like a vegetable at an old people’s home, I complied, my mouth stupidly hanging open. She then started cleaning up my room and expected me to labor with her.

  There have been other times, while at the cabin, that Valeen poked her head in the room, busted me with my video games, as electronics are forbidden at the cabin, and turned me in. But nowadays, me being the delightful man that I have become, having won the affection and trust of the Ripplinger women, which I labored diligently for,† the ladies leave me to myself, much to Valeen’s chagrin.

  It’s because of this proud lineage and heritage that descends from John Henry Ripplinger that we flock at least yearly to Driggs to pay homage to our roots. Court once remarked, “It doesn’t matter where we have lived or what we have been going through. Driggs has been the one constant in our lives.” It’s where I intend to build my first home.

  When Yaya’s family heard that we as a family were taking missionary lessons, they were all very welcoming and eager to help.

  We were still living with my dad’s family on the property and the tension was growing palpable. Dad, having the right to do so, as he owned the home, canceled Sunday school, which was held in our basement. We didn’t want people who harbored ill will toward us treading through our home. We heard that in Group meetings, lessons and sermons were being preached describing Dad as the great Judas, even an advocate of Lucifer. We were being condemned to hell by people we used to call family.

  One night Uncle Saul sheepishly came knocking on our door and told Dad that Owen and the AUB wanted the house back and that they had granted him the house with the trust that he would never betray them. It was ridiculous, but then so were they, so you couldn’t expect much.

  Dad, not wanting to burn any bridges, said that he would happily let them have the house back for $60,000, far less than the market rate of $260,000 and a very reasonable price considering the renovations he had made over the last two years. Understandably, Dad couldn’t just up and leave the house, as he had done so many times before for the AUB. He was getting older and couldn’t just push the reset button all over again. He needed a down payment for a new home for us to live in. We kids were
older and had needs that couldn’t simply be brushed aside this time.

  Saul took the offer back, and they refused.

  We knew then that it was time to move. Tensions were just too great. We found a real-estate agent, who found a couple who would be willing to swap houses with us—the fourplex for a home in downtown Salt Lake. Dad still held on to the hope that Saul could get the Council to just buy the house back for $60,000 and we wouldn’t have to swap houses. But the AUB wouldn’t budge. It had nothing to do with the house. It was all about setting an example of Dad to his friends and family, drawing a line of loyalty. Word was coming that there was a lawsuit in the works.

  It was May 1994. I was thirteen. It was a night where you could feel something was wrong. Everyone felt it. As verbal a family as we were, it was telling of the tension that was present that we didn’t discuss what any of us felt. I myself had a feeling that someone was watching me through my window in the night, with hands cupped against the window, allowing their eyes to scope my room, smilingly mischievously at me.

  The fact that I wasn’t sleeping wasn’t anything new, but had I gone from room to room that night, I would have discovered that no one else in the family was sleeping, either. But unlike all those other nights with imagined enemies and intruders, this time they were real. This night the enemies were all around us. They came from inside our house, from the old Sunday school room where the pictures of our prophets hung on the wood-paneled walls that led to the storage cellar; they surrounded the house, pounding on the roof to get in. Szen wouldn’t settle. He kept pacing back and forth between my room, the front door, and my parent’s room. He seemed to be making the rounds, making sure everyone was safe.