Peacemakers Needed

Last year General Conference happened before Easter. We're more pagan members of the church and don't make a great effort to watch the Saturday sessions, but I always read them afterwards. Although I didn't watch conference on Saturday, I distinctly remember texting a cousin of mine that day who had the same calling as me. Planning a summer camp is one of the biggest tasks a Young Women's Presidency has to do and we were chatting about what each of our wards were thinking of doing. And for the first time since accepting my calling, I felt some anxiety and dread. I was 4 months pregnant at this point, I was going to be 7 and 8 months pregnant during the summer. But camp was important and I was committed and we were going to have fun dang it.

For some reason on Sunday I got it in my head that Jon would come out that morning to watch a session with the kids so he could play "Conference Bingo" with them. I even bought candy I knew he would like. Had he said he would? No, but I had told him he was welcome and assumed he'd jump on a chance to spend time with the kids. As 10 am rolled by with no sign of Jon, I did some snooping on "Find My Friends" and discovered he was doing hot yoga. Again, he never said he'd come, he didn't owe me squat, but this marked the beginning of feeling disappointed for things I had no right to be disappointed in.

Conference was what it usually is. Except this time felt like the first time my kids actually listened and grasped "Conference Bingo." We sat on the floor together with little bowls of candy and excited whispers whenever a word like "prophet" or "faith" was uttered. It was one of the those moments where you feel so sublimely happy to be the parent of such smart and good and kind kids, but also a little sad that this moment didn't look like how you envisioned it would when you were first married and having babies.

Now, it's a fact of life that when you watch General Conference with young children, you really don't hear much of the talks. There's shushing and potty breaks, scolding for eating too much candy, random questions to answer, etc. When it came time for the last speaker, President Russell M. Nelson, I made a point of telling the kids this was our Prophet, that this was the most important talk of the whole conference, that if they could listen and be quiet for one talk, this should be it. And they were.

Perhaps I'm speaking for myself when I say that usually after General Conference I feel like I've been gently scolded and lovingly encouraged to continue doing my best. If you were to ask me how I felt after listening to President Nelson's talk "Peacemakers Needed," I might tear up and tell you that it felt like he was speaking to me and that he was patting me on the shoulder and telling me I was doing a good job. Over the course of the past 3 months, I had so, SO many reasons to be angry, spiteful, and filled with contempt. Anyone would have agreed that I was justified to curse and yell, to kick and scream, to release a maelstrom of justified indignance. But I had chosen to sit. To be still. To be quiet. To be calm. And it irritated some people. I was urged to lash out. I was encouraged to take a stance, to make rash decisions, to reimburse pain. I didn't have a word for it while I weathered the storm, but I did now. I had been a peacemaker. I had done my best to make the pain, hurt, and contention stop at me.

The disappointment I had felt evaporated. Hearing that talk was such a blessing. That afternoon we went to my parent's house to watch the afternoon session and have dinner. My bishop contacted me between sessions asking to speak later that afternoon. When he came over I genuinely assumed he needed to talk to me about upcoming Young Women camp things and catch me up on Ward Council business since I had missed a meeting. I was dumbfounded when he kindly explained that he was releasing me from my beloved calling as Young Women's President. In an attempt to take an edge off the devastation I was trying to mask, he asked how I had enjoyed conference. I told him how President Nelson's talk had been a gift. That I felt seen and recognized.

After the bishop left, I found my mom in the kitchen with tears in her eyes. As soon as they saw the bishop, my parents knew I was being released. They knew how much I loved my calling. And like me, they knew that my release was an olive branch as my life was unravelling at the seams. That didn't make it hurt any less though. This marked the beginning of my circumstances changing in big ways, in ways that almost felt like I was being punished for Jon's actions. I was losing my calling, losing my church keys. Soon I'd be losing my sweet little home, losing the keys to my home. I had done nothing wrong, but I was losing all the things that I had loved so much.