One of the things you experience growing up in Utah is various people always trying to convert you. I'm sure it happens alot in the rest of the bible belt but to be considdered a good Mormon you HAVE to try to convert everyone you can get eye contact with.
When you blend in to the crowd they'll usually asume you're already in their clutches but if you're with someone like my friend from California it's like they are drawn to you.
This is the story of the last encounter we had before she moved back to California,
We were all really bored one saturday so my sister convinced my friend to go to Classic rollerskating. I, of course, had to drive. We got about halfway there and my friend realized she had left her purse so we turned around and got it. Then after we got a little further my sister's friend started freaking out because she thought she was gonna die. She thought that because that night was the first time she took two kinds of painkillers for that time of the month. A little further and my friend realized that her money wasn't in her purse so we went back again.
I got the other girl some water and my friend spent a long time searching for her money before she found out that she had the money in her pocket the WHOLE TIME.
So we finally got going again with nothing left behind and my friend kep telling me how sorry she was about this (that summer my sister had gotten me to hate driving and it was well known among everyone who was in my car alot.)
When we got there the parking lot was full and there were cars parked along the road as well. Then my sister said, "Oh, it's the battle of the bands tonight!" I think she knew all along because she tries to manipulate me like that alot.
Eventually my friend persuaded me to come in with them even though I have no interest in that type of music. I went in for awhile and waited for the bands to actually start playing so I could reassure myself that I absolutely don't like the music and maybe go home. Instead my friend got my to hang out by the doors like usual. This is where we encountered the Mormons.
My friend was a real magnet for them; she started asking them if anyone wasn't religious. Two girls out of the large crowd weren't and they weren't very talkative either (I see this as an environmental adaptation.) So the most charismatic guy in the group takes it upon himself to make sure my friend is following the right religion. She told him she's agnostic but they confused it with aetheist (for anyone who doesn't know agnostic is basically neutral, aethist is no-god.) So he knew he had to convert her right there and began his little speech (all of the people who try to convert you have a preplanned speech that I'm fairly sure they practice in the mirror.)
What he said was something along the lines of "Well, science is wrong. The first law of physics says that matter cannot be created or destroyed, but the big bang theory says that there was nothing and then BANG! there's this universe." Now, besides the fact that the second one is just a theory his idea of what science "says" was a little off. I had been leaning against the wall like the Marlboro man and decided I needed to interupt him to clarify a little bit. I said, "The big bang theory says that all matter was condensed into a single point the size of a period you idiot. If you're going to try to disprove science don't just go off of your vague memories, make sure you're right about what you think." I blew his argument about 'science is wrong so there's only god' out of the water but after a brief pause he continued it only leaving out what I had ruined. Seems like he couldn't deviate from his plan because he had nothing else to use.
After a little bit of wanderring around we ended up back outside again. My friend was getting a little bit upset about how everyone was giving her dirty looks (she was in a black and pink plaid skirt and had something equally punk for a shirt,) so she asked them to stop being assholes and giving her dirty looks. One drunk guy stepped up to her and started asking how she could judge him to be an a*****e by the look of his face. My friend had a moment of shock so I deemed it a good time to speak a few words of windom unto the ignorant masses again and started to say, "You can tell alot by facial expressions." He cut me off before I finished the second word by quickly turning on me and screaming in my face that he "WASN'T ******** TALKING TO [me])" He surprised me so I was shocked for a few seconds but then he threatened to kick my a**. (Note: I am male. My avatar may have led you to believe otherwise. I used to have a male one and a female one but I liked how the female one was starting to look so I abandonned the other.)
I'd never been in a fight but was really interested in it. This guy was much larger than I and I doubt I could have come out of a fight with him consious but that seemed kind of apealing as well. So coming out of shock a big smile quickly apeared on my face. Every time he said something about kicking my a** (which was almost every sentence) my smile got wider until my facial muscles were starting to ache. After nearly a full minute of him screaming at me he started to realize that 'this kid shouldn't be so happy about this, he must be dangerous' and tried to dismiss me and go over to the other doors.
Everyone gatherred around me as soon as he had left and were trying to make his actions nothing because "he's an a*****e when he's drunk." I moved my forearms out with my palms facing up and said, "You know, he heard me say about two words and then judged me entirely by my facial expressions."
With two zealots dispatched I went inside and got some water. Then I dislocated my knee while I was leaning on a table and collapsed on the ground. That used to happen to me alot because my muscles were under developed or maybe one of the ligaments had snapped. Anyway, I ended up limping out to my car a sleeping for awhile before my friend came over and drug me back to the party we were enjoying so much. With my keen eyes I spotted the otherwise invisible ambulance parked on the curb and inquired about the situation. Some guy got hit in the head with a ball so I made a joke about it involving the lyrics to the ball song (earlier some guy was drawing attention and saying he was out of 'the band' if they weren't going to do the ball song.) and got my friend to laugh. After that it was over and I drove everyone home. My friend kept trying to apologize about draggin me through the crappy music, Mormons, and my knee popping out of it's joint but at least I got this story out of it. Note: This all happened two years ago but it's still the story I tell the most often in regards to mormons. We had various encounters with zealous youths trying to convert my friend and I but the rest have faded from memory.)
Reika Hyou · Mon Sep 27, 2004 @ 04:46am · 1 Comments |