May I say it was a classic?
thank you so much my dear sister!
the story of Teresa Patterson and her boy Arthur
Yes, Arthur! Oh he was a big kid. We all respected him so much for the fact his pituitary gland worked a little overtime. I'm sure, based on his physical stature, like unto Nephi, he would have made a great church leader.
before, tall like a tree) that the recruitment office had no inkling he was a mere 15 years old (a stripling warrior, indeed. Hey, Tommy, how did you miss that reference?)!!!
Indeed my dear sister. But don't forget, he didn't make it. None of the stripling warriors died, though they all received many wounds.
To cut to the chase---after all, I could never tell it quite as movingly as you did with your truncated arm and hand gestures and vocal emphasis dancing between the ingenuous, the naïve, the incredulous, and sometimes, the scary---stalwart, tall, strong and idolized Arthur was killed. Leaving his mother, a hard-working widow, deep in grief.
I'm so glad my gestures were effective. I practice each talk 21 times, but this one I felt impressed to practice 30 times. I really felt I had to bounce back from my depression. Well you know, some might say that sheer physical size doesn't mean much in modern warfare and that the age of enlistment is what it is for reasons other than physical presence, otherwise, I guess we would have baptized Arthur when he was three. They might say he didn't have the mental maturity to be in the Army and had he not broken the law, he may have lived. But those people know little of the big American tale telling. Some might also say that the amount of good he did in the war didn't justify the cost of leaving his mother's heart broken and without support the rest of her life. Sartre once struggled with this very question (though his framing was the French revolution) Without an answer of course because he was a Godless existentialist just like the Little Blue Engine. Arthur did a big, brave, Freiburg-mural-worthy show of faith. Some might further say that his friends should have dissuaded him from breaking the law and getting in over his head. We were all so impressed by his size, we thought he'd just go over there with bullets bouncing off him. I mean, if you shoot a mountain with a machine gun, it doesn't really move much or appear to get hurt. Oh well, I don't feel that bad because he's in a better place now and his mom was one of the great and noble spirits in the preexistence and needed this difficult trial.
So deep in her despair was this hard-working widow woman with hands coarsened by her endless labor as a cleaning woman in a downtown office building (in those days, one could often see her, pail and mop in hand, bent over from her back-breaking wearying troubles, struggling to make her way to the bus stop) that she turned to you, saying, "Tommy, for that is what she called you, Tommy, I have no church. But you, you believe. Tell me, will I ever see my precious Arthur again?"
"Tommy", well, that's my name, don't wear it out! Yes, her life was reduced to a drudgery of menial labor. In all that time she never had a church. It was a little strange, given that she knew I "believed", the logical implication would be that I would say, "Yes, of course you'll see your son again since I believe in Jesus and the obvious logical entailments of that."
And so you bore your testimony to her that, yes, she would indeed be reunited with her darling, tall, yellow-haired and brave son. For you had assurance from your lord and savior, even Jesus Christ (by the way, Tommy, I've always wondered about the rhetorical elocution "even, Jesus Christ." It seems so...faux archaic, so fakey King James, so...oh, never mind).
Yes! of course! He is there waiting, still 15 years old with the same hair and everything. Waiting in heaven to see ma again.
And just as you were impressed to tell this story in General Conference on April 9th, 1969---when not having seen dear Mrs. Patterson for many years, and she having moved to California in the meantime and having been invited by member friends to watch that session of conference, none of them knowing that you were speaking nor what the topic of your talk would be, and it was no accident that she heard you tell this moving story and was moved to get in touch with you, writing, "Dear Tommy, I hope you don't mind me calling you Tommy, but that is what I like to call you," and other things----you were impressed to tell this story today
.
Absolutely. Oh, and I don't mind, that's my name after all!
So relentlessly did you repeat every agonizingly minor detail of this story, again and again, that even a listener of severe mental impairment would be able to grasp your message: Arthur dead. And yet the dead live!
Yes indeed! But had her son been small, weaker, and timid, I guess he'd still be living in heaven, but it wouldn't have made an epic Mormon-American tale.
What a great story for Halloween-time! I'm sure the subtle hint of Zombie-ism found in the tale of Arthur the dead boy who will return, was not lost on you. In fact, I am certain that is why you were impressed to retell it during October General Conference, where it would connect with the current holiday season, just like you were impressed to initially tell it in April for the Easter tie-in.
My good sister, there is a distinction we must not forget between zombie-hood and the living dead. Zombies are technicall undead. They are animated corpses with no intelligent spirit governing. Arhur is just dead, and in heaven as a spirit-being with his normal intelligent persona.
Thank you so much for tuning in. I could feel your hand metaphorically raising in a vote of thanks as I closed my talk.
your friend,
Tommy
