missions -- Tears for All of It

We plan to go to Chili's for dinner before we attend the Hale Theatre Performance of "Hello Dolly" tonight and all I can think of is the time I cried myself senseless while sitting at the Chili's over at the Family Center in Sandy after Brad left on his mission.

The deal was, Ben had gotten home from his mission just a week after Brad went into the mission home. It had been such a long two years while Ben was in Japan.

People in the Church talk about their children's missions as though they had been just a moment in time. I found out they were lying. Ben's two years were the longest two years of my life. I even thought sometimes that I'd forgotten what he'd looked like so I carried a picture of him and checked it out often to remind myself.

Finally he came home. It wasn't so bad while Brad was in the mission home, but the day we sent him off finally to Cleveland, I started a marathon crying session that included lunch at Chili's. I'm certain the waitress was totally alarmed as I never told her why I was crying. Maybe she was ready to call the police on Carl presuming he was the brute that caused all my sorrow.

Ben asked Carl, later on after the wailing and tossing of ashes stopped, whether I had cried like that when he left on his mission. Carl told him "No." What really was the truth was that I really was crying for him in total retrospect. I don't cry very often, but when I do it reminds everyone that making me sad is not a good idea.