Vulnerable

I get attached to people easily, even people I’ve never met, but have only seen on tv or on the internet. I think that is a common human experience. People in general fascinate me, to the point that even though I do not think polygamy is a good way to form a family I have watched three separate polygamous family shows. There is a lot to learn about the problem of jealousy from polygamous families as it plagues everyone except, perhaps, the man at the hub of it all. He has his own crosses to bear. The best show was by the National Geographic Channel called “Meet the Polygamists.” It’s about a group with better moorings than the FLDS, but less dramatic and photogenic as the other polygamous Mormon families. The FLDS reminds one of labor camps or other horrors of that ilk. The more commercial families seem not so different from your weird Uncle Stan. In this group things are more fairly regulated and somewhat normalized. I particularly appreciated that the woman chooses her man—as inspired by God, of course.

The thing that held me riveted was the uncertain fate of a young woman named Rose. I was a little concerned about Hyrum, but he’s a man in a man’s religion. Some day he’ll be running the whole place. Rose had no guaranties except the hope of being given the name of her future husband, and it wasn’t coming. I like to think it was because she was more honest and willing to wait instead of peeking through her fingers and choosing a cute one. She sincerely seemed to be holding herself open to a lot of fates I found unspeakable, because that was what she believed God wanted her to do. I admired her courage and daring, but I also worried. She was so vulnerable in her family, in her church, in her relationship to God. I wanted to know what had happened, but National Geographic quit filming. I searched and searched, but could not find the fate of Rose, until this week when I came across a picture of what looks like her happily ever after. 

I hope she is happy. The brave and devout ought to be happy. It isn’t a life I would choose for her, but her life doesn’t belong to me. She is living it and offering it to God as best she understands, and really there isn’t anything else.