Essay Contest Honorable Mention
My Sister, My Friend

Gladys Farmer
Volume 23, No. 4

October 29, 1999. For about ten minutes, gargled sounds come out of my tape recorder; then all rotation stops. Another of my cassette tapes has "died" – the third in a month. My aerobics partner is leaving on Monday for a temple mission in Hong Kong. By the time she gets back, I will have moved to Boston. The symbolism of the tape's dying doesn’t escape me. But I remind myself – friendships made in heaven never die. 

For twenty years, these same tapes have spun their tunes through numerous boom boxes and tape recorders. At first, close to thirty women worked out to their steady beat and energetic commands. But busy schedules, new commitments, health problems, and sheer fatigue gradually reduced the numbers to 12, 8, 6. Then there I was in 1992 – the inheritor of the tapes, looking for a friend to begin the day with. A friend with both the disposition to rise at 6 A.M. and familiarity with the dance routines. 

I visualized the various women with whom I had shared the morning workout at our stake center cultural hall (even the basketball players had learned that female power reigned during the 6 to 7 A.M. hour). Most of the women were either not available or not compatible. Not that I'm a difficult person to associate with, but the beginning of the day sets the stage for the sixteen hours that follow. It had to be a time I could look forward to with someone I could genuinely enjoy. 

A name came to my mind. I hardly knew her, though. She was from a different ward and stake and had been an on-again, off-again dancer for the previous thirteen years. Besides, her petite, shapely frame and unusual beauty intimidated me a little. 'Yet I felt beholden to her: A story she had shared with a larger group of us had been one of my major sources of reassurance during my tenure as a Relief Society president. 

It was a story of when she had worked at the BYU Motion Picture Studio. Faced with the assignment of selecting the cast for the First Vision film, she had prayed, studied it out in her mind, and made selections. But with nagging fears that she was following her own impressions rather than doing His will, she had begged the Lord to know if she had done it right. "Trust your feelings," she was told in her mind. "I'm the one who gave them to you." 

Following that advice, I had done just that for nearly two and a half years in selecting my Relief Society staff, my visiting teaching companions, their assignments, and so forth. And that is what I knew I must do now: trust the feeling that she would be an appropriate aerobic dance partner. 

When I called her, I found out that she was not ordinarily a morning person. But she was enrolled in a stressful Ph. D. program at BYU, recognized the need for the daily workout, and had only the early morning hours free for exercise. Thus, she agreed to meet me at the church at 6:30 A.M. 

It was then mid-September. A month and a half of an empty cultural hall had invited the basketball boys back – from 6 to 7 on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. So we found ourselves stretching and walking the hallways that first half-hour. We really didn't mind. We could still get home and into the shower by 8 A.m., and it gave us a chance to get to know each other a little better. What neither of us realized was that those half-hour walks would reframe our lives and see us through seven years of both heart-wrenching and heart-warming experiences. 

It took only a few mornings to realize how deeply spiritual each of us was, how much we both loved music, how much joy we took in lifting and helping other people. 

We also began to discover each other's pains: "We had singing time with my extended family last night," she shared one Monday morning. "Our blind Uncle Vern was at the piano; we all had such a good time. Except for Bruce. He just sat in the corner and acted antisocially." Embarrassment, disappointment, resignation; I heard it all in her voice. Because it resonated in painful familiarity, I had the courage to respond. "That sounds just like Jim. We'll have a family reunion and all be sitting in the front room having a great visit, and he'll stay in the basement watching T.V." 

What made this family confession so significant was that I had never before said a negative word to anyone about my husband. As a Mormon wife, I had been taught to respect and support him as the head of the house. In addition, I'm a peacemaker, a Pollyanna who doesn't even have to work very hard at it. And I have no sisters to confide in. 

There was power in releasing my years of assiduously contained frustration. As we became increasingly honest in our conversations, we realized that our "Leo husbands" could have been brothers. Our morning visits didn't become a time to just vent or focus on negative things, though. That wouldn't have been productive, and we were both mature enough to realize it. But we also realized that with each other, it was safe to strip back our veneers. 

We both had public faces. She was a dancer, a singer, an actress, a poet, one gifted in languages. I was a writer, an organist, a college teacher, and one with organization skills used as a PTA, Young Women, and Relief Society president.

Both of us were hurting. Few knew of our family situations or could appreciate the irony of totally devout mothers who had 2/3 and 3/5 of their adult children inactive in the Church. The pain had been too great to verbalize to other ward members. Most had no inkling of what we were struggling with. 

We'd walk, we'd talk, and we'd pray before beginning our dancing. Some days we never even got around to the dancing. We'd remind each other of our children's goodness; we'd share success stories of those whose lives had been touched by the Spirit; we'd assure each other that Christ had, indeed, borne our sorrows and that we no longer needed to hang on to them. I'd sometimes jot down the insights or remembrances that came to us: 

'When at a task, be there – all of you. That includes praying. And sleeping." 

"Live for the day – rejoice in it. Fill it with good things. None of us have any idea what awaits us in the tomorrows." 

"It doesn't matter what you're doing, as long as you praise the Lord." 

"When a mother takes care of her own needs, it allows others around her to take care of theirs." 

"'Be of good cheer' is a commandment." 

"You sow in Faith; you nurture with your Works; but even with that combination, sometimes things go wrong. Then we need the Grace of God. Christ's atonement steps in when we've done all we can." 

"If you aren't having a good time, you're probably doing it wrong." 

"God's time is not man's time. We mustn't be impatient because things aren't happening as quickly as we desire. We're here to listen and to learn." 

The list goes on. (Maybe someday our gems will turn into my essays or her poems.) But for any particular day, one of those insights led us to a point of focus in our prayers. The Spirit would pour out upon us as we rejoiced in our blessings and pled for help with our problems. At home, I'd always felt a need to keep family prayers short. Here each of us could plead for our spouses, our children – by name and circumstance – our brothers, sisters, friends, neighbors. Some days we felt that we had angels surrounding us, listening to us. We often went home with sweat on our brows; we always returned home with joy in our heart. 

In the next seven years, I saw Helen through her metamorphosis: departure from her doctoral program; concentration on her poetry, refining that skill to where she was winning local and national contests; a new level of communication with her husband; opportunities for both of them to work in the temple; the marriage of two children; the baptism of a son-in-law; the birth of three grandchildren; and one couple's return to activity in the Church. 

Our family was taking a similar journey: First my husband and then several of the children recognized the presence of chemical imbalances. The diagnoses finally came in as Adult ADD, obsessive/compulsive disorder, and depression. With medication and new behavioral patterns, communication and healing began. Helen was there to cheer me on when I went to visit our partially estranged son, to share my excitement about becoming an adoptive grandma, to be the temple guide for my youngest daughter the day she took out her endowments. We probably know more about each other than our siblings or spouses do. 

So I put away the tapes – only five workable ones left. That might see me through the year, but the cultural hall will be a lonely place. Yes, we knew it would have to end some time; no earthly experience lasts forever. But this isn't just an earthly friendship. We're certain that we met in the pre-existence and pledged to find and help each other at the critical point in life when we'd each need a confidante, someone to help us over the hump. I guess we've both seen the top; e-mail will have to sustain us now. Goodbye, and God bless you, Helen – my sister, my friend.

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