Barnson.org

So, today appears to be a dramatic day in my life. My sister-in-law just called; I think she’ll be OK with me posting my response to her email. If you aren’t, sister, let me know! Plus my mother is heading over in a few hours to “have a chat and dinner” with me. We had a really, really good talk the other night. She sounded pretty hostile on the phone, though.

I’ve substituted “Sister” for my sister-in-law’s name, and “My Wife” for all instances of my wife’s name.

Thanks for your note. Please forgive me if I sound at all defensive; you’re welcome to call (I’m home right now because I’ll be working Saturday — XXX.XXX.XXXX) to clear any questions up.

Sister, unfortunately, you’ve never known me that well. The “views I cherish the most” have been, in part, love, laughter, friendship, music, and intellect. There are more, but those are some. These are not incompatible with my current outlook. Why not get to know me better before you decide to slam me about my philosophies on life, love, and religion?

| but it didn’t sound like you at all.

I’ve always been a happy person. At seventeen, I decided to try to put that “light-minded” part of me behind me and knuckle down to being a serious Mormon. I did that for twelve years, putting all my doubts on a shelf in the back of my mind.

One day, the shelf collapsed, and I was left with a choice: put myself out of my misery, or deal with all my doubts and start fresh. I eventually told my wife that I was agnostic (actually, I used the word “atheist”, but religious people tend to misinterpret that as “anti-religion” rather than its true meaning, “not one who promotes theism, or god-view”). I’d rather choose life than killing myself, thanks.

| WHAT IS GOING ON IN YOUR MIND??

You make it sound as if something is wrong, when it’s actually something that’s so right! I can finally be honest with myself and other people about what I think and feel, instead of piling it all up silently in my mind and presenting this fake cheerful front.

| Do you realize how upset your mom is over all of this?

Yes, I know it upset her. I’m not happy that she’s unhappy. I’ve been agnostic in my mind for six years, and a declared, or “out” agnostic for one year. I figured it was finally time to clue her in — particularly, since I won’t be baptizing Sara in a month or so. I mean, what’s the alternative: let her live in a lie the rest of her life as to what I believe? She did everything she could to bring us up right, and she did. She taught me to think for myself, a passion for life, and a desire to do good. These wonderful attributes which she has in abundance are not derived from the Church!

| Do you realize that this is going to hurt not only you but your | family?

I’ve been through the hurt, and you can’t make me feel much worse about the way other people feel about my personal philosophies. I’d rather be honest than dead; I’ll live with the consequences. I cannot control your feelings, or my wife’s, or my mother’s, or my brother’s. I am responsible for myself. Although I empathize, and tried to break the news to my mom as gently as I could, how much more gently could I have done it.

Right, I could have kept lying. That doesn’t work for me.

| Do you realize that everything that you hold dear to your heart might |leave because of your current views on life?

My wife has been very clear on what will and will not make her leave me. I have no desire to lose my wife or children. I love them very dearly; my feelings about religion have absolutely nothing to do with my feelings towards my family. I think, over the last year as my wife has become accustomed to my non-religiousness, that she’s begun to understand this. I wish other people would.

| What made you decide to change?

Nothing “made me” decide to change. I finally reached the point where lying about what I thought about religion became more unbearable than telling the truth. I’m not sure exactly what caused the snap, but I think it was the birth of Elijah. From around March until July of 2002, I was trying to reconcile the fact that I’d never received the burning in the bosom”, and what few “spiritual” feelings or impressions I had felt were felt in equal measure by people of other religions, as well as those of no faith. I asked a friend that I knew had left the church for advice on how he dealt with his lack of belief (IMPORTANT NOTE: I already knew I lacked belief, I was just trying to communicate it to my family at this point!!!), and he shared his experiences. I tried his approach, and learned that writing a letter about my beliefs, given the intensely personal and loving relationship my wife and I usually enjoy, was the wrong choice.

Now I know, that’s why I wanted to talk to my Mom in person. I can’t communicate my sincerity to you over email like I can in person. I’m serious about keeping my family, and serious about the fact that I am a skeptic, too.

| DO I NEED TO COME ALL THE WAY FROM MARYLAND AND KICK YOU IN THE | BUTT!!

I’d love to see you, regardless of your reasons.

| My family was partially torn apart because of Brian’s views on | religion.

Brian and I are very, very different people. I know a lot of other people that have allowed religion to tear apart their families. I am determined to not be one of them. I will not break my marriage vows willingly. I am committed to my relationship. Maybe my wife will decide to leave me because she loves the Church more than she loves me.

I sure hope not. A religious institution is not a warm companion at night.

And the oaths you take in the temple are never, ever to God — they are always to the Church, with God as a witness. That’s one of the things that led me to where I am now.

| I couldn’t take the religion bashing anymore.

I confine my religious discussion, in large part, to my weblog and mailing lists where people, by joining, express their desire to engage in religious discussion. I’ve told my wife she’s welcome to read my blog, and invited her specially to read a few entries that I felt were particularly poignant. Perhaps you may find one enlightening too:

http://barnson.org/node/view/112

| You are going to lose everything that have worked for….you house,your family, your mother…everything.

No, I’m not. My mother will continue to love me; although I suspect our relationship will change, if anything I feel much closer by this admission.

My family? They are the most important thing in my life. I think I’ve made that abundantly clear. MY CORE VALUES HAVE NOT CHANGED!!!! I’m simply not a believer. I’m ethical, moral, and I try to be 100% honest in my dealings with my fellow men. Honesty is the most important thing in my life. I fall short sometimes, but I’m gaining ground. I don’t need to be brutal — I just need to tell the truth, in actions as well as in words.

| Matt, I adore you and your family.

Thanks, we like you too. I, particularly, am fond of you and grateful that you are still a part of our circle of relatives despite your divorce from my brother.

| You are apart of my family even though I am divorced from Brian.

I’m happy for that!

| You are my brother and I care about you and worry about you guys alot. This whole thing makes me very very mad and sad at the same time. Sad because what it will do to you in the long run…think hard about what you really believe…..and what put you into this place. Your mom told me you lost your job…..you about to lose more than that if you don’t reevalaute everything.

I’ve had seven jobs in nine years. Getting laid off from a job is not a big deal to me — it may be lean for a time, but we’ll find another. I’d really, really, really like to find a place that doesn’t start shutting down shortly after me joining. At this point, I chalk that up to bad luck and timing, riding on startups during the dot-com boom and bust.

And Sister, it is “reevaluating everything” that got me to where I am in the first place. If you’re too busy, with no time to think because you’re constantly shuttling to and fro with church and family duties, you lack the time to really contemplate your place in the Universe. I made the time. I took long walks by myself to think. I take public transportation so that I have time to write notes about where my thoughts lead me, and to actually step back and gain some perspective on my life. It’s calming and peaceful to realize my place on the planet, and to try to approach my relationships with others as the real, live, people they are, rather than as something I want something from.

Your experience is not my experience. I have no desire to “bash the church”, and take particular care not to introduce my ideas to any who are not a willing audience. By visiting my site, you have made yourself a willing audience.

My wife and I are doing OK, with some rough spots. We’re going through some therapy. The reality is, we get along pretty darn well, except for this large rough patch involving the church. To soothe your mind, I don’t plan on taking up lying, stealing, backbiting, cursing, drinking, smoking, chewing tobacco, or attempting to pick up any other bad habits. My sole desire was to rid myself of this monkey on my back my whole life. That monkey is fear, which the Church uses liberally to keep members in line, and which it seems nearly all religions apply without conscience of the repercussions.

I REFUSE to be afraid anymore. I will take my lumps like a man, and be happy that I’m being honest and true to my conscience. I hope with all my heart that my wife does not decide to abandon this family over her beliefs, and I think we’ll work through this. My family is my duty, my responsibility, and passion.

Your bad experience will not be mine if I can possibly help it.

My position is simply this: I don’t know. Religion appears to be mostly a game of who can con who, but you know what? I wasn’t there, so I don’t know. I don’t know if there are gods, pixies, imps, or fire-breathing dragons. I don’t know if there’s such a thing as “The Spirit”, or if it’s just a label people give emotions that don’t have other words to describe them. I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow.

I DO know that I love my family dearly, and the singular most important purpose in my life, beyond being honest, is to preserve it at any price that does not involve dishonesty. Everything else comes after that. I find some time here and there for hobbies, games, and maintaining a few web sites.

I really think if two people are committed to a relationship, they canwork it out. If one of them decides that something else is more important than their relationship, then that leads to the relationship falling apart. I know exactly where I stand.

I read this posting today one of my bulletin boards. It was so beautiful and meaningful to me, to read these words from someone else going through the same thing I’m going through, and in the process of considering similar conclusions, that I had to preserve them. In case you didn’t know, posts on that board get deleted after just a few weeks; I felt this one deserved longer-term treatment.

———————————-

So I strongly believed. I was among those that even imagined having feelings of knowing somebody from the preexistence, had a relationship with her father in heaven, and thought that Christ really knew her and had suffered pain because of all the times she had been bad. My life was so intertwined with religion that it was part of my every thought.

At first I distanced myself from the church because of my faith in god. I became angry that his name was used to reach worthless goals that had nothing to do with real brotherly love, or even plain kindness. I felt sincerely offended because I loved god and I thought he was different. As I slowly began to leave the church, at first I sincerely missed the chance to meet with people and talk about god. So once, while in Rome I went to Saint Peter’s and went to talk to one of the many priests. I asked him if he was sure that god existed – he thought the question was rather bizarre, it was so obvious to him, it was as if I had asked him if he was sure the sun was in the sky. He said that sometimes he had doubted, but then the evidence that god existed was so plain that he could not deny it. He said that everything was a witness that there was a god.

I began to realize how ironic it was that the greatest injustices were almost always carried under the banner of some god. Starting from the Spanish inquisition, to witch-burning, to European missionaries destroying entire races of people in south America. I thought about protestant missionaries feeling it was their duty (being chosen by god)to destroy a people’s way of living, and reducing native American populations to a miserable state. I thought of Muslim anger for those who don’t believe in their same god and don’t follow their same rules. All in all, religion has been responsible for an unimaginable amount of evil.

As I thought of the people that had done good, they were never responsible for pushing people to believe in their same religion: mother Teresa of Calcutta, for example, only did good, and never preached. Gandhi never told people to believe in his same god. Rev. Martin Luther King fought peacefully for freedom but never pushed his religious beliefs. I can’t think of anything good that has ever come out of organized religions. Not one.

So, why is there such concern about how it is best to worship god, and which rules he likes best? Does god really want to be worshiped in the first place? Does he want people to pray using a certain name or kneeling a certain way? Does he care the least about all the religious stuff?

I came to my personal conclusion that god wasn’t at all about religion. That made some sense to me.

Religion is a way to explain the unexplainable, give a name to things that cannot be understood, and look into the invisible. If religion didn’t really exist – meaning, if religion cannot be relied upon – then how would god communicate with us? Which, consequently, had me think on whether he really wanted to.

So, I was left with a god that had no name, no characteristics, no message, and especially, no involvement in our lives. He was just an entity. Did he create the world, or did he just let it evolve on its own? Does he care about people or does he just let them live their lives? In other terms: what the heck does he do? Could I seriously remember anything that god had actually done? All the so-called spiritual experiences were nothing but warm-fuzzies, all the times that god had apparently helped out somebody now stood against all the times that god had done nothing for starving populations, people dying in earthquakes, wars, tortures, rapes, violence of every kind, drought, floods, storms.

A god that cannot be understood, a god with an incomprehensible behavior, a god that cannot be seen or felt, an entity that has done nothing… is that a god? I no longer believed so. I no longer believed.

So here I am. When I see a sunset I still feel emotional – but now it’s not because god is so good he created the pretty colors in the sky, but because the earth is beautiful, and I am part of it. I no longer do good because I know it is my duty, but because I want to, because I think the world can be so much better if we all were nicer to each other. I am alive now, and I want to make the most out of my life. I don’t have any consoling feeling of an after life to make up for my daily frustrations. Now I take up the responsibility of finding happiness in the present. I feel whole.

If that’s what not believing in god does to people, I am glad I have been disillusioned about god and religion. As I look at the way I lived my life before, I am sorry it took me so long to get out of it.

THERE IS A SONG TO DOWNLOAD LINKED AT THE BOTTOM: READ ON!!

Matt and I had agreed to double date on homecoming my sophomore year of high school. I was bringing my girlfriend and Matt was bringing Ranj. We had a glorious plan including the premiere of the song, HOLDIN HEARTS, HOLDIN HANDS, to be sung as a duet to our dates.

Unfortunately, at the last minute, Matt crashed his car while trying to swat away a bee.

Well, so to underscore my feelings at the time, I was terrified. I had barely gotten my girlfriend to agree to go, much less take me back, and now we were about to ruin 2 girls’ homecoming night. Desperately, we set up another ride, and played it off as if it were a chauffer. We picked up our respective dates and were on our way.

We had made up some story about going to the Silver Diner, a local fabrication of a 1950’s caboose restaurant, but really just an overpriced greasy spoon diguised as a theme restaurant (or was it the other way around). Suddenly, we became what seemed to be very upset at having forgotten the tickets to the dance. Matt rushed in his house to get the “tickets”, but after a moment waved us inside.

When the girls and I entered, candles were lit and Matt started playing his trusty (but slightly out of tune) piano.

I sang: CANDLES ON THE TABLE, SHADOWS ON THE FLOOR AND I CAN”T HELP BUT SMILE WHEN MY EYES ARE DRAWN TO YOURS.

then Matt: A LITTLE TOUCH OF ROMANCE CAN MAKE IT ALL SEEM RIGHT SO PROMISE ME YOU’LL FALL IN LOVE, IF JUST FOR THIS ONE NIGHT.

See, at the last minute, that night, Matt prepared the dinner as he sent me upstairs to complete the lyrics to the song. In a rush, I slapped together the sappiest bunch of hooey you’ve ever heard.. and we sang it with every ounce of our adolescent hearts.

The girls of course were swept away, and we enjoyed our Orange duck, served to us by our friend Van Lindberg.

At the dance, we alternated between dancing slow under the paper streamers in the cafeteria and reenacting show choir dances, sweating through our outfits.. (and matt got a lovely red stain from a streamer on his gray zoot suit) and having just a lovely time. We ended with a chaste but titillating night of PG rated hottub fun and brough our dates home fifteen minutes early, like good conservative boys.

Well, teenage romances are like a love letter set on fire.. it is all heat and sentimentality, but ultimately it is windblown and ashen and gone, and so too were the romantic affiliations from that memorable evening.

Later in the year, just before my relationship imploded over my teenage “jealous boyfriend” phase, matt and I performed our song under the name “The Harmony Brothers” on the stage of Quince Orchard High School to the cheers and applause of 2 high school generations of girls, ranging anywhere from 14 to 19. For that one moment, Matt and I were stars.

Don’t believe me? http://www.timpane.com/clapping.mp3

Now, I must admit, that song got me a fair number of dates in high school and even was one of my wife’s faves. Today, it seems naive and silly, but it remains a testament to the teenage heart, bereft of the jade that comes with heartbreak and full of the wonder we lose as we worry about bills and homes and jobs.

It has been twelve years since Matt, Ranj, Tiff, and I tripped the fluorescent lunchroom light fantastic, and what remains is the initial collaboration between Matt and myself. We rewrote and recorded it 3 times, and the MIDI for it a fourth, mixed it all together.. and so, if you’ve made it this far.. click below to experience the fluff it takes to charm the teenage heart. HOLDIN HEARTS, HOLDIN HANDS

http://www.timpane.com/holdin.mp3

EDIT by Matthew: Linked.

The only reason I didn’t go out on a “hot” date tonight is because my regular date’s about 2,000 miles away visiting a friend in New Hampshire right now.

But, after getting home from work at about 6 PM, I went out on a date with my two sons (age five and 18 months). We picked up some KFC (mmm, eight pieces plus a big tub of macaroni and cheese, baby!), “Daddy Day Care” from Blockbuster, popped some popcorn, grabbed a fat box of Mike ‘n Ike’s candy, and proceeded to gorge ourselves silly on greasy food and candy while laughing our heads off at the television. The reviewers said this movie was terrible, but with the right company, you’d laugh yourself silly at it too. My oldest son remembers being in day care and preschool, and he thought the movie was insightful and charming. In different words, of course…

You know, I’m usually depressed when my wife leaves town, but right now, LIFE IS GOOD.

Or maybe it’s just the SUGAR RUSH. And the eight pounds I put on chowing down on all that stuff. Thank heaven for Pepto-Bismol.

And you know what? I do have the sweetest wife in the world. Because she’s the girl that prepared a special brown bag for every single day that she’s going to be gone, each day with a special treat or idea so that we won’t get lonely or bored. She put the candy and microwave popcorn in the bag, along with her Blockbuster card to remind me. She knows Mike ‘n Ike’s are my fave. And my sons and I enjoyed the crap out of each other tonight. And we’re going to enjoy going to the zoo even more tomorrow — thanks to her reminder in the form of tickets in another bag.

Too bad it’s the middle of the night where she’s at right now, or I’d call and leave her a big telephone hug.

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,
angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night …

ah, Carl, while you are not safe I am not safe, and now you’re really in the total animal soup of time —

Allen Ginsberg

From John Q. Random, regarding theories of Noah’s flood creating the Grand Canyon, people positing that if the Earth were just a few miles closer to the Sun we’d fry, that if we didn’t have the Moon we’d all die from terrific floods, and more muddy-brained hogwash:

“Remember, the internet is basically a giant, electronic bathroom wall. Silly stuff written on a web site is still silly stuff.”

How true that is, huh?

Today marks the first day I’ve ever received spam to my “matthew” address at barnson.org! I’ve received it to numerous other addresses on the barnson.org domain, but for a weblog in operation for over a year, with an easily-guessable and abundantly available address in various places on my site, well, this tells me that if you’re cautious about where your email address goes aside from your personal domain, you can prevent a lot of spam that way. Obviously not a cure-all, though, and since I’m on one person’s list now, I expect to soon be on a ton.

In the interest of science, here’s the Postfix transaction log (with my email address defanged, because I’d rather my email address not be too-easily harvested. But I’ve left theirs intact, you know…)

 Oct 7 22:03:59 ross postfix/smtpd[9865]: connect from unknown[211.154.171.120] Oct 7 22:04:12 ross postfix/smtpd[9865]: 34FA03880F: client=unknown[211.154.171.120] Oct 7 22:04:23 ross postfix/cleanup[9885]: 34FA03880F: message-id=<> Oct 7 22:04:23 ross postfix/qmgr[63904]: 34FA03880F: from=, size=6245, nrcpt=1 (queue active) Oct 7 22:04:24 ross postfix/pipe[9889]: 34FA03880F: to=, relay=cyrus, delay=12, status=sent (mail.barnson.org) Oct 7 22:04:24 ross postfix/smtpd[9865]: disconnect from unknown[211.154.171.120] 

Here’s the message — headers and all. I’ve defanged all their image bugs and other assorted crap that’s supposed to track the success of their campaign. It was also pretty hideous HTML… I stripped it out with links. This will also probably be the last time I ever feature spam prominently on my web site, but I just want to preserve this unique moment before I go ape on them in my journal.

root@ross ttyp2 07:24:25 Wed Oct 08 /var/spool/imap/user/matthew/
$ lynx -dump -force-html -nolist 12611.
Return-Path: <return@submitstar.com>
Received: from ross.barnson.org ([unix socket])
by ross.barnson.org (Cyrus v2.1.12) with LMTP; Tue, 07 Oct 2003 22:04:24
-0600
X-Sieve: CMU Sieve 2.2
Received: from localhost.localdomain (unknown [211.154.171.120])
by mail.barnson.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 34FA03880F
for <matthew at barnson dot org>; Tue, 7 Oct 2003 22:04:12 -0600 (MDT)
Received: from ()
by (8.12.8/8.12.5) with SMTP id h9846KNV017586
for <matthew at barnson dot org>; Wed, 8 Oct 2003 12:06:26 +0800
Message-Id: <>
From: Irene Parker <return@submitstar.com>
To: “matthew at barnson dot org” <matthew at barnson dot org>
Subject: www.barnson.org
Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 12:00:33 +0800
X-Mailer: CSMTPConnection v2.17
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/related; boundary=”b551ee61-35fd-4489-8f0b-c86930e3c9c2″
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
Reply-To: Irene Parker <Irene_parker@submitstar.com>

This is a multi-part message in MIME format
–b551ee61-35fd-4489-8f0b-c86930e3c9c2
Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
<!– saved from url=3D(0022)http://internet.e-mail –>

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–b551ee61-35fd-4489-8f0b-c86930e3c9c2–

My response was “Yeah, you can help me. Stop spamming, you jerk!”. However, I did not click “send” — because unsubscribing or replying to these types of things is not only a waste of time, but a confirmation to them that their list has a known-good email address.

The only way this mail was unique was that it was the first to hit my “real” address — the one I use for friends, family, and correspondents from this web site. And now, this email is just another piece of junk for the Bayesian filter on my mail reader. A few more like this, and they’ll be automatically round-filed.

Today I read a beautiful metaphor on one of my message boards. I’ve revised it a good deal, and present it to you here:

Most people have seen Disney’s Toy Story. A few years ago I watched the movie (again) and felt compelled by Buzz Lightyear’s character. As you may recall, Buzz was charismatic, confident and even charming. He believed himself to be an authentic space ranger, together with wings and a laser that could stun and even kill opponents. He believed he was an important member of a force fighting against a cosmic foe bent on destroying the universe.

Of course, he paid no attention to the fact that his cool gadgets didn’t really work. When he was asked if he could fly, he was able to demonstrate his flying ability to the satisfaction of all the other toys (except Woody). Buzz’s faith was so strong that he was able to produce the evidence necessary to vindicate it, quite convincingly, I might add, (almost miraculously) as he bounced around Andy’s bedroom appearing to fly.

Then something important happened. Woody was able to convince Buzz to test out his machinery, really, to see if he was truly a space ranger. Buzz watched a TV commercial, and tested his equipment. He started to seriously doubt. Later, Buzz’s doubts turned into complete hopelessness as he leaped off a staircase only to find his that his wings were useless.

As a broken toy, Buzz suffered in the depths of depression. He got rid of the stickers on his body that did nothing but serve as decorations. He experimented with his personality, acting totally different, for a while, from the way people had always known him. The courageous, confident Buzz seemed a broken and unhappy toy.

Buzz went through a major transformation. He became more human when he learned of his true identity and limitations.

He was just a toy.

Once he acknowledged this, he decided that his goal should be to try to help Woody and Andy find happiness.

At the end of the movie, in a desperate moment, Buzz had to muster the courage to use his wings to “fly” in order to take himself and Woody to the child, Andy. Amazingly, he was able to fly, only this time his response to the admiration of Woody was, “This isn’t flying. This is falling with style!” He recognized his limitations, yet working within them was able to accomplish amazing things.

I hope I can still fall with style.

.

.

Note: I realize metaphors can be taken too far. As it stands, I think this one is beautiful; I’d rather not try to extend it too far to try to analyze the role of Andy as a loving caretaker, Sid as the incarnation of evil, and Mr. Potato Head as the need for comic relief. Or whatever.

Received this in my mail today; author unknown. Laughs unbearable! You probably have to live in Utah to get it…

In celebration of Barbie’s 40th birthday, Mattel has created a Mormon Barbie for the folks in Utah. The most popular, Celestial Barbie, comes with 8.4 children. She wears a mid-calf flower print Laura Ashley dress with conservative flats (no heels), a bow in her flowing shoulder-length hair, with puffy bangs.
Barbie wears a permanent smile and comes with her own bread making machine, store of wheat, list of ways to feed a family of 12 on less than $200 a week, casserole recipes, and year’s supply of green Jell-O.

Also available MAV (Dodge/Ford/Nissan/whatever mini-van, otherwise known as a Mormon Assault Vehicle). When you pull the cord in her back she sheds real tears and says, “You have such a special spirit, Sister,” and “Love ya!”

Occasionally you can find one that says “Oh, my heck!” but this is a manufacturer’s defect. Celestial Barbie would never say “heck.”

You can buy a Celestial Ken to go with Celestial Barbie, but he’s hard to find. He’s always off fulfilling some priesthood calling, so he’s rarely home.

Other Special LDS Barbies include:

• RM Barbie – This Barbie comes with your choice of a BYU or Ricks sweatshirt and mini computer, and bears her testimony in a foreign language.
• Homemaking Leader Barbie – Comes with a wide assortment of miniature baking, sewing, and craft supplies.
• Primary President Barbie – Not very popular, since this one has no hair. Pull her cord and she sings “Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree,” “Give Said the Little Stream,” and folds her arms to remind everyone to be reverent.
• Relief Society Presidency Barbies – Sold in sets of three, these Barbies come complete with their own agenda! Also included are mini telephones which come attached to their ears. Batteries required, as these busy little numbers never stop running. No shutoff buttons.
• Young Women’s Leader Barbie – Comes dressed for camp with all necessary equipment, including enough insect repellent for everyone. Bishop Ken also available in camping attire.
• Young Women Skippers – Laurels, Mia Maids, and Beehives, all cute as buttons, dressed in flannel nighties for the sleepover. One-piece swimsuits and knee-length shorts outfits also available.
• Nursery Leader Barbie – This frazzled, smiling Barbie talks in her own baby-like voice and comes with an assortment of babies and toddlers, storybooks, toys, and a supply of disposable diapers. Be careful, however: on Sundays after church, all this one wants to do is sleep.
• Organist Barbie – Has rimmed glasses and comes with her very own spiral-bound hymnal. Sits only–in position to play, with arms bent and fingers extended. Piano also available.
• Chorister Barbie – right arm permanently raised to a moving square. Sings seven hymns. Batteries required.
• Visiting Teaching Barbies – Sold in sets of two, this is a true collector’s item as each set has its own recorded message. Comes with supply of message handouts and plates of birthday and Christmas cookies.
• Stake Leader Barbie – comes with a voluminous set of mini-leadership manuals.
• Salt Lake Leader Barbie- White hair in a hurricane hairdo!
• Also available: Priesthood leader husband Ken who sits permanently asleep on the stand. Eyes do not open. Snores. Batteries required.

EDIT: Of course, after I post this, I learn that it’s posted in roughly 429,000 other web sites around the planet. Eh, well. I thought it was clever, and apparently 428,999 other people think so too.

If you’re a programmer, you’ll probably get this cartoon. If you aren’t, good luck to you:

http://www.ucomics.com/foxtrot/2003/10/03/