I learned from the best, Giant Sloth

[Korihor]

This post is in tribute to Giant Sloth, my mentor.

Last night, we arrived home just before 6 o'clock. I had the kids and Mrs Korihor was out running an errand. I decided to wash the car since it was sorely overdue. We live in Phoenix, so it's still plenty warm to wash the car.

Half way through, a vehicle pulls up in front of our house, it's nearly dark and I don't recognize the vehicle.

"Hello, Bro Korihor!"

It's the Sister Missionaries.

The missionaries are always welcome at our home. They don't know about my disaffection and I'm happy to let them hang out (slothening the work). They come up the driveway and introduce the new sister missionary in this area. I tell them Mrs Korihor is not home but should be back soon and we'll just stay outside washing the car anyway.

We talk briefly and one sister asks if we can wash their mission car as well. I obliged.
She says they have mission vehicle inspection coming up and they never have it clean enough. We wash it really good, vacuum it out and Mrs Korihor arrives home. It's 7;15 and we start cooking dinner, dinner is kinda late tonight.
I ask the sisters if they would like to eat with us, knowing they already had dinner earlier, and the one sister surprisingly accepts and says she's hungry. I wonder what they had previously that she wouldn't eat.

We finish up with dinner and it's now 8:20. The sisters need to return home to meet some other missionaries at 8:30.

Of course we talk about some basic church stuff, but they never shared a spiritual message. No talk about "do you have any referrals?" The only prayer was before we ate. We talked about how their families are doing. I tried to get them to facetime their mom's on my phone. They declined but recorded a short video message. I got their parents email address and sent it to the mom's. We talked about basic world events.

Basically, I tried to let them be normal early 20's women, let them relax and not bother anyone else that night about church stuff. The work is slothening

We talked a little about church. Last sunday was stake conference and the Korihor Family didn't attend. Our stake was split. I learned they simply created two stakes from one. No new wards, just smaller stakes. Our biggest problem is growth indeed.
Previously we had a set of missionaries in each ward, now a set covers two wards. It seems the missionary surge might be declining.

So, Giant Sloth, I dedicate this evening of slothening the work to you. Many thanks for your wonderful example.

[SunbeltRed]

I applaud your efforts. When the missionaries get sent to my house I will keep Giant Sloth's and your example in mind.

May we raise a toast to The Sloth and his giantness.

Amen.

[LSOF]

No hallowed hand shall stop the work from retarding. O that I could dare to slothen the work!

[GoodBoy]

Awesome! The missionaries are always welcome in my house too. The sisters asked if there was anything they could do last time, and I put them to work building a barb-wire fence. They loved it! I took pictures of them and sent them to their families as well.

[desertrat]

You guys are making me feel bad now. I politely told them we were inactive and weren't interested in a message. They came back during the day a week later and my wife told them the same thing. In retrospect I wish I would have told them that they are welcome to use our phones and computer, hang out, eat, drink and be merry, but no messages or discussion of doctrine. I don't think hearing what we have to say about those things would do them any good.

[Korihor]

I thought it might be fun to add...
When the sisters showed up, I was wearing heathen underbritches beneath my t-shirt and shorts. If they were observant enough, some dark blue fabric was probably visible from time to time.

I had a Mike's Hard Lemonade in the fridge. While cooking dinner, if they were observant it would have been visible to them.

I actively encouraged them to break mission rules by offering to facetime and/or email their parents. I gave one sister my cell phone to read a story about some current news events.

They should pick up on certain clues that I'm not playing by the same rules, but I doubt it.

[Red Ryder]

You're clearly not a Master Sloth Jedi yet young KishKorWhore.

If you were, you would have just used the patented "Sloth Stare" and kept eye contact while saying absolutely nothing. They would have eventually just turned around and went home.

[Korihor]

You're clearly not a Master Sloth Jedi yet young KishKorWhore.

If you were, you would have just used the patented "Sloth Stare" and kept eye contact while saying absolutely nothing. They would have eventually just turned around and went home.

Clearly

[trophywife26.2]

Good for you for being so nice! This thread makes me sad we lost that thread: slothening the work though. It had some gems! But time to rebuild I guess.

[Giant Sloth]

Gosh, you guys have made my day! (Just barely saw this thread just now!)

I'm afraid I've slothened myself out of a job... Sister Sloth and I are now totally inactive, and our new baby sloth remains an unblessed heathen who has yet to set a three-toed paw inside a meetinghouse. The Slothening the Work thread is the closest thing I had to a journal of my disaffection. I'm sad it was lost, but its loss is yet another sign of how that chapter has ended and I can move on.

It warms my heart that the slothening continues on without us. May you be firm and almost immoveable in your good-natured obstinance, and may the nagging of your church leaders be forever met with peaceful blank stares.

[Abinidied]

Fun fact. Sloths are covered in a green algae rendering them invisible against the forest canopy to those intent on ingesting said sloth. So . . . it begs the question. Is it better as a MM (marginalized member) to be covered in camo or be completely transparent? I submit that both work and both come with a caveat. If you are hiding yourself (camo), you may find yourself giving up a measure of honesty as you smile, nod your head in the affirmative thus passively agreeing when testimony is born to or at you. It's a smooth ride as you fake out your primary predator, fade to the left, and disappear into the canopy. On the other hand, transparency (the form of invisibility I have chosen) runs the risk of complete alienation, thus impacting important relationships. I have only been public a few days and am a bit panicky about being alienated and marginalized because I don't squarely fit in the round 'whole' anymore. Primary predators can't see me and will likely pray (spelling intentional) elsewhere to find a more easily persuaded and visible prey. Guess I won't see much of them again. Camouflage or transparency - dishonesty or alienation. Sheesh! Tough choice. Thanks, church!

Endnote: if you look in the mirror, what do you see if you are completely transparent? Nothing? Everything? I think what you see is a choice.

[Giant Sloth]

Is it better as a MM (marginalized member) to be covered in camo or be completely transparent?

That's an important question! Luckily in the church, nothing can eat you if you don't want it to. They can only nip at you. But if you never come down from the canopy for them, it becomes a huge hassle for them to even do that.

When people are trying to reactivate/ give you a calling / interrogate / etc., make them work for it at every single step.
Reprimands
"We've missed you", is a reprimand, but you can pretend it's not. Reply with "Oh." or "Thanks for thinking of me.", or the Blank Stare.
Interrogations
People will almost never ask you anything bluntly, so you can avoid their intent by answering them literally. "Have you been out of town?" (No.) "Is everything alright with your family." (Yes, thanks.)
Callings, etc.
More experienced/confident leaders learned to ask direct, "will you" questions on the mission. Even though these are technically yes/no questions, it's always amusing to answer them as though they are offers.
"Can you make yourself available for the Stake Presidency to visit this Wednesday?" (No thank you.)
"Will you accept this calling?" (No thank you)
"Can you fulfill your obligation to help clean the church this Saturday?" (No thank you.)

The Blank Stare, explained
Mormonism follows scripts. If you go off script, you derail the whole conversation and the Bishop's (or home teacher's, etc.) goal is thwarted. The blank stare is when you derail the script by just assuming a neutral expression and not saying a word until the other person speaks again. Imagine the following statements being answered with a friendly but very blank stare.
"I'm your new home teacher."
"You've been assigned to clean the church tomorrow."
"We've missed you at church these last few weeks."
"The leadership is worried about you."
"Well I can tell you in my own life, I've gotten answers to any question I took to the Lord sincerely."
"We want to encourage you to read and pray every day."
"I know taking callings is hard, but we receive blessings when we serve."
"I hope you'll reconsider."

Even though I rebranded the blank stare as my own invention, silence is a fairly well-known negotiation tool among salesmen and other business types. The adage is, "He who speaks first loses."

Warning: It is painfully awkward the first few times doing this. It's supposed to be -- that's why it works so well. As uncomfortable as it is for you, it is more so for your poor bishop. After a few blank stares, most people will quit trying to get you to do anything.

[wtfluff]

Reprimands
"We've missed you", is a reprimand, but you can pretend it's not. Reply with "Oh." or "Thanks for thinking of me.", or the Blank Stare.

Those answers are awesome.

You can also turn the "We missed you" Reprimand right back around and say: "You know where I live right?"

Though you've got to be careful; That response could open you up to them actually visiting you at your home and trying to use all of the mentioned "list" to "fix" you...

[Abinidied]

That's an important question! Luckily in the church, nothing can eat you if you don't want it to. They can only nip at you. But if you never come down from the canopy for them, it becomes a huge hassle for them to even do that.

Some sage advice and thanks for the breakdown - stuff I really haven't thought that much about so appreciate the way you brought the abstract into focus in a way that makes a whack of sense. Small wonder Korihor looks to you as a mentor!

I love the canopy (except the one under my bed for most of my upbringing - raised without an indoor toilet! True story).

Cheers!

[Emower]

You can also turn the "We missed you" Reprimand right back around and say: "You know where I live right?"

Though you've got to be careful; That response could open you up to them actually visiting you at your home and trying to use all of the mentioned "list" to "fix" you...

I am totes gong to do this. I Doubt if it will prompt more than any obligatory monthly visits, but I am willing to take the gamble.

[2bizE]

Brother Korihor has completed his home teaching assignment this month. Thank you for returning and reporting.

[Red Ryder]

I’m topping this post for Sloth as I ran into him over on the Reddit exmo board and was reminded of this post.

[wtfluff]

I’m topping this post for Sloth as I ran into him over on the Reddit exmo board and was reminded of this post.

Who invoked the Blank Stare™ first?




Oh wait... If it was a "running into" in cyberspace, I guess the blank stare would be... Slothfully ignoring his post on that "other" message board thingy?