There are so many I'd love to send in return, but I'm not playing that game. Matthew told me I should have sent this old seventies joke of a heartbreaker called "Torn betweeen two lovers, except tell him that in his case it's at least three lovers he's torn between. but I held my tongue, or fingers. He couldn't deal with my silence, so he sent this one.
I deleted on the request of myaunt.
Then he sent the Art Garfunkel one. If all he knows is that he loves me so much, he has a funny way of showing it. Furthermore, his grades are in serious peril if that's truly all he knows.
My brother wanted to text him and said that if the next song he texts is that one from the Police or Sting or whoever, "Every Breath You Take," he's seriously calling the police whether Jared is a friend or not. Instead, my pseudouncle Scott, who is his biological uncle, insisted on texting him. I don't know what the message was, but I haven't received another text.
Seriously, why can't the guy just make up his mind. He could have had me -- well, not really had me -- but I would have dated him until he made up his mind about his mission. I would not have agreed to have waited for him because I think that's a bad idea because it's making a promise one can't necessarily keep. Also, it implies marriage is at the end of the rainbow, and that's an implication I'm not sure I can follow through with even if I'm otherwise unencumbered. There's no guarantee, even if it were to end up that we were right for each other, that either one of us would be anywhere near ready for marriage in two years.
Mormon mishies are typically encouraged to be engaged within six months of returning from their missions. Most likely I'll be through year one of medical school when he returns. That hardly seems like an ideal time to plan and implement a wedding. Then, should he successfully complete his mission, chances are he'll be a much more devout Latter-Day Saint than he is right now. I can't see him being all that comfortable with marriage to a Catholic. I know it worked out for Scott and Jillian, but Scott had one foot out the door of the church before he ever left for his mission. Maybe Jared does as well, but if such is the case, he'd be better off not going at all. Not everyone is as lucky as Scott was.
Bottom line: I'm kind of taking the same position as girlfriend #2, or would she be #3, since I'm probably technically numero uno? Anyway, it's the non-Mormon other woman of whom I speak, the one who told Jared to get lost and not to call until he decided for certain that he wasn't riding his bicycle all over God knows where handing out sky-blue paperbacks with golden angels blowing horns that look like the ones people take to football games just to be obnoxious, except that the horns, too, are gold like the angels.
I don't wish to be hardhearted. I won't refuse to have a relationship with him when he returns (if he goes) just because he's a more devout Mormon than he presently is, as long as he's OK with me being the way I am and as long as all other factors work out in such a way that it's a good idea for us to have a relationship at the time. Neither will I promise not to date, or even not to fall in love with anyone else while he's gone. My heart belongs to me, as Barbara streisand used to sing, (I don't think she does that one in concert anymore.) And if he decides not to go, neither is that any guarantee we'll again become an item.
Jared needs to decide, totally independent of me, what's right for him in terms of a mission. Once that decision is made, there's plenty of time for me to decide if I want a casual relationship, a more serious one, or no relationship at all. He'll need to grow up a bit and prove to be more straightforward and less flaky if he expects me to as much as meet him on campus for ice cream on a day when he has no classes.
My primary concern at this point is not for me (as strange as the songs he has sent me have been, Jared isn't some male version of Jodi Arias who is going to stalk me or worse) but for Jared's mental health, which seems a bit shaky to be potentially put on a plane and flown halfway across the world to a place where he knows absolutely no one and possibly doesn't even speak the language. I believe the decision has been weighing on him so heavily that he's really not himself and not quite in his right mind. (I won't entirely excuse his indiscretions on that account, but I do think there's a connection.) I can't say for certain that my state of mind would be a whole lot more stable were I in identical circumstances. I wish his pareents could see this. He's their son; his well-being should come before any program their church pushes. Even though he's eighteen, his parents have some obligation to look out for him. Despite what the church says about every young man being obligated to be worthy so that he can serve a mission, the calling obviously isn't for everyone.
Thomas S. Monson, the current President, Prophet, Seer, and Revelator of the LDS Church, did not serve a mission as a youth. Why, then, is it absolutely necessary for Jared to do so if either he doesn't want to go or if it wouldn't be in his best interests?
I'd hate to see him come back as my cousin did last year, half dead from intestinal disease, or worse, so mentally ill that he never fully recovers, as did his uncle about twelve years ago.
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