Stake Conference on Father's Day

I’m pretty sure Eddy was the only one in the whole congregation at the Regional Center (formerly the Valley Music Hall) who listened to stake conference. DeRay was sound asleep; I was watching the people in front, listening to the people behind, watching half the congregation file up and down the stairs endlessly. It’s only two hours. Can’t people hold still? Two rows in front of us a gaggle of girls, including the mother, all have long hair, and they played with each other’s hair twisting, winding, snaking incessantly, or scratching each other’s backs. They passed gum from one end to the other jostling and fighting over it, even the dad.  Directly in front of us a father of four scrunched over three people to confiscate a smart phone from his daughter on the far end. She seethed, then pushed out the other side of the row and disappeared. The mother played with the phone for the rest of the meeting. Maybe she was checking her daughter’s texts, I can’t say. At one point, on her phone she showed the woman sitting next to her what kind of gel she puts on her hair.  The young couple next to them took their toddler out ten times. Or more. Would she have been better off at home? But no one could see her. All around us, people were on their iPhones, iPads, kindles. A chorus of constant clamor. Didn’t anyone learn about reverence in Primary?  Like I say, I think Eddy was the only one listening in the entire edifice. How can he concentrate when there is so much going on?

I've had many titles:

I've been called bishop,

 stake president;

mission president;

and now elder

as a member of the

Council of Seventies,

my favorite title

is that of Father.