Shared Spaces

I took my family to see Palmyra recently. My wife had been there before, but none of the rest of us had. One thing I’ve learned about Mrs. C is that she doesn’t really have the fourth-dimensional sense of wonder at occupying a historically significant spot of earth. I can personally attest that she’s much more excited to enjoy a Caesar salad than she was to visit Caesar’s tomb. Which isn’t to say she doesn’t find history interesting, just that she doesn’t take any special pleasure in retracing its steps.

“It’s a gift, you know, being able to feel history in certain places. My mom has it. We’d visit Church historical sites, and she would ask me, ‘Can you feel that?’ But I never really did.”

“Well,” I said, “I guess you’re right, it is a gift. Although I’m not sure it’s an especially rare gift. Lots of people like visiting historical sites.”

“That’s true.”

We got to the Smith family farm in the early afternoon. The first place you visit on the guided tour is the log cabin where the Smiths lived in 1820, when Joseph Smith had the First Vision. The cabin is rebuilt, but in the same spot as before. The senior missionary leading the tour asked if anyone could recite Joseph’s description of the First Vision. The volunteer was a young man who seemed to me to be less than two years off his mission, despite having a wife and baby with him. “I saw a pillar of light, exactly over my head above the brightness of the sun….”

He got a few lines in and had to stop. Choked up. You’ve seen this before. He squeaked out maybe one more line and then his wife finished it for him.

We went upstairs. I reminded my oldest that we were standing in the same room where the Angel Moroni visited Joseph three times during the night. His eyes widened, and then he began to furiously pace around the room in every direction.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m trying to make sure I walk everywhere that Moroni might have stood.” Ah, so he has the gift too. “Well,” I said, “he never actually touched the floor; he was standing in the air.”

He took a moment to contemplate. Then he began jumping around the room as high as he could. I hated to tell him to stop.

After the tour, we got in the car to drive to the Hill Cumorah. “Why don’t I get choked up?” Mrs. C asked.

“What do you mean?”

“I have a testimony of Joseph Smith, but when I hear the words of the First Vision, I don’t have the same reaction that guy had. Why do you think that is?”

“I think if you had served a mission it would make more sense to you. Those are the first words that any missionary has to memorize. You say them over and over, and you repeat them at every first discussion, which is a majority of all discussions. And I can imagine that, standing in Joseph Smith’s home, reciting those words, and thinking of all the people you taught, all the people who joined the Church….”

I stopped there. If I’d said another word, I’d have ended up mimicking the young man, and that would simply be impolite.