Big Love Affair

I've been sick as of late. Nothing like living with a doc who brings home all sorts of gamboo on his clothes after a long day. Its no wonder I'm ill. Between the two of us, we have a sort of symphony of hacking in the middle of the night. I feel worse for him. He's been sick on and off since mid-January. However, stories of my mucus and phlegm is not the point of this entry.

Since I've been down, I've been watching a lot of videos. Got caught up on the politically incorrect "Borat" and the much more correct "Babel." When I was returning these two I decided to pick up the first season of "Big Love." For those of you who don't know it, this is a HBO tv series that is shot in Utah and is about polygamy. Part of me was curious just to see how this alternative life style was portrayed, but really I think deep down I'm just home sick.

The opening credits were enough to make my jaw drop open. Its picturesque with the Wasatch Front in the back ground and the husband ice skating with all three wives. Then the ice splits and you see them wandering alone through translucent sheets. Not a mystery that they were referring to the "beyond the veil" belief Mormons have after death. Sure enough, the husband finds all of them in the veils and the last part is all 4 of them sitting around a table praying over a meal...on their own planet. Oh. My. God.

No wonder the Mormons took offense to this. It was a blatant rip off to their highly held beliefs. You know, the ones that mainstream think are up there with the Scientologists. Planets, veils, polygamy. I'm not Mormon, but part of me was shocked. The other part of me was amazed someone took such a huge risk in "unveiling" (forgive the pun) of their secret rituals. The only reason why I know of these is I dated a Mormon missionary (he only lasted 6 weeks before he confessed that we had sex and got sent home) and he told me about the rituals after he went through the Temple.

Once I got past the opening credits, I got into the story. I really felt bad for the characters. I think they do a great job showing how lonely and isolating the life style can be as well as all of the pressures on the man. Need less to say, I was hooked. I finished two discs in one day and was back in my pj's at Hollywood Video the next day. By now, the same cashier was just looking at me funny. Then he noticed my membership card was from Utah. I got a strange look.

"Is it really like this?" He asked

"I really wouldn't know. I'm not Mormon and I'm not polygamous. I'm just from there."

When J woke from his sleep coma post call last night, I told him about the series. He too was a bit taken back by the opening credits. But then, he started to do what I had been doing for two days now: searching for landmarks from home.

We would pause the dvd at times and point out Henrie's Dry Cleaning on 2000 E., we would guess what mountain range was in the background, we would chuckle at how they re-named Dixie Regional Hospital and put a new sign on it. Bottom line: we're both homesick. Despite all of the quirks Utah has, its still home and we're both comfortable with them. I'll trade you a red neck with a NASCAR racing scanner (sold from Costco) with a trailer as a "country home" for a vial of concecrated oil and an open investigation on a sister-wife anyday.