Living Happily Ever After
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Be True No Matter What

Date: December 13, 2012  Author: Andrea Merriman

“I prefer to be true to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of others, rather than to be false and to incur my own abhorrence.” (Frederick Douglass)

Step 5: Hold your head up and be true to who you are no matter what.

Boy, for me in the wake of the destruction of 2009, this proved to be a hard one. It was NOT fun!

I remember the first Sunday after our life ended, my children looked at me and said, “We don’t have to go to church today, do we?” (None of us wanted to face our congregation for the first time after such a disaster.) And I had to be the one to say, “Yes, we are going.” Honestly, it wasn’t fun. In truth, it was awful. Not just the uncomfortable and awkward, but having my oldest sit on the pew and cry during the meeting while my middle son sat and drew on a piece of paper, “There’s a hole where my heart used to be” was terrible. I was grief stricken and disgraced, but we went to church because it was who we were. In life, you have to do that.

What I didn’t expect was an even greater challenge. A moment of temptation to be someone I was not and never had been.

Stay tuned.

Loss

Date: May 18, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“And yet, I suppose you mourn the loss or the death of what you thought your life was, even if you find your life is better after. You mourn the future that you thought you’d planned.”  (Lynn Redgrave)

It has been two years since my unexpected life began. I haven’t been haunted by the events that led to it for quite some time and then out of the blue, unexpectedly, I dreamed of a moment connected to it (not one of my favorite moments, by the way) and I could not shake the memory of it when I awoke.

The experience I dreamed of occurred a few weeks after certain events ended my life as I knew it. One ramification of the unexpected situation was that I was released from serving as president of the women’s organization of my church congregation. Another ramification of it was that due to the public nature of my former husband’s crimes and positions of leadership he had held within our church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, local church leadership determined it was necessary to publicly address some of it to congregations our family had been closely associated with. My church leaders were very kind about it all; they told me it was necessary and explained why; they told me the day they were going to do it so I could be prepared (and probably, if I were smarter and raised by different parents, so that I could be absent from those meetings that day.) But unfortunately, I had been taught differently than that–taught to face what needs to be faced and that trials and tragedy don’t change what is right or what is expected of us.

It was a poignant lesson I learned in 1986 when my dad unexpectedly died in a plane crash. I was a teenager and dreaded going to church that Sunday after he died. He had been a leader in our congregation and I didn’t want to face people (even people I loved or people who loved me and my family) and I had a sneaking suspicion my mom was planning that our family would attend church. Late Saturday night I asked, “We don’t have to go to church tomorrow, do we?”

My mom was firm in her resolve and her answer. “Of course we do! Just because your dad isn’t here doesn’t mean the rest of us can stop living and it certainly doesn’t change what is right. We believe in going to church on Sunday, that is what we have always done and that is what we will continue to do.” She was a strong woman in a gentle kind of way (I don’t want to make her sound harsh–she was anything but that.) She took our family to church despite the loss we’d experienced just two days previously (although she relented a little bit and let us arrive 5 minutes late so we wouldn’t have to talk to anyone before the meeting.)

Interestingly, when our unexpected life began, one of my children asked me a question very similar to the one I’d asked my own mother 23 years before, “Mom, we don’t have to go to church this Sunday, do we?” and I gave an answer very similar to the one my mom had given me and we went to church and continued to attend each Sunday, regardless of some uncomfortable moments.

Like the Sunday I dreamed of recently. The Sunday I had to sit and endure public comments about my personal situation that was so public– comment about my former spouse’s crimes and the situation he created as a result. It was also the day the new presidency of the women’s organization of our congregation publicly recognized me, gave me a bouquet of flowers and thanked me for my service; and then after that, the leader of our cluster of congregations (known as a stake president) stood and addressed the issues that needed to be publicly discussed. I don’t remember a lot about that day, I mostly remember sitting in the back of the room, tears of grief, shame, humiliation, sorrow (and a host of other feelings and emotions) streaming down my cheeks as I stared at the beautiful flowers in my lap and endured what was being said to the women around me. I do remember a woman sitting by me on the back row, patting my arm or giving my shoulder a squeeze, through the whole thing. I can’t remember who she was, but how much I appreciated her kindness to me at that time! She helped me feel slightly less alone and helped me get through a very difficult moment.

That was a tough experience but I got through it and it’s now a part of my past. I honestly haven’t let myself think too much about it, or look back on it, until that recent morning when I woke up, tears streaming down my face. And #5 was asleep next to me in bed!

I was shocked. It has been two years! I am living a new life, remarried to a wonderful man, and I wake up crying over something that happened two years ago? I felt a little bit crazy. I didn’t want #5 to see, or know, he was married to such a wacky wife that dreamed about the past and woke up crying! I confess, I even felt a little bit guilty as I am the recipient of many miracles and kindness and have much to be thankful for; I have the great blessing to be remarried and am truly happy again–I can’t (or shouldn’t) be crying about the past (even if it was unintentional–something I woke up doing in a dream!)

I quickly got up to hide my insanity, pulled myself together and went on about my day. Except that I couldn’t quite shake the feelings that dream left me with. I felt slightly emotionally “off.” And that was just the start of the day.

“Going back to Ireland involves at least six to seven emotional breakdowns for me per day.” (Anjelica Huston)

Stay tuned. More emotional breakdowns to come.

Living Legend

Date: April 27, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“Deangelo: ‘Why do you use your name when you answer the phone?’ Erin: ‘Oh, that’s how Pam does it. I just copy her. She’s sort of a living legend.’” (The Office)

I had my new name, not too long thanks to the Social Security Administration, and now all I had to do was remember it. And answer to it. Easier said than done, as it turns out.

One Sunday, sitting in the women’s meeting at church, I suddenly noticed everyone in the room looking at me and laughing. They joked, “She doesn’t even know her name!” I assumed they must have called me “Andrea Ramsey” and I had failed to respond to it.

After the meeting a friend joked with me about it and I promised I’d get my name right the next time. That was when I found out they were laughing because they had called me “Andrea Ramsey” not just once, but THREE times! And it hadn’t registered with me, I hadn’t realized they meant me and had failed to respond to it every single time!

“Respond intelligently…” (Lao Tzu)

If you can. I’m going to work on that.

Second marriage moment #7.


My Ellis Island

Date: April 26, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“Choose your new name carefully. Practice signing with it. Have a few people close to you call you by that name, and see how you like it. You can change your first name, middle name, last name, or all of the above. Just make sure your new name doesn’t imply “fraudulent intent” or is not in the public interest.” (wikiHow)

I took more time off work and returned to the Social Security Office the very next morning. I thought, since they closed at 4 p.m., that they’d open at 8 a.m. but I was wrong. I waited an hour for the doors to open, took a number (I was first in line and got the first number of the day), and stepped forward to wait my turn.

As I stood there waiting for my number to be called, the only clerk helped someone. Then another person. Then another. I finally stepped forward and asked, “Excuse me, are you calling numbers?”

The clerk looked at me with a blank expression. I explained, “The guard told us to take a number as we walked through the door, you have several signs posted that direct us to take numbers, but I haven’t heard you call any numbers…”

Despite the full waiting room, they hadn’t been calling numbers. But they decided to help me next anyway. I stepped forward, thoroughly prepared for the name change (after all, it was my second attempt to change my name at the Social Security Office; I’d had an additional wait I hadn’t planned on which gave me time to make sure I’d filled everything out correctly) and handed the clerk my paperwork. The paperwork to add “Ramsey” to my name, to make it my new and official last name.

Unfortunately, the clerk had a problem with it. “It’s too long,” she said.

“What?”

She showed me that her computer screen had three boxes: first name, middle name, and last name; with a limited number of characters per box. My proposed name was too long for the Social Security Administration computers! She told me I could have three names. I asked, “Wait a second–what about the famous people and movie stars who name their children 5-6 names? How do they do that, if my 34 letter name is too long?”

She said she didn’t know, but I had these options: my maiden name with the addition of “Ramsey,” “Andrea Merriman Ramsey” (without any part of my middle or maiden names),  ”Andrea Merriman-Ramsey” (but I’d have to sign that long last name every time I signed my name, not to mention it would give me a last name different than my children AND my husband!), Andrea L.C. Merriman Ramsey,” “Andrea L.C.M. Ramsey,” and a few other options. I stood at the counter, suddenly unprepared, facing a huge decision that was going to follow me every day of my life, and feeling pressure to hurry because I had to get to work and I knew other people in the room were waiting!

It was my own, personal Ellis Island.

But there wasn’t time to choose my name carefully because I had already carefully chosen my name and it had been rejected by the government, I had to get to work and people were waiting for me to make a decision and complete my business. I never thought to practice signing it. And at that point in my life, I was being called by pretty much anything and everything–no one was sure what I was going to go by. In fact, one Sunday the program at church one listed me by one name in one spot and a different name in a different spot!

Basically, it came down to the fact that I could use my maiden name (the name my church records used and the name of my parents, my ancestors and my heritage) or Merriman (the name of the man I wasn’t married to anymore.) In that moment, that spur of the moment, I chose my heritage. Merriman was gone.

Second marriage moment #6.

“I know who I WAS when I got up this morning, but I think I must have changed several times since then.” (Lewis Carroll, Alice In Wonderland)

“Oh, How Nice!”

Date: April 19, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“The first of April is the day we remember what we are the other 364 days of the year.” (Mark Twain)

Actually, it was the first of March…but it showed me pretty much the same thing April was bound to.

Our first Sunday back at church after our honeymoon, our pastor asked #5 and I to address our congregation the following week. The Sunday of our assigned talks, I gave mine and sat down. I was followed by #5, who gave an excellent and heartfelt talk and ended it by expressing his love and gratitude for his wife; thanking her for her good example and for all she had taught him.

I sat there watching #5 conclude his talk, listening to him express his love and gratitude for his wife, and never thinking a thing of it–other than to think to myself in a very detached way (like I did the entire time I was single), “Oh, how nice. That man is married and that man loves his wife.”

He finished, turned to sit down and then suddenly it hit me:  Wait! He was talking about ME! I was HIS wife!

Married two weeks, and I’d already forgotten who my husband was! I’d found adjusting to being single after 20 years of marriage very difficult. I never imagined that the fulfillment of my dream–to find an amazing man, fall in love and remarry–would be an adjustment, too! But apparently it was going to be, since I experienced a total brain freeze about being married again just two weeks into it!

Second marriage moment #3.

“If it’s hard to remember, it’ll be difficult to forget.” (Arnold Schwarzenegger)

Thank goodness my forgetfulness only lasted a moment.:)