Are You Honest in Your Dealings With Your Fellow Man?

So many times in my church, I hear talks about the blessings of regular temple attendance. I probably don't attend as often as I ought to. Particularly considering that I pass seven temples on the way to work and I work within walking distance of the Salt Lake Temple...so I can't add any insight into the blessings that come to us with regular temple attendance. But I can tell you that being worthy to attend the temple saved my job once.

When I worked in Wisconsin, the company I worked for was owned by a man and his wife who were some of the finest people I'd ever met. The owner of the company was the kind of man who would often drive by late at night, see the light on in my office as I was working to meet a deadline, turn his car around, drive to Subway, and bring me a sandwich and drink as he sat in my office and asked me whether or not they were working me too hard and what they could do to ease my burden so that I could spend more time with my family and less time at work. He was a deeply religious man who often told me how he admired my religion's emphasis on family.

After a year working there, they decided to semi-retire and handed the daily management of the company over to a man who, by all reports, hated the very ground on which I walked. I never could understand why and none of my co-workers who told me that he had confided in them about his hatred for me could tell me why. Several theories were floated...I was a Texan and he hated George W. Bush with the white hot hatred of a thousand suns so he hated me as well....I was the only one in my company who fully understood how to do the job I was hired to do and so he disliked not having more control over the process....the most popular theory was that I was a big person and he was a cigar-chomping small man who, if psychiatrists had been in his company for fifteen minutes, would be rushing to write papers proposing to rename "Napoleon Complex" to "Skrowonski-itis"

But, whatever the reason for his dislike of me, it was something I lived with. I kept my head down, did my work, and did everything I could to not give him an excuse to fire me...then one day, he got the excuse he was looking for.

We had been hired by a construction company to design a water park. The initial job came in over budget and so all departments were asked to work with the sub-contractors to cut down costs. My department was asked to cut a quarter of a million from the cost and so I went back and forth between the two HVAC companies that were bidding on the job to get suggestions on how we might do what was needed to get the job within budget.

On my own, I discovered a possible way to cut more than a quarter of a million from the job. This job had a North Woods Lodge-type feel so it featured steep sloping roofs. I found a small obscure portion of the roof that would support equipment allowing me to go with a much less expensive system and made the changes over the weekend.

The following Monday, I went to our client with my proposed changes as well as my estimate of the potential savings. When my ideas were green-lit, I said, "Great! I'll pass this along to the two HVAC companies". It was then that I was instructed by our client to do something I considered unethical. I was told to give the information to only one of the companies and leave the other in the dark. I took my concerns to the CEO who told me to do as our client had instructed.

When the new bids came in, the company that had been informed of the new changes had a clear and distinct advantage over the one left in the dark. The owner of the company who had been left out of the loop called me in bewilderment. During the course of our conversation, he said, "I don't know where they're getting their numbers from. Are you giving them the same information that you're giving me?"

My heart came to my throat as I thought of all the possible ramifications of telling the truth...none of which were immediately good for me"

After a moment's hesitation, I said, "No, I'm not."

"Can you give me the same information that you're giving them?"

Another moment's hesitation..."No I can't"

"WHY NOT!?!?!?"

"You need to take that up with our client"

I'm not sure exactly what the conversation was between the two companies but when the smoke cleared, our client had been threatened with a lawsuit and had made some settlement agreement with the company that had been left out of the loop.

I was called into my CEO's office and, when I got there, Our CEO, and our client's CEO were in the office, both glared at me as I sat down and took my seat. I was about to be fired.

I was raked over the coals for the better part of thirty minutes being told how I had caused embarrassment to our firm and our client's firm because of my inability to maintain confidentiality. I heard the door open behind me, I assumed it was the head of Human Resources coming to give me my severance papers.

It was the owner of the company who came into the room and took a seat next to me. As he sat down, the CEO of the company asked me, "What were you thinking of?"

There was a bit of a pause. I glanced over to the owner and recalled all of the discussions we had had about my religion and how he had always expressed admiration for our ideals...and then, I reached into my wallet and pulled out my temple recommend.

"Do you see this piece of paper?" I asked. "This is one of the most precious things I own. It allows me to go to a place I consider to be one of the most sacred places on earth and worship my Heavenly Father". The CEO looked a bit confused but he allowed me to continue. "Every year, I have to have this piece of paper renewed. During that process, I have to be interviewed twice; each time by a man that I recognize as being called of God to represent Him. Both of them will ask me several questions, one of which will be, 'Are you honest in your dealings with your fellow man?'. You ask me what I was thinking? I was thinking how I was going to answer that question the next time I was asked."

I stopped talking and left my temple recommend on the table. After an awkward moment of silence, the owner of the company reached out, took the recommend, handed it back to me and then turned to the men on the other side of the able and said, "Gentlemen, this meeting is over".

Eventually the owner decided to sell the company but for the time he was there, I was assured by people in the know that I was untouchable.

The Portrait

29 years ago tomorrow, Kerry Huber against all better judgement, rescued me from bachelorhood. I knew Kerry exactly three weeks before I proposed to her. In a way, it was an arranged marriage. It came about in a rather unorthodox way. (but when have I ever been orthodox about anything?)

As he officially released me from my mission, my Stake President asked me if I would like a blessing. I'm not certain if it was a usual offer but he was my Stake President and his son was my best friend and, in high school I had spent more waking hours at his home than my own so I looked to him and his wife as secondary parents. In light of all that, I readily accepted.

During the blessing, he paused for what seemed an awfully long time. In retrospect, I now know exactly what was going on because it's happened to me since. During the course of a blessing, you're prompted to say something out of the ordinary and, for a while, you kind of have to chew on it. Like when Kerry lost her diamond bracelet, the very first really nice piece of jewelry I'd given her and, in retracing her steps, she realized it could be anywhere up to and including a garbage truck that had carried away tree clippings earlier that day.

She was inconsolable and asked me for a blessing during which I was prompted to promise her she would get it back (I normally don't involve Heavenly Father on the matter of lost jewelry but this was a very sentimental piece and my wife was crying)

Anyway, when I felt prompted to give my wife that blessing, I hemmed and hawed for a moment thinking over the rammifications. Here I was using my priesthood to promise returned jewelry to my wife. It didn't feel right....on a smaller scale, like Nephi wrestling with The Spirit over the demise of Laban.

So, when I was prompted to give that promise to my wife, I kind of backpedaled and said, in my heart, "You know, Heavenly Father, if that's how you feel about it, why don't you just tell her yourself and leave me out of the whole thing?"

"Tell her"

"Okay...but...this doesn't feel right, Heavenly Father. I'm using my priesthood here to promise a blessing to my wife and it seems kind of vain"

"Tell Her"

"Okay...but....you're SURE she's going to get it back? Because, if I promise this thing and she doesn't get it back....I'm gonna look awful fool.."

"Would you just tell her already?

So I promised my wife she would get her bracelet back.

"Now tell her again"

The next day, I walked out of the house, went straight to the garage, opened the door and looked in the bottom of the fertilizer spreader to see my wife's bracelet lying there. (whew)

Anyway...that kind of exchange must have been what was happening in President Bassett's mind while he was paused in my blessing because, the next words out of his mouth were, "Tom, not everyone has somebody that they are supposed to marry, but you do. I bless you that, when you see her, you will know it instantly"

Two years later, I was talking to my girlfriend, Lisa at institute when I looked across the room and saw Kerry. The next thing I thought was, "what am I going to tell Lisa?"

Kerry and I were engaged three weeks later and married four months later. Over the years, I have seen the wisdom of our Heavenly Father in placing the two of us together. When the school district we were in was refusing to give our special needs son the services he needed, I watched in awe as the lioness I married argued with no fewer than twelve school district officials and lawyers. At the end of three hours, they finally threw in the towel and gave us everything we were asking for.

While I was recuperating from my accident, when growing a beard was the only thing I could do by myself, she fed and dressed and bathed me for the better part of a year. She never complained once or made me feel like the service she rendered me was a burden.

Over the years, she has been my companion, my confidant, my willing scrabble partner and, when I've needed it, the thorn in my side and the boot to my rear.

Our courtship was brief and so we had to get to know each other better after we married. We are both dominant personalities and so we've had to work out many many compromises over the last three decades. Most of these have concerned my personal wardrobe choices. If she hates a tie that I love, the compromise we work out is that she tells me I can keep it and then one day, several months later, I will look through my closet and realize that the tie we argued over hasn't been seen in quite a while.

If I could change one thing about her, it would be her own self-deprication. Although I love to take pictures, my wife has never been a willing subject, telling me that she want's to get a better haircut or lose some weight first.

Every time she offers these excuses, I look at her and wonder what the heck she's talking about. She looks more beautiful today than the day we married and I realize that I cannot look at her without filtering everything I take in through the three decades of our life together. And so I wrote her this poem and, in honor of the anniversary of her agreeing to rescue me, I share it with our friends:

(I'm a little ham-fisted when it comes to poetry so all I can manage is iambic pentameter)

The Portrait

I have no portrait of my wife to place upon a wall
There's none within my wallet, to share with one and all
There lies a canvas in my heart that's stretched out through the years
and with a brush of memories, I paint her portrait there

I have so many memories, from each of them I choose
her colors vibrant and bold or soft and subtle hues
and every time I add a stroke, I glance again to see
the portrait in my heart has grown more beautiful to me

Across the altar of The Lord, her lovliness and grace
are captured in my memory, and form the portrait's face
The day that our first son was born, I watched her hold the child
and it is from that memory, I paint the portrait's smile

Each tender word, each warm caress, each moment that I prize
are captured in my memory and shines within her eyes
And every day of triumph, and those of pain and grief
adds character, and contrast, and beauty underneath.

There are no borders in my heart; no barriers, nor fences
to mark the place the portrait stops, and where my soul commences
The countenance shall never fade; the colors never set
upon this cherished rendering, that's not quite finished yet.

The Last Spanking

We never did spank our kids a lot. In our home, there were only two offenses which were 'spanking-worthy'

1) The child in question did something that endangered himself or others
2) The child in question directly (and I mean DIRECTLY) defied parental authority

Then one day in Foley's during the Christmas holiday rush, Daniel became frustrated with his mother for something or other and he raised his fist to strike her. I blocked the blow and, using his raised hand to turn him around, administered two swift swats to his hindquarters.

Sniffling ensued.

I pulled Daniel off to the side and asked, "Do you know why I spanked you?"

....sniff...."yes"....sniff

"Why did I spank you?", I asked

"'cause you don't love me"

That was the last spanking I ever gave.

(you should thank your older brother, Sarah)