Growing Up Mormon: Alma the Lamanite, Part One

For the entire story, click the Alma the Lamanite topic at the end of this post, in the sidebar to your right, or just click here.

Living in Idaho, I considered myself an outsider.  For one thing I moved there in high school while most of the kids in town had been there since birth.  For another I'd been on several continents and most of those kids hadn't even left the Mormon Valley which stretches from Southeastern Idaho to Southern Utah.  But I wasn't the outsider I considered myself to be.

During my junior year I became friends with Alma Bischoff, a boy who showed me everything I'd ever learn about being an outsider.  Alma was the fourth and youngest child of an elderly couple in our church ward.  He was also the only one of the four to have been adopted, and obviously so, for you see Alma was Native American and his family was decidedly Caucasian.  It was from my association with Alma that my interest in American Indians and their heritage first began.   

At church everyone knew him, but no one was close to him.  He was dark and sinewy. In his legs and arms his muscles were defined in long strokes like those of a paintbrush, creating the illusion of rapid motion even when he was standing still.  His face was cut at angles that contrasted the rest of us with our softer, rounder, whiter features.  He looked through people with an intensity that would convince you he could.  For those reasons he was watched intensely by the girls as if he were the forbidden fruit.

I met Alma on the basketball court. Mormon churches always have a court and the young men gravitate toward it whenever possible.  The one thing I could do was play ball, so for me the court was the place to be, the place where all other things equalized and I could excel.  At the new ward I'd play one on one, two on two, horse, around-the-world, twenty-one – the game didn't matter and I won more often than not.  These victories always came with an asterisk from my opponents: “Too bad Alma isn't here.” Alma had a rep and I really wanted to play him, but for the first year he wasn't around.  His parents were “having problems” with him and they were dealing with it by having him stay at someone else's house and going to a different ward.  Eventually he came back unannounced and one Wednesday night I arrived at the church building to see this Indian boy taking shots from from the three point line.

Swish.

Swish.

Swish.

I knew this was Alma. 

In the way of boys, I didn't introduce myself I just walked out onto the court and started rebounding for him until he missed, then I took some shots.  His right eyebrow raised noticeably when the white boy swished some too.  “Game?” he asked.  “Sure,” I answered. 

I've played against some amazing ball players in my years.  Once while in Florida I was on the Tyndale Air Force Base traveling team and we played the East Coast circuit.  I played against a lot of college and former college players and even played one game against Spud Webb and his team.  In Korea I was on the squad that the U.S. Olympic team practiced against in preparation for a humiliating bronze medal finish.  Against all those players and in all those years I still say that Alma Bischoff was one of the best I've ever seen.  He was fluid on the court, a constant motion always directed toward the rim.  When he jumped he could control every part of his body in the air and seemed weightless as he'd shoot and rebound.  It was a pleasure to play against him – you never knew what he was going to do next.

I quickly understood why the boys had been reverential with his name.  Not that I didn't hold my own, but his victories were one after another.  Usually on Wednesday nights the Mutual instructors would round up the boys from the gym when the lesson or activity was starting, but on Alma's first night back they stood at the double doors and watched until we were both drenched in sweat and there wasn't any point in having a lesson.  They just called open basketball and we finished the night, captains on opposing teams.

The next day, Thursday, my father took me aside to explain to me about Alma Bischoff.  He had his serious face on, the one where he brow ridge protruded and his Elvis sneer reared up on the left side of his mouth.  It was the face he used to explain to me how awful it'd be to die and find out that you were going to be eternally punished instead of rewarded.  He began, “Son I want to talk to you about Alma Bischoff.  I want you to fellowship him at church and Mutual, but I'd rather you didn't associate with him outside of sanctioned church events.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Brother and Sister Bischoff are wonderful people.  They're very spiritual and the Lord is guiding them to do everything they can with their son.  But I'm afraid that he's got some very bad spirits influencing him.  I know that can happen with some of our Lamanite brethren.” 

In the book of Mormon, after the part where Lehi and his family travel in submarines to South America. (Yeah, I know they weren't exactly submarines in that they didn't travel submerged, but they were enclosed, sealed and bobbing along with currents.)  Anyway, after that part, there was a feud between brothers and some were good and became Nephites and got to stay white and some were bad and became Lamanites and had their skin darkened. These Lamanites, according to Mormons eventually became the Native American Tribes that Europeans discovered and conquered.

“Yes, dad,” I answered, now with yet another reason to go find Alma. 

I found him at his house that Saturday. As I walked up I stopped short at the door and listened to the yelling coming from inside.  It was his parents, Brother and Sister Bischoff, yelling at Alma and him yelling back.  I didn't catch it all, but here's some of the snippets I did hear:

“We adopted you to give you a chance at salvation but you can't overcome your heritage, can you?”

“Absolutely not.  You are not allowed to search for that filthy family that couldn't take care of you in the first place.”

“If I ever catch you with any of those Indian boys again, I swear we'll send you to a boarding school that you'll never escape from.”

I waited on the porch for a while and then started to walk away.  That's when the door opened and I turned around to see Alma standing there.  He had tears down his cheeks but his eyes were cold and I wasn't going to say anything about it.  We looked at each other for a minute and then I bounced my ball on the cement and said, “I just came over to see if you wanted to shoot some.”

He smiled gratefully.

(Much more to come in the story of Alma the Lamanite)

Comments

[a rose is a rose]

damn you (no, not really) for NOT finishing the story all in one swoop. damn damn damn

you know rick, i just cannot understand growing up 'that way'. not that MY parents were the most open and embracing people in the universe or anything but (once again) DAMN

if you've never seen the movie rabbit proof fence, i recommend it. i believe it's a book too, but i've not read it.

[SML]

Oh, God. This story is so touching.

My very first teenage crush and date was with an Indian guy named Mike who had been adopted into an LDS family.

[mark]

soooooo...if skin color is so damn important to Mormons, what do they make of MJ? I mean he is darn near white now!

[CV Rick]

Rose, there's no way I could write it all at one time nor is there any realistic expectation that anyone's going to read 10,000+ words of content in a single sitting. The internet more readily lends itself to small chunks.

SML, I hope that Mike didn't suffer the life that Alma endured.

Mark, sometimes I don't have a clue where your tangents come from.

[Sideon]

This was painful to read.

A good friend in high school was an adopted "Lamanite." His family said similarly hateful things. The self-righteousness was palpable in that household. I certainly didn't help things because I wasn't a good Mormon, hence a negative influence for him. He was shy and soft spoken, and completely girl crazy, but none of the Mormon girls would give him the time of day. I lost contact with him after he went on a mission - which I will never in my life understand how he reconciled (kind of like gay guys doing missions - I just don't get it).

He wasn't at our 20 year high school reunion, but I found his home address. I hope he's happier than he was in the hell days of high school.

[Jonathan Blake]

Excellent story. I'm looking forward to the next installment.

Just to prove that I spent too much time with the Book of Mormon in my life, Lehi et al. sailed in a boat. It was the Jaredites who had the submarines. And yes, I am this pedantic about other works of fiction.

[Jonathan Blake]

Oh, this also reminded me of my two "Indian foster brothers" who were placed with my family when I was very young to help them go to schools outside of the reservation. I can only guess that the root motivation to start this program was tied up in the Mormon ideas about Native American heritage and destiny.

[CV Rick]

That's true, Jonathan. Most of the people reading my blog have never read the Book of Mormon, however and I'm just trying to simplify the ridiculous.

[CV Rick]

Think it's painful now, Sideon? Wait for the next few installments. This was just the introduction.

[Sideon]

I may have to read through the slits of my fingers over my eyes.

[Cynthia Bagley]

Yes, I saw this too. But it was in the northeast corner of Utah in a little place called Whiterocks.

[mark]

tangents? C'mon, they aren't that hard are they? I never knew the Mormons had this skin color thing...so yes, I was making a joke about skin color and its affect on your afterlife/standing with the almighty...get it now?

MJ=Michel Jackson

[CV Rick]

oh . . . I thought you were talking about Michael Jordan because of the references to basketball in this story.

[Hellmut]

Great writing, great story, CV Rick.

Although there is something noble about wanting to "save" someone else, it's also arrogant. It establishes a hierarchy where the receiver can never be an equal.

Of course, parents should not be the equals of children. But children can become adults. If your parents believe they need to save you from your race then you will always remain inferior in their eyes.

It is sad when dogma cripples us like Alma's parents. I am anxious to find out if Alma somehow escapes intact.

[Pants]

Poor Alma. I knew children like him who grew up in "righteous" Mormon families. Thank you for sharing this...I will definitely be back for more!