A Tale of Two Houses, Part 2

So our neighbors sold their land. They were a polygamist family that had a lot with three houses, one for each wife. The new owner - not really an active Mormon - was there often making improvements. But - as he lived out of state - he wasn't there often enough. During his absence, he had discovered tire tracks coming down Cinder Mountain, right up to his house, and his property ransacked. Several other secondary homes had been robbed, also. So he asked us if we would consider moving into one of the homes in exchange for keeping an eye on the place.

The benefit was that the house he was referring to was very close to my house. (I timed it. It takes exactly 2.34 minutes to walk between houses.) The solution was to move one of my wives (with her respective kids) into the new house, and keep the other wife in our existing trailer. But the question was - which one?

Individually, my wives approached me, expressing a desire to be the one to move into the new home.

Martha pointed out that the house was bigger, and that she had more children. She also pointed out that she had lived longer in our beat-up, old trailer than anyone else.

Temple pointed out that - unlike Martha - she had never been able to move into her own place. She had been the one to move into Martha's house. She didn't even have her own bedroom when she first married me. We had hung up sheets, partitioning off the living room just so thatshe could have her own space. (Eventually the curtains became walls.)

No pressure....

To make matters worse, my extended family started to get themselves involved. Some family members actually went to Martha and told her that SHE deserved to have the new house. Some of them went to my CHILDREN and planted in their ears that they should have the chance to move into the new house. I couldn't believe that people were interfering this way! Like it was any of their business.

But that is something I have learned - when you live plural marriage, everyone becomes an armchair judge on how you handle your marriages. You fall under a kind of scrutiny, and everyone is a critic.

So I set out trying to make a careful decision.

I examined each house. The house we lived in had smaller living room, but larger bedrooms. The new house had smaller bedrooms, but a larger living area. Where would the space be better used?

Again, it was housekeeping that made my decision for me.

I don't mean to speak indelicately or to say anything negative about my wives. But I have one wife who is fastidious and clean (when it comes to keeping house). And I have another wife who is more messy and very prone to let cleaning chores accumulate, a bit of a pack rat, as it were. One wife keeps her bedroom immaculate. The other wife - let's just say that I have to clear the bed off in order to get in and sleep.

That doesn't mean that I love any wife less. It's just that every woman is different, every woman has her own idea on how things should be done. Luckily, the common areas - the kitchen, dining room, living room and bathroom - were kept clean by both wives.

But I had to consider - this new house did not belong to us. It belonged to someone else. I had to consider that it was expected that there would be some upkeep involved in living there. Whoever lived there would have to keep it clean and not trash the place. I had to pick the wife who was most likely to keep it clean.

And so I picked Temple.

Martha was upset at first. We had a few heated discussions in private, and then I took both wives aside and had it out. I told them, "This is a win/ win situation for everyone. We get exactly what we prayed for - more space. And we don't even have to pay for it! Temple gets to move into the new place, and Martha gets to expand in the old house."

Each wife would get something they had not had in a while - a room to themselves. And I could finally provide to my teenage daughter Sophie something she had never had - a room without her brothers. I was excited about this.

And as we started to make arrangements, Martha started to get excited, too.

But immediately people started to judge us. My extended family and other in our community started to talk about me behind my back, that I was favoring Temple over Martha. It was very frustrating for me to have these rumors float back to me. They didn't understand the reason or the logic behind my decision.

And my logic has proved sound. Temple keeps the new place spotless. And the messiness of Martha's room has expanded into the common areas. But I'm jumping ahead of myself...

As we prepared to make the move, some of the kids expressed disfavor about the whole situation. Some of Martha's kids expressed resentment that it was Temple - not their mother - moving into the new place. And my son with Temple, Aidan, who is 8 years-old, burst into tears when we broke the news to him.

He insisted that it was going to be his MOTHER that be would be moving, NOT him. He would stay with his other brothers and sisters and live with Martha.

Even though she had earlier expressed a desire to move, Temple came to me in private.

"I'm no longer in favor of splitting up the family," she said. "I'm afraid of what's going to happen to the family."

I brought up these concerns to Martha, but she was already determined and anticipating the new space.

It was around this time last year that I had to leave for the summer on the fair circuit. It was also around this time that Temple's seasonal job at the school gave her the summer off. I wasn't there, but Temple put all her time into getting the new place ready. She deep-cleaned, sanded, painted. She put a lot of work into it.

Around the end of August, I came home for a few days. It had already been several weeks since Temple had moved up to the new house on the hill. In my absence, my family had already split up and were living apart. It was weird coming home.

The new house was still in the process of being renovated, so all of the bedrooms were empty. She had a mattress on the living room floor, and that's where she and I and the kids slept. It was a strange feeling.

Then I went back on the road until October. When I came back, Temple had finished the renovation. She had done all that work by herself, with no help from anybody else. What I found was a home. Temple and I had something that we had never had in our married life - a place to ourselves.

But it came with its challenges.

I have always said that the hardest part of plural marriage was the first year, getting used to it. I found that adjusting to having two families in two separate homes was just as bad as adjusting to living the Principle.

But I am going to save that for Part 3...