If you Google Kukuipukaheau you will find it is a physical location on the Island of Maui.
While working at National Camp School at Camp Tracy Utah for the Boy Scouts of America I was given the rare opportunity to run Camp Malahia for the summer. The Kukuipukaheau is part of the 300 acres owned by the Maui County Council. Some say it dates back about ten thousand years and is a place of healing family relationships and individuals. I believe it is.
I turned sixty a few months ago and have been single for the past twenty plus years. My wife and I married as a result of a pregnancy and were sealed in the Salt Lake Temple a year later. We had five children together within our first nine years of marriage. Two girls and three boys. After the second child was born my wife suffered from postpartum depression which developed into psychosis and she began a long voyage in and out of mental wards receiving continuous care from teams of mental health professionals.
After about ten years of marriage and while my wife was a resident at a facility in Idaho her primary Doctor asked me to make an appointment to visit with him where he expressed his concerns as well as the concerns of the entire staff. They came to the consensus her attempts at suicide would eventually succeed and "...if I loved my wife, I would divorce her."
After consulting with my parents and my Bishop I filed for divorce. Eventually she was released from the hospital and began her new life with a loving husband.
I became a single parent of five beautiful children and my life transformed into the father who brings home the paycheck, and the mother.
With three children in school and two at home it was a difficult balancing act between daycare, work, and stay at home mom which eventually worked out when I changed my occupation from managing a Deseret Industries to teaching 7th grade Geography about a half mile from our home.
I was able to be in school with my children, and home with them shortly after they were out of school. With the summers off I worked at Boy Scout Camps where I got a little break from cooking the meals.
I was called to be the co-chair of the stake mid-singles and served for ten years but never went on a date. A few years ago one of my students, now an adult, really wanted to set me up on a date with a woman she worked and I agreed to have lunch with her near her work. During lunch she asked me what my greatest achievement had been in life and without hesitation I replied being a single parent with five children.
She was a very successful professional in the social science field and had worked very hard to get where she was, but she was not impressed with my response. We finished our lunch with some pleasant conversation and she thanked me. That was my one and only date.
About five years ago my aunt passed away and I met President Monson at her funeral. She had lived next door to President Monson after they moved in as newly weds and I remember as a child sitting on the curb in front of her house waiting for President Monson to drive by to catch a glimpse of my favorite General Authority. I haven't attended my Ward since my Aunts funeral.
Meeting President Monson is a highlight of my life and has nothing to do with my lack of church attendance but I simply took a part time job working week ends just to stay busy. I've lived in my current Ward since 1969 attending regularly. I've taught every Sunday school class and served two stake missions, a full time mission, Ward Clerk, early morning Seminary Teacher, Elders Quorum Presidencies, Stake and Ward Young Men's Presidencies, Varsity Coach, Cub Master and Nursery leader. They have all been wonderful testimony building experiences and I have loved all those whom I was called to serve with. But I must say in my humble opinion being a single male in a Ward is like a round peg in a square hole. As a single parent I never had home teachers, or a visit from the relief society. Of course I understand why married woman would be reluctant to visit a single male and his family but nevertheless our needs were no less than any single parents.
I understood why over 90 percent of the single men on my mid-singles roster were inactive needless to say.
I haven't always had a testimony of the gospel. As a teenager I did not like to go to church or family prayers, or family home evenings. I wasn't going to go on a mission and I wouldn't have if it hadn't been for my high school sweetheart who talked me into fasting and praying for a testimony. I agreed to fast for five days with her and pray for a testimony of the church. I drove from Idaho to Provo and we started our fast together in prayer. At the end of the five day fast I was back in Idaho and did not expect what would happen at the conclusion of our fast. I found a very private place, got on my knees fully expecting this to be the very last religious act in my life time and asked one simple question. "Is there a God, do you really exist?" Needless to say I got my answer and worthily went on a full time mission. My life was changed for ever against my full intentions and desires for ever.
I know Joseph Smith Jr. is a prophet of God, that the Book Of Mormon was translated by the gift and power of God. I know Thomas S. Monson is our living Prophet today and that God through his Son Jesus Christ guides and directs this work.
