Caring for church's property

My wife was preparing for a stake women's event, and we needed cloths for the round banquet tables that had replaced the long rectangular ones in a recent remodeling of our aging stake center.

We were at Bed Bath & Beyond and were disappointed that they didn't have enough cloths of any color in the right size. "These orange, brown, gold and green ones looks great together," I pointed out. "Who says they have to be uniform?"

She liked that idea, and we proceeded to load our selections into the cart.

She didn't like my next suggestion, though. "I assume we're donating these tablecloths to the stake," I said.

"Not a chance," she answered.

"You don't have a budget for this, do you?"

"There's a budget, all right," she said. "What I mean is, we'll lend these tablecloths for any stake function that needs them, but they will remain our personal property."

"Oh," I said. "Why?"

"If they belong to the church, they'll be in a Relief Society closet where anyone can use them whenever they want."

"Isn't that a good thing?" I asked.

"It would be, except that within a year some or all of them would be missing when I need them. There'll be holes and stains. Or they'll be dirty from the last usage, and I'll have to wash them before I can use them."

"Really?" This was as much a surprise to me as when I learned, years before, than women's public restrooms were not always cleaner than men's. I guess I imagined that women always behaved responsibly because all the women I knew well behaved that way.

But my wife's rather pessimistic attitude about how church property would be treated was born of long experience. The data were on her side.

My own experience supported her view. Our stake center has a nonstandard, super-cushioned wooden basketball floor. (This is North Carolina; that's what we do instead of putting in a pipe organ.) To protect it when metal folding chairs were being put out, we have two huge plastic tarpaulins that, when folded, weigh so much and are so awkward to handle that it takes four men to lift them.