As a child, I was full of faith. Not just faith in the religious sense, but faith in the people around me, and in the goodness of the world. I was devout in the way that many true believers are, following all of the social protocols, proselytizing constantly and often obnoxiously, and most of all repeating back everything taught to me. I desperately wanted to belong. And as time went on, I did come to belong. I sang with the worship team, mixed sound for the church band, and put out chairs for the audiences as we did street-preaching on Main Street. I lead the "Alive in Him" club at my high school for a time. I studied in Greek and Hebrew, analyzing verses word by word for a meaning that would move my fellow believers. I wrote sermons for effect, and practiced them under the tutelage of the pastors of our local church. I sometimes even did well enough that I moved people to tears. And in retrospect, I think I was mostly happy in that area of my life.
But there were problems. Privately, I was a deeply depressed individual for much of my high school career. The depth of emotion that allowed me to move others also let me peer deeply into an abyss for which I was not, at that time, prepared. More than dreaming, I had waking visions, and felt compelled to act out strange experiments. I would sit alone in my room and repeat the most hurtful things said to me by various people over and over again, annihilating all sense of self worth that I might have. I felt that my work was useless and that I wasn't helping anyone, that perhaps I was only doing it all to be seen, and to be liked for it. The self-recrimination became a constant buzz in my head, causing me to lose focus whenever I sang, or spoke in front of a crowd. Even when I was just helping out around the church, I could feel it. Not only that, but to add to the oddity of my life, my late grandfather passed on to me a small bible, which in the back had a chart of the numerical values of the letters of the Greek alphabet. Asking around about it got me some very strange looks. Soon it was time to prep for college, a church affiliated school in this case, and I just didn't feel it. I felt alienated from the rest of the church people I had grown accustomed to, but for the most part, knew no one else.
It was at that point that two things happened to me: 1) The girl I really liked utterly crushed me, and 2) I got into a car accident. The first was pretty pathetic really. I called her often and was typically desperate as only the virginal can be. She wasn't really interested in me, because I wasn't really an interesting person. I had been so wrapped up in fitting in, that all of the things that could have made me seem interesting were entirely buried beneath the template self I had built up. Still, it wasn't really a very nice thing to say... "Why are you laughing at me?" "Because I can." Nevertheless, it was probably as dramatic a moment as any angsty teenager could really hope to have happen to them, barring comparisons to movie moments or horrific abuse of some sort. I lost 20 or 30 pounds in a month, and ended up seeing a psychiatrist, who recommended Demian by Herman Hesse to me. The second was sudden and swift. I was messing with the radio in my truck while talking to a friend on a ramp between two freeways. I hit the edge of the curb and flipped my truck two or three times. Neither of us was hurt badly, although my friend did break his finger. After that nothing felt the same. The joy of going to church services and being around the people there was gone. I felt nothing, as though a limb had been cut off. I left in the middle of the first service I went to after the accident, went to the bathroom and just sat there until it ended. I couldn't stay any longer.
And I didn't. My parents had planned a month long trip to the East Coast, and I went with them, discovering as I went, that I was okay with being something different. Something broken, surely, but not bad. After the trip, I left home. I stayed with friends and wandered at intervals. I did not know where I was going, for the first time, and it felt good. My skills served me well. Gematria came to be more than just a curiosity to me, and the study of Hebrew is something I have continued. The vanity I feared is no longer a concern. I am now safely unpleasant to the eyes, and my voice chokes up around people I don't know. I don't think that Christianity failed me, nor that I was somehow lacking as a believer. I think I was awkward at everything I did, often self-sabotaging and conformist. I failed because I needed to know what was behind the curtains and the quickest way out is through the abject.
I don't remember why I was the person who would preach to anyone. I can't remember whether I was really happy or if it was just a delusion. I don't even remember what it feels like to be so self-assured. Aikeena used to talk about waking up a different person, and I knew what he meant, then and now. I learned not to trust people, because whenever I went into a group of new people, there were loads of history that I could sense, but not know until it was too late. The volatility that substance usage added to all my social situations later on made it imperative that I not extend trust to people even after years of knowing them. I learned that some people will hurt you because they can, not just by laughing at you, but with fists and knives and guns. I learned that our reality, despite the appearance of stability, is a weak and tinny song that can be silenced at any moment. I learned that peace and reason are not infinite commodities, but rare and sacred when they can be found. Most of all, I learned that having faith means continuing to try and build a better world out of the muck and mire in which we often find ourselves. It means knowing that you will not complete the work, but neither may you desist from it. It means that we rarely acknowledge through action how much we need each other, and yet it is together that we inherit our greatest strengths.
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. (Psalm 23:5)
