I used to believe in everything. Monsters and fairies, eternal damnation and paradise, love and hate. It seems like I always gravitated toward the inbetweenness of life. Somewhere, I discovered that there are few comfortable living in the middle of the tension. I don't enjoy it much myself, but it seems like there's no where else for my mind and heart to live.

When I was small, I played a lot by myself. I must have preferred it that way, though I can't say I clearly remember. A memory invaded me tonight, of when the questions didn't hurt as much. Surrounded by the fence in our backyard, I danced around by myself--the movements were structured, even if it were just in my mind, and I was imagining auditioning for some role which would make me famous and fill the deep need I had to fit in. I sang, probably slightly off-pitch, Disney's mermaid's song of longing to be "where the people are" so I could "ask my questions and get some answers." I wanted to be a part of everyone else's world.

But life doesn't seem to work that way for me. I can't figure if it's me or others. Is my desire to risk everything on other people, risk being open and vulnerable and authentic, foolishness? Because it certainly feels like it. I know that it isn't about me, but sometimes I wonder if it is. If I could just be like the other people. If I could just find a way to acclimate without sacrificing who I am at my core...

In order to do that, I have to sacrifice my own voice--just like Ariel, the mermaid did. Somehow, despite that, her prince still seemed to fall in love with her. But I wonder. I wonder if he didn't just fall in love with a shadow of who she was...I wonder if they don't just love a shadow of who I am.

I'm being dramatic. Surely that's all there is to this, but I ache for that acceptance. I ache to be loved for who I am, not what I do. That's something that's common to all of us though, isn't it?

I recently broke up with someone. It wasn't necessarily my choice, but we didn't date for a very long period of time, and while I mourn the loss of the possibility, I think I'm coping fairly well. I say this, not to continue to bemoan the break-up (my journal carries those sentiments for me), but rather because I feel like I have all of these random possibilities coming out of the woodwork. It's a bit disconcerting, and I keep thinking that maybe I'm just making it up. Part of that is due to the fact that I've not dated much before, and I guess I had just come to the conclusion that people just weren't interested in me. It'd be nice to meet someone though. I miss being in that type of relationship (especially with an amazing man). It'll come along though. I hope.

There's so much in more conservative theology that limits understanding of how these types of relationships are supposed to work. My heart seems firmly rooted in this longing to have someone--someone amazing and who fits me just right--to have until I die. I understand that I can't expect that of the next person I date, at least not at first. It's hard not to though. It's hard not to expect that of anyone I become involved in relationship with. Part of it is due to the fact that I'd prefer to avoid the potential pain of a broken relationship. Part of it is due to the hope that I hold for a healthy marriage and family life someday. Most of it is the former though.

I wish in the church we had a more authentic understanding of romantic relationships and sexuality. It's sexuality in a romance that is cast in such a dark, mysterious and to a point, evil light. It saddens me that we've vilified this sacred act of two becoming one. There's a beautiful power in the erotic, something that speaks to the embodiment of love and mutual giving and receiving.

It's a thought I've been exploring, very, very recently, this idea of the way of the masculine versus the way of the feminine (not to be confused with gender exclusive roles assigned according to biology--I wish there were better words for these things). The way of the masculine has placed so much emphasis on transcending life, by achieving some form of immortality--through the building of kingdoms, the creating of art, the productivity of life. There is a disconnect here, between the spirit (of work, life, love) and the body (of relationship, life, love). Certainly, this could be illustrated in the difference of sexual release in a man in difference to the sexual release of a woman. For a man, the orgasm releases energy, physically spilling seed which yearns to be planted. For a woman, the release is more focused internally, it is a grasping and holding onto (in the case of coitus with a man, of the seed). This receiving of a woman becomes a giving of human life, in the gestation of a new life.

There needs to be coupling of both masculine thought, but the feminine perspective needs to take these thoughts, add it's own, and birth something new, something that is not a spirit (though spirit is part of it), these new "concepts" would be more than just abstractions, but rather they would be the embodiment of life and fresh answers to all these questions that plague us.

In another train of thought, it seems to me that the church has failed to equip it's youth in a variety of ways, one of the most significant is a way to harness the power of the erotic and the surge of hormones. There needs to be some open, non-rigid way to speak with people of how sensuality (which includes sexuality, among other things) needs to be harnessed. Part of my problem is I find the forbidding of an appropriate exploration of sexuality before marriage is naive and often harmful to the development of healthy relationships. I would never wish to make the case that a relationship should revolve around sexuality, I think that extreme would be dangerous. But to try to make a relationship revolve around the "spirituality" (i.e., emotional connection) is just as dangerous. There needs to be a growth of both together.

These are just some of the thoughts rambling around in my head. Loose threads that I'll eventually weave into something...I hope.

In the Beginning

I think I was thirteen. Maybe fourteen. It's hard to remember now. It was that pivotal moment in your life, where you have the first notion that you're not a child anymore, but still caught in the agony of the in between. Maybe agony's too strong a word, but how else can you define the angst of having your identity dissolved into a puddle of questions and hormones? I wish I could still see the scene with vivid clarity, but even the short span of nine to ten years has blurred it into some mythological event that I can only recount with hyperbole.

I remember sitting on my bedroom floor a lot. The pink carpet rough, my cheeks stained with tears, and my entire being wracked with fear. I had somehow convinced myself that God was disappointed with me, that I wasn't living up to those oh-so-holy notions of what God had intended for me. I was only thirteen, and already my life was a failure. I couldn't find the right words to apologize, I only knew how to make promises that I would do better. Mostly, I just coveted love--God's love of me, sure, but even more so, I yearned to love God. No one had ever explained to me how. They told me how to "know" God, and I figured that this was as good of a step as any. So I began in the beginning, in Genesis, and kept reading that King James, highlighting and underlining, until my Bible matched all those I considered highly devoted to this craft of faith. I knew nothing more about God at the close of Revelation then I knew before. I only had more questions.

That was in the beginning. In the now, I'm finishing up my first year as a divinity student, working at a church as a youth minister, and experiencing a whole horseload of shitty other emotions (though, to be fair, some of them shouldn't be classified as "shitty," some of them have been quite wonderful.) But I'm still sitting with a lot of questions, and if possible, seemingly even more emotions. Despair, anger, fear, and apathy all crowd in like unwanted guests in this party of my current life. I keep seeing glimpses of hope and love, but they always seem to be talking to others.

I dreamed the other night, that I had a public journal to write all these things down. These are things I want to be able to express without censoring myself (something most who know me well would laugh at me about, as much of what I say is candid to say the least).

So this is it. This is my beginning.