Which is why a lot of people are scared to live in an atheist society. If you have surgery and get anesthesia, you can see the relationship between the words atheist and aesthete. Anesthesia literally means without sensation. The prefix a/an means without. Theist means god, so a monotheist worships one God, and a polytheist worships many, such as the Hindus. Atheist means without a god.
Funny how the introduction of Islam was not the true religion, but it still was an improvement, or was closer to the truth, because it took the Arabic people descended from Ishmael from a polytheist to a monotheist society. "No God but God" was their chant. Nearly every principle found in the Bible is found in the Quran. Yes, they made Joseph a prophet, and added and played loose with quite a bit. Still, it got the nation rid of all those stupid graven images.
Time pollutes things. We get careless or selfish or some other agenda pops up. Even in language. I say "ya'll" all the time even knowing it means all of you. Today I saw an ad for a product called "whonu". Why can't they say Who Knew? I understand why my students are using these abbreviations like oic and lol and ttyl. It's a lot easier if you are texting on a keyboard the size of Barbie's hands.
In view of all that, it amazes me that the Bible has maintained its integrity. That must be some serious holy spirit. The military moves soldiers to a new fort at least once every three years. "Familiarity breeds contempt" and they want the troops to maintain readiness for battle. Stay on your toes. I was thinking about what allows us to treat each other harshly or with contempt. We get used to each other and take each other for granted. Sometimes I wonder if we are even familiar with the object of our contempt in the first place. My boss treats me like I'm a fool but she doesn't even know me, never took any time or made any effort to understand me, to know what makes me tick.
Like, have you seen the movie "Dead Poet's Society"? Yeah, you're right. I like that one. There's a subplot in that movie about a boy who is at the prep school and is a talented actor. Extremely gifted brilliant even. It's after the depression and his parents went through that time period, and they do not want their good boy to be an actor. They want him to have a real solid dependable job. I don't remember what they want him to study, doctor, lawyer, accountant. Something like that
He just wants to act. They take him out of prep school and tell him he's headed to military academy on the train the next morning. He has no choice.
Oh but he does. His father has a gun in his study. The boy goes inside and gets it, and uses it. He commits suicide. If he can't live doing what he loves, and must live doing what he abhors, he would prefer to end his life.
Now that is a hard choice to face. When the parents hear the bang, the father rushes to his study. You don't see the boy; the scene lasts maybe ten seconds. All you see is the father opening the door to a darkened room, and then his voice breaking as he says, "Oh, my baby boy."
I suppose some regret in that father's heart for forcing such a choice on his child. There is no doubt the father loves his son, and that scene (yes it is a made up story) breaks your heart when you hear his voice breaking down. But there are real people like that. Can you love someone without knowing who they are, what they think, what they want? Evidently.
Isn't it sad humans can get so far away from each other that all the love in the world can't help them overcome their differences? People used to tell me when the girls were teenagers that I was the boss and just go in their rooms and rip the rock star calendars off the wall. For what? So they can hate me more, and then secretly plot the days till they can move out and hook up with rock stars? That's what my mother did. I didn't want rock stars, just education. But she made it so impossible for me to live at home, between her and my father I had to go. I didn't have any direction to go towards. I just had a direction to leave behind. Something to get away from.
Sunday our talk was about relying on Jehovah. Leslie's husband Chris gave it. He started talking about an example in the bible of someone who relied on Jehovah when no one else understood what they were going through. I thought wow, that should be Hannah, but he'll probably talk about some guy in the bible.
He turned to 1 Samuel and we read about Hannah and how no one except Jehovah understood why she was so hurt. Even Elkanah didn't get it, said what do you want with sons when you have me? Chris says: "Some people just don't know what to say." That's so funny. Elkanah was stupid when it came to his wife's desire to have a child. Socially inept, awkward, whatever you want to call it. He just didn't get it. Jehovah did. That's all.
Hannah got to have her babies finally, but it was many years of listening to Peninah brag about her babies. It takes nine months to make one, and she bragged about more than one, so that's a long time to be in Hannah's shoes.
I suppose my mother might love me, or the idea of me. I don't think she knows who I am, or wants to know. She doesn't understand books and reading and writing and wanting to be in words all the time. For the last two days I wore only black and white to school. Why? Because I don't have to waste my brain on matching anything. I just want to get dressed and get on with what matters. And my mother cares about clothes and how you look and varying your fashion. I don't. I mean, it's nice to look nice. I wish I was gorgeous. But I would rather have a half hour a day to blog a lot more than a half hour to piddle around in the closet. It's just not that interesting.
Here, the words, now that is engaging. I have a favorite word, a favorite letter, a favorite Bible verse (lots of them) a favorite quote, book, poem, saying, lyric. I don't have a favorite outfit. Am I decent and socially acceptable? Fine, let's go.
I am such a disappointment to her. I have tried to be who she wanted me to be, and it isn't in me. I was so depressed from 17-18 that I barely functioned. I had a quiet little nervous breakdown and no one bothered to see it. Here's a quote I like: Trying to be someone else wastes the person you really are.
I got tired of wasting me, my brain, my life. Here is what is ironic. She is such a disappointment to me. Last time we were there, before she threw us out, we went to meeting with her. All the way home, a 20 minute drive, she kept asking us did we see this sister, that family, those brothers, and all she could do was criticize their appearances. Some of those spiritual kin did not seem to have much money, so I don't know how she expected them to dress better or have a new car in the parking lot. I don't know if Jehovah feels reproached over a 1974 panel van with duct tape over one of the windows parked at His house on Sunday morning. But I got so tired of hearing her whine about how no one met the standards she was busy setting on Jehovah's behalf.
I'm pretty sure that we didn't meet that standard either. We are decent and covered, but we don't look like a runner up in the Miss New Mexico pageant like she was. So we disappoint her. There was a brother five years younger than me named Charlie and when I was 12 and he was 7 he asked me to marry him. Well, I didn't hold him to that, and he married a nice girl named Shawn and they had babies nearly the exact ages of my babies. And they are thin and blonde and my mother goes on and on about them. She never goes on and on about my girls.
That's pretty tough to bear. I don't bear it anymore. I just stay away. The whole time she does stuff like this the word going on in the back of my mind is "Pharisee." Quit praying where everybody can see you Mother. Quit feeling so righteous because you are wearing a $300 belt from QVC to meeting. Quit being so concerned with your additions that you lose sight of the will of God. Quit being shallow.
I hate shallow people. When Sara was here to spend a month with us, a sister who never speaks to my daughters at the Hall runs up to Sara and wants to meet her. Sara is thin and wearing a Kathy purse and Steve Madden shoes and leopard striped jewelry. She's cool.
My kids are cool. And smart. Just not thin and wearing high heels. I'm doing everything I can to get life for them, and then they go to the Hall to be hurt. You are not serving people, I say. Only trust in Jehovah. No one else matters.
*****
Sometimes I think it is good the end has not come yet. All the sheep are not gathered, the number of the anointed is not sealed, and I don't know if I am ready to make it, if the girls are, if I am too critical and my mother too shallow and we need this time to balance ourselves. As I approach 50 next year, I absolutely understand how we can live eternally, and still have things to learn.
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