ah hah

I had an uncomfortable revelation recently. I've been struggling mightily with the idea of joining this church that I've been going to for like 4 years. I took off work to take all the required membership classes, and yet I can't seem to make myself sign on the dotted line. What would really change if I were a member? Nothing, really, except then I would be subject to church discipline. And this church is feeling more and more heavy handed to me.

I was at church on Sunday and the pastor said, "You need to repent of wanting this church to be 'normal' if you're one of the people who is afraid of change. We are going to change, and it shouldn't be any other way! We are going to grow and expand and it's going to be uncomfortable, but that's okay. Normal is BORING! Your life is already boring enough. Did you know the average attender of this church only comes 2 out of every 5 Sundays? It's time to stop sitting in the boat and start ROWING! You know why?! Because if you're rowing the boat, you don't have time to bitch and moan about what direction the boat is going in!!!"

I told my friend Ralph this because he was out of town and missed the sermon. He was like, "Awesome! So are you going to suck it up and join the church now!?"

That was odd to me, that Ralph assumed that I took this sermon to mean I should join the church and become an actively committed "rower." And the more I thought of it, that is the very obvious conclusion, that is of course what I SHOULD have gotten from the message. But it wasn't what I got at all. I got a sick feeling. I told Ralph that I wanted to tell the pastor, "I know why the average attender only comes 2 out of 5 Sundays!!! They come to write their tithe check and serve in the nursery like you keep telling them to do, and then they look for another church on the other 3 Sundays!! They look for a church that won't make them feel like they are constantly missing the mark and stuck on the outside!"

And that's when it hit me: I ALWAYS feel like I'm on the outside of everything. I never feel like I really fit in. At my first college, my second college, CCF, my first church... And then I started thinking about it and I realized that the problem with the church I left wasn't that the man I was going to marry was on staff and I couldn't handle seeing him. I mean, at first it was that. But really what it boiled down to was that when we broke up and he got hired, I felt like he was the favored child, on The Inside. And I was on The Outside. I hated that the church was growing like crazy and he was part of this exciting new ministry and everyone knew he was... and I was just some random nobody who didn't belong and didn't fit in and didn't have any place anymore.

And then I realized that I'm really pathetic. I mean, what the heck? I can't go to church there because I don't have a ton of friends and I feel like I have no one to sit with? I mean, what is that? Is that why I can't commit to the present church, too? Because I don't feel like I belong? How much of my life have I wasted just imagining that I was on the outside of something? And how does one get past that?

Wanted: My Dignity.

I am a man in dire need of help. As you can see from this photo, my manliness has been either stolen or badly mislaid. Why else would I, a white man with a buzz cut living in the city, strip down to teeny-tiny boy shorts, anoint myself with enough oil to fry a chicken, and lay out to baste in front of my apartment complex? The mere fact that I just used the phrase "teeny-tiny boy shorts" should be evidence enough that something alarming has happened to impair my brawn. In the city, this ain't how we do! I have clearly been robbed. If you can furnish any information as to the whereabouts of my dignity (even if it's just a few shreds here or there) you will be handsomely rewarded with an apple martini.

Wanted: Man

Requirements:

6'+ Otherwise my mother will purse her lips and sigh

Fully loaded head of hair so my mother does not grimace and make tsk-ing sounds, both behind and in front of your back

Clean-shaven so that my ex-Marine Corps father will not immediately write you off

No wait, full beard so that Sister #1 does not immediately write you off

Stable career with excellent credentials so that my Financial Advisor brother will not extoll advice to me about how I need to make better choices concerning whom I date

Must vote Democrat so that Sister #2 --who legally changed her name to Bonsai and joined a commune -- takes you seriously... or rather, so that you can take her seriously

Scratch that. Must vote Republican or you will never hear the end of it when you come to dinner at my parents' house

Must willingly endure a meal at my parents' house one time per month. Also, must either forego alcohol altogether or cheerfully accept the label "alcoholic" from both mother and father (I've chosen the latter option myself)

A complete aversion to any and all physical contact with me will ensure that my father does not try to shoot you, either with his eyes or with his .357 magnum

Must be manly enough (ie, flannel, work boots, muscles) that my grandmother will not later inform me she thinks you may be a homosexual

Must like parrots whose sole claim to fame is the ability to mimic a smoke detector and blow out your eardrums

If this sounds like you, fantastic. Let's meet up after church.