Ministry
When I think back to those days, the days when I was a young born again Christian, I remember most the Sunday mornings my grandma came to church with us. About four times a year, maybe more, my mom would drive across town and pick her up to come to our church with us. I had to drive with my stepdad then. Dressed up and hungover, I'd fight the pressure of air bearing down on me in the cab of his small Toyota pick-up truck, feeling his discomfort, dislike, and vibes of decidedly unchurchly hate raging around him, in him and out of him. He really hated me, I have to tell you.
I still don't know, even though I'm pretty firmly planted into adulthood at this point, whether I was just somehow that horrible that he was tortured by my presence, or what. Not everyone wanted to smash my face in with a sledgehammer or cinderblock, so it can't have been me, I don't think. Logically, of course, I know that. I know that it wasn't my fault as a kid that this grown man hated me. Logically. And in retrospect. But thinking back, going back to Sunday mornings and Hal and me alone in the truck, both eager to get to church and connect with my mom, his wife, I can feel what he was going through, and I know for certain that he was suffering such an acute distaste that I'm hard-pressed to believe it was self-generated. Couldn't have been, really; that man reacted to my existence like any normal person---you, for example---would react if closed up in small quarters for twenty minutes with a huge, steaming, fresh pile of dog shit on the seat just inches away. Seriously, I am not being gross for dramatic effect; this is truly the man's reflexive repulsive nature around me.
There's these songs from the 1970s that make me want to tear my skin out from the inside. Here is one: "Moonlight Feels Right" by Starbuck. Do you know it? Can you hear it? If you can, do you feel what I am feeling? When I hear it, I see the canals of Harsen's Island, where I used to visit my dad before he moved away. I don't even understand these feelings or visions that come with the song. I mean, I see marshes and cattails and the view from the backseat driving up to my dad's. But what am I feeling? All I know is that it is way, way, way too big for my body to contain. That much I know. That is why it makes me need to shred my skin, but preferably from the inside. The feelings are some fucked up blenderized stew of bliss, peace, horror, and some tearing terror. The losing of it all, maybe. I used to be real back then, did you know that? There was a time in my life when I was more than just a steaming pile of shit frozen with self-consciousness next to a red and angry stepfather.
I was a born again Christian; it wasn't just a ruse. Granted, I was a born again Christian who spent Saturday nights in the back seats of senior boys' cars, drinking whatever they gave me, but I was only 14 and doing the best I could. Or so I think it sounds good to say. I have no idea, really. Who can say?
My grandma was always acting as a normalizing when she was around, simply be default, because she didn't see the levels where I existed in totality, the depth of what my real life was. She just smiled or complained and held her purse in her lap and thought it was lovely that I was young and free and had pretty hair and my whole life ahead of me. Any hints of me running razor blades down my arms would have conflicted with her reality, a discomfort and dicombobulation which would result in her being irritated with me. That's how it works in my family. You do anything that makes life uncomfortable or reflective, and people find you a real problem.
When I was six, I asked why.
I still don't know, even though I'm pretty firmly planted into adulthood at this point, whether I was just somehow that horrible that he was tortured by my presence, or what. Not everyone wanted to smash my face in with a sledgehammer or cinderblock, so it can't have been me, I don't think. Logically, of course, I know that. I know that it wasn't my fault as a kid that this grown man hated me. Logically. And in retrospect. But thinking back, going back to Sunday mornings and Hal and me alone in the truck, both eager to get to church and connect with my mom, his wife, I can feel what he was going through, and I know for certain that he was suffering such an acute distaste that I'm hard-pressed to believe it was self-generated. Couldn't have been, really; that man reacted to my existence like any normal person---you, for example---would react if closed up in small quarters for twenty minutes with a huge, steaming, fresh pile of dog shit on the seat just inches away. Seriously, I am not being gross for dramatic effect; this is truly the man's reflexive repulsive nature around me.
There's these songs from the 1970s that make me want to tear my skin out from the inside. Here is one: "Moonlight Feels Right" by Starbuck. Do you know it? Can you hear it? If you can, do you feel what I am feeling? When I hear it, I see the canals of Harsen's Island, where I used to visit my dad before he moved away. I don't even understand these feelings or visions that come with the song. I mean, I see marshes and cattails and the view from the backseat driving up to my dad's. But what am I feeling? All I know is that it is way, way, way too big for my body to contain. That much I know. That is why it makes me need to shred my skin, but preferably from the inside. The feelings are some fucked up blenderized stew of bliss, peace, horror, and some tearing terror. The losing of it all, maybe. I used to be real back then, did you know that? There was a time in my life when I was more than just a steaming pile of shit frozen with self-consciousness next to a red and angry stepfather.
I was a born again Christian; it wasn't just a ruse. Granted, I was a born again Christian who spent Saturday nights in the back seats of senior boys' cars, drinking whatever they gave me, but I was only 14 and doing the best I could. Or so I think it sounds good to say. I have no idea, really. Who can say?
My grandma was always acting as a normalizing when she was around, simply be default, because she didn't see the levels where I existed in totality, the depth of what my real life was. She just smiled or complained and held her purse in her lap and thought it was lovely that I was young and free and had pretty hair and my whole life ahead of me. Any hints of me running razor blades down my arms would have conflicted with her reality, a discomfort and dicombobulation which would result in her being irritated with me. That's how it works in my family. You do anything that makes life uncomfortable or reflective, and people find you a real problem.
When I was six, I asked why.
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