Sometimes, I Think I Should Just Get It Over With Already

I'm sure many of you are probably tired of hearing me gripe about my life, but I have something to tell you: I'm sick of it too. I keep having this strange compulsion to keep writing, to keep opening up those wounds, both new and old. Maybe it's because I can't speak openly about such things in my personal life. Few people know about me being in the closet about my atheism, and none know anything about the abuse in my past.

Right now, I'm getting frustrated, I want out, I want to finally break free, and declare to the world I'm an atheist. I want to no longer have to support a denomination I abhor, a denomination that refuses to do anything about the pedophilia in their midst, a denomination that's misogynist, supports complementarian theology, and is highly homophobic.

It makes me sick to think that in order to keep my cover, I have to keep donating to this despicable group. My money going to support this, my name on the membership rolls. I don't know what's holding me back, if it's fear, or something else. I know it's inevitable, I must do it sometime, I must come out, I didn't fight this hard to get what little progress I have made in my life, just to give up, and roll over, and pretend to be something I'm not for the rest of my life, just to make people around me happy.

There's an American analogy that some situations are like "ripping off a Band Aid", if something you are dreading is inevitable, it's best to just get it over with, fight through the pain. That's the way I need to think about it. I'm thinking that sometime after Christmas, I'll just go ahead and do it (or is waiting that long procrastinating out of fear, I wonder, putting it off for another day?)

Undercover Agnostic (Update 15): Anything Worth Having Is Worth Fighting For

I have talked before on the blog about how my mother when I was growing up (and still to this day) felt that rock music is “evil”, she defined “rock music” as anything that is modern music, except for classic country, and what passes for country music these days on the radio. I know I sound like I’m 80 years old when I say that about country music, but what’s on country radio now, to me sounds like hollow pop music with a southern accent to it. I would much rather prefer Johnny Cash or Waylon Jennings any day over modern country music.

Anyway, enough on that tangent (or as a former pastor of mine used to call it, “chasing rabbits”, whenever someone would go off topic), as a kid, I didn’t agree with her about rock, it didn’t like it, it sounded like senseless noise to me, but I didn’t agree with it (well, maybe about some of it, especially rock with darker themes, I imagine 15 year old me would be horrified to find out that 24 year old me is listening to the likes of Avenged Sevenfold).

I just tolerated her new country music, and enjoyed the old country, and by the time I was about 14-15 years old, I was starting to warm up to the Christian contemporary music that was common in the evangelical/fundamentalist church we were in, and I’m still in as the Undercover Agnostic.

As I said in my first Undercover Agnostic update, she didn’t approve of Christian contemporary music, even though most of it is rather mild in tone/volume, and now to me, sounds rather cheesy, because she felt it was too “worldly” and insincere. I used to listen to it by myself on the radio in my room, with headphones, or by the time I was 16, on the radio while driving.

When I was in the Southern Baptist university I was in for a year (I won’t go more into detail on that, I’m sure most of you already know about that time period in my life), I had a room mate who was raised on classic rock, groups like the Rolling Stones, AC/DC, etc. (His absolute favorite was Van Halen). I started to listen to it myself, and slowly warm up to it, and actually enjoy it, but modern rock bands I still couldn’t handle the sound of, and felt slightly repulsed by.

It wasn’t until I came back home that I really started to slowly appreciate more modern rock, especially various forms of alternative rock. Upon returning home, I had a hard time settling into a normal sleep schedule, and instead of just staring at the ceiling, trying to fall asleep, I knew I had to do something to keep my mind somewhat occupied for a while, and I found that listening to the radio (with ear buds in of course), would help.

Going through the stations, I ended up stumbling upon the Loveline radio show with celebrity psychiatrist Dr. Drew Pinsky, and radio DJ/comedian “Psycho” Mike Catherwood. The show was highly entertaining, both with Mike’s comedy, and some of the rather odd questions that callers would have. The show, more importantly, besides being rather entertaining and informative at the same time, helped to open up a whole new world to me. The show would regularly have various bands as guests, and I was introduced to the quirky lyrics of the band Cake, the rich vocals, great guitar solos, and dark themes of Avenged Sevenfold, and the anti-establishment attitudes of the band Bad Religion.

The band that really spoke to me the most at this time, though was one of the Loveline crew’s favorite guests, Linkin Park. The lyrics, especially of their songs from their Hybrid Theory album really summed up what I was feeling at the time in such a deep way. This song, In the End especially had it’s lyrics speak to me in a profound way then:

I tried so hard
And got so far
But in the end
It doesn't even matter.

I had to fall
To lose it all
But in the end
It doesn't even matter. 

Bank Teller Confessional

 

Over the last few weeks, I had noticed that a new teller at the credit union that I am a member of would talk to me more often than the others, and seemed to be happy that I had arrived whenever I would show up in line. I do have a hard time reading people, but it sure seemed like more than just the typical rehearsed customer service training friendliness. I had thought that she was just wanting to flirt in her own way, and I didn't mind.

Well, this past Friday, she told me that she had recognized my name. I have a rather unusual first name due to having parents as religious as mine, and she said she thought she had recognized me, but as soon as she saw my name, she knew who I was. Several years ago, she had been attending the church I have attended since I was 12, the church I am undercover in today. I couldn't remember her well, but she remembered me, and many of the people who were there then, when we we both teens, most of those people are still there, including my good friends "Sam and Rose", who I have come out to about my unbelief, there are 2 of only 5 people that know so far.

We had talked for a while about the old days, she didn't know Sam and Rose were dating, and she was happy to hear that they have been together for 3 years now, and all the while I'm talking to her, I can't pull up in my mind much of who she was, I couldn't hardly remember her. I have a strange sense of knowing when I can trust people and when I can't, despite my struggles in reading tone of voice, context, etc in conversations (I guess this special ability comes from dealing with the Stained Glass Masquerade effect that I have talked about in fundamentalist circles), and that radar was starting to come up that she was indeed someone I could trust.

There wasn't any more customers coming in, the credit union was going to close in about a half an hour, so I did what I don't do with hardly anyone: I told her some of the story of my life over the last few years.

I told her about my depression, and dealing with my doctor who couldn't understand why I am depressed ("You have a job, a house and insurance, what do you have to depressed about?"), my mother refusing to believe that I am depressed, and about my suspicions that I could be autistic.

I also talked about my leaving Christianity (but still remaining in the closet about that). There were a few details I left out, but I felt like I was in a confessional booth at a Catholic church, just letting it all out to the priest inside.