Reflections of an Outcast.

Please forgive the seeming randomness and spontaneity of this. I started blogging to feel less alone, and in some ways, it helps. Just a chance to share thoughts with the world is a better answer than the hollow void that predated the Internet.

For virtually all of my adult life, I have pleaded with the world in every way I know how, and searched for a place to truly fit. For the companionship, the closeness that people around me take for granted, but which has always eluded me. I've been the outsider, hanging just close enough to hear the words, the giggles, the memories, but just far enough that it is a foreign world, one that never will genuinely be mine.

I am interjecting again because in this crazy world, people tend to interpret. I am not in any way, shape or form suggesting any harm to myself or others, I am merely sharing these feelings in the hope they may offer some comfort to someone else who sees themselves in them. Please don't suggest that I "seek help", as that is a vagary that doesn't truly exist; if you aren't offering the rope, then you've no business suggesting I call out to someone else to throw me a line!

I am not suggesting the problem lies with those around me; the problem is well and truly mine. But in weighing the options available to me, I find myself trapped in a very tight little corner. My wife and children inherit my status, as I've never been able to form the kind of friendships that have given them that normalcy, and thus they suffer. I have, over the years, contemplated leaving as I abandoned the idea of suicide long ago, not for the loss it would bring me, but for the hurt and pain that my family would inherit. I may deserve the constant pain of loneliness; my family does not.

My cynicism towards the church is because I long ago thought that answer was in the church, and I reached for it. I thirsted for it. I went to church with the faithfulness of a dedicated, devoted disciple. But it was not there. I longed for someone to "bear my burdens", and tried to bear the burdens of others to show them what was needed. But there was no one to lift the load. I tried to invite people over, to share with the community, to just belong in giving, but again, isolation, loneliness.

I even contemplated the possibility that maybe I did have some kind of mental instability, but no instability, just loneliness. I went through a lot of anger, a lot of bitterness, but that left a long time ago. There's no anger, no bitterness, just aloneness.

It would be wrong to say I've rejected God; nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, the ONLY comfort I have found in all of this is God. If not for the comfort of God, I honestly, truly would not be here to give this monologue that will echo back to me off of the empty walls.

The only comfort, the only light in this darkness, though, that I have ever experienced was in ministering to those who are in an equally dark place. But I also discovered years ago that despite the plea of declining numbers in ministry, professional ministry is limited to those who have the kinds of connections that I have never been able to form. And lay ministers are not even respected as ministers; unless your tax status is tied to a minister, you are not a minister.

I could go on about how this contradicts Scripture, but at this point even I am tired of beating dead horses.

In closing this article, I would like to say that unless you have read EVERY word, please be silent. Unless you are willing to actually recognize and assist with filling the void in a Christian way, please move on. I've had enough of the harsh and bitter critics and those who answer with well meaning platitudes; if you don't have a true answer and one I haven't tried a thousand times before, this message is probably not for you, and that is completely OK. I've searched the Bible for answers, I've prayed, and I established a relationship with Christ a very long time ago. And that relationship is one of the few things of value that I have left in this world, beyond my family.

I am grateful for those who have found a place where they belong. In forty four years of trying, I still haven't found mine. And I am seriously hoping for an end to wandering in the desert sometime soon.

I love each and every person that I have in my life, even if we've never connected, but I think it's time I figure out how to embrace the loneliness and get comfortable in the darkness. It's the only constant.

Confessions of a Pest

One of the hardest, most compelling aspects of my personality is, frankly: I'm a pest.

Thing is, I know I'm a pest. It bugs me, and it is one of the major reasons I work to avoid social settings. But it's also, in my opinion, one of the most indicting aspects of our passive-aggressive society.

See, we expect for people to arrive to us whole. I'm not pointing fingers here; I am probably the worst at it. We don't expect broken people, we don't expect people who tend to follow rabbit trail after rabbit trail to get to a point they actually have, and we really don't tend to like people who tend to be clingy because they have a preciously small group of friends and tend in social settings to gravitate very closely to the ones they trust.

I try to be self aware, and occasionally I catch myself, but it's usually about the time someone's eyes glaze over and they respond with dismissive grunts in lieu of meaningful conversation, but by then, unfortunately, it's too late. There aren't a lot of opportunities for do overs.

But don't get me wrong; I'm not meaning this post to be some sort of rant or pity party. And I certainly don't see it as something deserving of pity; it is immensely helpful to me. See, I may be a pest, but I'm not the only one. And yes, like everyone else, I get frustrated by other pests.

But because I am one, I try to meet others with a dose of understanding. I don't have a high batting average in that regard, honestly, but I AM trying.

And while I'm trying to veer away from the more cynical side I expressed when I began this blog, I do have to say that one of the things that has made relationships within the body of Christ difficult is that I came to Christ with some VERY starry eyed expectations, only to find them more lacking than not. It has taken me awhile, though, to come to the grips with the fact that if I want people to accept my brokenness, I need to do a better job accepting theirs.

I truly think this is a massive failing, not only of the church, but of society in general. Because, to tell you the truth, I haven't found nonChristians any more accepting than Christians in that regard. I hear people talk about their mentors; I've never really had the luxury of having one. In fact, I really haven't had the luxury of having genuinely sane parents, and I don't really know the ones I do have all that well. So the places where people generally adopt these social mores have really been lacking for me more often than not.

But the one thing I ask of those who know I am a pest is honesty. And patience. I may be a pest, but I'm also probably the most loyal friend you will ever have because of it.

I don't know what the solution is; for me the temptation is towards isolation, but I try to avoid it because I've been there, and that doesn't help. And it certainly doesn't make things easier for my family. But I do know that if I can't figure out the solution for myself, maybe in being open I can help someone else find their own solution.