So, it’s no secret that I have a rather, um, fraught relationship with religion and extremely religious people. I was raised non-denominational Christian, did Sunday school like most of my peers, but I was never christened or baptized. I also didn’t have pierced ears till I was 22, but that’s another post. Point is, somewhere along the line I fell off the Christian wagon. I think it was right around when my parents really started fighting, so that would have made me around 12. By 15 I was pretty close to being atheist. Some pretty shitty things had happened to me by then so I reasoned that there probably wasn’t a God, or if there was then he wasn’t listening. Now I’m agnostic and I try to tolerate (with varying levels of success) when people try to proselytize or use religious explanations rather than being rational.

This will likely be offensive to someone, but I find Jehovah’s Witnesses a little creepy. Now before someone starts advising me that I should get to know people who are JW or visit a Kingdom Hall so I can gain some perspective, let me qualify this. I know JW’s who range from the moderate to the extreme and I have close family members and friends who are JW. I have gone to Kingdom Hall on more than one occasion and I’ve listened to them minister to my father in our home. THEY CREEP ME OUT. Or rather their teachings creep me out. I was a kid who was always drawn to science and my grandmother died for want of clotting factor in her blood so I always thought the idea of not accepting blood transfusions and letting loved ones die was ludicrous. The concept of a finite number of people seemed kind of bizarre too. I mean if only 144,000 are going to heaven then why do they keep trying to convert people? Are there not more than 144,000 JW’s globally? Are some of them just happy with the idea of *not* going? And Watchtower magazines are relentlessly apocalyptic and have strangely discomfiting artwork, like this:

JW’s smiling brightly in the face of the Armageddon! C’mon…You really going to tell me that doesn’t weird you out?

Anyway my favourite uncle is JW. I love him to death but I’m not especially crazy about his religion. We try not to talk about it much. He has 2 daughters. The older one is very devout the younger one is…well…skeptical. I’ve been running interference between the two of them for a couple of weeks now. The older sister, let’s call her F, is 23 and the picture of the perfect JW daughter…she’s also boring as all get out. The younger sister, S, is 19 and way more outgoing. F went to community college, S got a scholarship to Yale. F is timid and is likely still a virgin, S has a boyfriend and has a sex life. F goes to Meeting twice a week, S says JW is a cult. Yup, a cult. As you might imagine, this did not go over well. F called S a whore and told their father that it must be this boyfriend of hers that is putting these ideas in her head. S maintains that she just does not believe. She says she believes in a God but she feels that JW faith is too punitive and controlling. Her dad is frothing with righteous(?) indignation of course.

A lot of heavy words are being thrown around, that is, when they are talking at all. And this is the part that I don’t really understand. How can how you worship or your belief system be more important than the fact that you are family? I know in some ways I’m oversimplifying this but I really wish they would just respect her decision and let it go. Can you only love someone if they are of the same faith as you? Do they become different because they don’t believe? How can whether or not someone goes to church erase 19 years of being someone’s sister…or someone’s parent? They really seem willing to let go of their relationship with her in the name of their faith and I just. do.not.get.it. She’s bright, she’s articulate, she has a good head on her shoulders, she’s done really well considering her challenges (that’s another post too), what else do they *want*? If that’s what being “saved” is about then count me out. Maybe I’ll give Pastafarianism a try instead, if only for the look on people’s faces when I tell them I worship the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

I’m over the Olympics. Matter of fact I was over them before they even began - I’m just not very engaged this time around. But I couldn’t ignore Usain Bolt.

When I watched the semifinal heat and he looked to either side of himself at the 50m mark and effortlessly coasted his way to a 9.9s win I knew we were in for something special.

Now in the wake of his record breaking win in the final and yet another for the 200m there’s a lot of talk. The Jamaicans swept the women’s 100m too so some of the chatter is annoying race based crap, which a lot of people have blogged about already and I don’t really have anything to add to. It’s just the usual bullshit: we can’t have nuthin’ and when we do people try to undermine our victories by saying “well they have an unfair advantage because…”. The rest is about his showboating.

I know this may not be PC or even polite, but I say bwoy, do de dyam ting yes! Pung yuh ches’!!! Jamaica to di werl’ mi yute!!

I have to wonder if the reaction would have been the same if he had been an athlete from the U.S. or another developed country.

The IOC president has his panties all in a twist about it:

The International Olympic Committee chief hailed Bolt’s stunning achievements in the two sprints, comparing him to American great Jesse Owens, but said Bolt should have cut out the look-at-me flaunting and acknowledged the other athletes.

“I have no problem with him doing a show,” Rogge said in an interview with three international news agency reporters. “I think he should show more respect for his competitors and shake hands, give a tap on the shoulder to the other ones immediately after the finish and not make gestures like the one he made in the 100 meters.”

Having built a huge lead in Saturday’s 100 final, Bolt slowed, glanced around with arms outstretched and pounded his chest before crossing the finish line in a world record time of 9.69 seconds.

“I understand the joy,” Rogge said. “He might have interpreted that in another way, but the way it was perceived was ‘catch me if you can.’ You don’t do that. But he’ll learn. He’s still a young man.

I dunno if it’s just that I’m peeved by all the other nonsense people have been saying about him and the female Jamaican delegates, but I’m not that pressed. I say, swagger black man, swagger!

How many times do I have to try to tell you
That I’m sorry for the things I’ve done
But when I start to try to tell you
That’s when you have to tell me
Hey… this kind of trouble’s only just begun
I tell myself too many times
Why don’t you ever learn to keep your big mouth shut
That’s why it hurts so bad to hear the words
That keep on falling from your mouth
Falling from your mouth
Falling from your mouth
Tell me…
Why
Why

I may be mad
I may be blind
I may be viciously unkind
But I can still read what you’re thinking
And I’ve heard it said too many times
That you’d be better off
Besides…
Why can’t you see this boat is sinking
(this boat is sinking this boat is sinking)
Let’s go down to the water’s edge
we can cast away those doubts
Some things are better left unsaid
But they still turn me inside out
Turning inside out turning inside out
Tell me…
Why
Tell me…
Why

This is the book I never read
These are the words I never said
This is the path I’ll never tread
These are the dreams I’ll dream instead
This is the joy that’s seldom spread
These are the tears…
The tears we shed
This is the fear
This is the dread
These are the contents of my head
And these are the years that we have spent
And this is what they represent
And this is how I feel
Do you know how I feel
’cause i don’t think you know how I feel
I don’t think you know what I feel
I don’t think you know what I fear
You don’t know what I fear

(Annie Lennox, “Why” )

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I tell myself too many times
Why don’t you ever learn to keep your big mouth shut

There may be such a thing as excessive communication. I love to talk. I know the facetious response to that would be “you’re a woman, of course you do”. Anyway, yes, talking. I’m pretty verbally facile and don’t usually have a problem expressing myself. Lately though it’s been getting me into trouble. My ex friend and I go back and forth endlessly. I waver between having nothing to say and being unable to contain my outrage during certain arguments. I have been doing nothing but sticking my foot in my mouth all week. I say things only to have to rephrase. I am clumsy. The words get all mixed up in my head. I have frequently restrained the desire to fling my cellphone/landline/laptop HARD against a wall from sheer frustration. I wish I could just not speak. But I can’t. I keep picking picking picking at it. I want so badly to feign nonchalance, but I can’t. I want all of this to be over.

No-one has the power to hurt you like your friends.

Kept it inside, didn’t tell no-one else;

Didn’t even wanna admit it to yourself.

But now your chest burns,

And your back aches

From fifteen years of holding the pain

And now you’ll only have yourself to blame

If you continue to live this way.

(From “Get It Together” - India Arie)

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Long friendships can be peculiar. A good long standing friend offers you perspective on yourself. They hold parts of your narrative. They are the supporting cast to the drama that is your life. When you spend more than half your life relating to someone you never have to explain. They know the undercurrents and backstories. They know the secretly held wishes and hurts. They have unique access to who you were, who you are and possibly who you will be. This makes them powerful people. Power for good…and power for bad.

The closer you are the better you know how to push someone’s buttons (see for example the enduring influence of one’s mother). When you know someone so intimately the difference between a caress and a slap may be a matter of minute degrees. Everything you say is loaded when you argue with someone you know this way. Seemingly innocuous things take on shades of meaning never intended. It’s exhausting. You’re not having an argument, you’re navigating a minefield. It’s crazy. You love them. You HATE them. They say every single thing that could make you feel like shit. They know all the dirt. ALL if it. You want to fix it. You want to call your best friend and tell them all about it…but you’re fighting with your best friend. You want to work it out. You want to never ever speak to them again.

I have never fought this way with anyone ever. I have gone through every cliched saying in my head about how sometimes things are just over, how you have to step back to step forward, how sometimes you have to leave things alone so they can heal but…why does doing that feel so much like giving up? Maybe it is because I fear that if I let this person walk away they will take some vital part of my self with them. I am nearly 26. I have known this person since I was 12. My whole teenage story is wrapped up in them, not to mention my adult life up to this point. They carry my first kiss, my first boyfriend, my lost innocence, the remnants of the child I was. They were there when I graduated high school, they asked my prom date to escort me because I was too shy to talk to him myself, they watched me change and change and change again. They are pretty much the only person with whom I have been utterly vulnerable from that time to this. Perhaps this is selfish, wanting the them around because they are “the keeper of the keys”.

It is a crazy love. It can be so destructive yet so fulfilling. Time was we could sit in a room and say nothing. Once when we laid on my couch for hours. Someone had completely destroyed me. My body felt carpet-bombed. I was cavernous and desolate. We were quiet while I cried.

When we look at each other now the weight of all that presses down on us. We say things we don’t mean, or maybe things we *do* mean but would have softened a few months ago. I feel both of us saying “How did this happen?” and then wavering: “It’s YOUR fault…no it’s MY fault.” The tenuous thread that connects us pulls, recoils, tightens hard around my heart. I put my hand on yours. You look up and say “What?”.

I want to.

But I can’t.

It’s stuck in my throat.

The voice in my head whispers. “Please…please.”

The art of losing isn’t hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster,

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother’s watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three beloved houses went.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn’t a disaster.

– Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident
the art of losing’s not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) a disaster.

(Elizabeth Bishop)

Busy busy busy busy busy.

Work, study, coach, take meetings, schedule, liaise, shmooze. Offices, gyms, schools. Bars, parties, cocktails. Fill the day to overflowing. Designate every second you can. Fry your synapses, or at least try to occupy them. Maybe if there is enough music, enough meaningless conversation, enough things to do and places to be, you’ll forget. If you can cut down the moments of silence you can prevent introspection, and hopefully if you stop thinking about it, it will hurt less and maybe, maybe one day it will not hurt at all. Falling asleep and just waking are vulnerable times. Lacking a task, the thoughts crowd in unimpeded. That’s why it’s best to be utterly exhausted at night and practically vault out of bed in the morning. Whenever you lie around too long you’ll be forced to confront your suppressed musings. You’ll palpate the margins, poking at it apprehensively. There will be a slow sinking as you realize things are not better, that there appear to be no limits on how long you will go on feeling this. But eventually you get up, because even if you’re not better life can’t come to a standstill. After all, you’re busy.

Chant it like a mantra. “I’m fine. I’m fine. I’m fine.” It would be ungracious to not be fine, right? There are so many things going on, things to achieve, work to be done…you’re so busy. Smile bright for the camera baby. Whisper to yourself that you don’t care. Something else will happen along, always does. Any day now. Until then just mark time. I’m not ever sad. I don’t feel anything.

I don’t care.

I’m busy.

I’m fine.