I need to thank Adam Phillips, author of Crosscurrents (http://archerland.disbelieve.org/adam.htm) for his help with this chapter. Thank you also to Bill for his editing help.
Finally,
as always, thank you to my partner. I love you more than words can ever
express.
Chapter 18
When I'd gone
back to school to work on a Bachelor's in biology,
Walt was one of the first members of the biology faculty I met. He was
the
professor of the very first class I attended when I went back to
school.
Walt was one of the most amazing people I have ever known. He was
flatly
intimidating. Physically, he was tall and imposing; academically,
he had
an encyclopedic knowledge of his field. His expectations of his
students were
sky-high, but I soon learned that his expectations of himself were even
higher.
I was also to learn that he'd do just about anything to help his
students
achieve their goals.
Early in that first semester, I was in a lab which was being taught by
one of
his doctoral students. As I was working on a project one day, she
walked over
to my end of the lab.
I was so caught up in thought, I didn't
notice her until she said,"Sam."
I looked up. "Oh...hey,
Denise. I think
I'm doing okay here, want
to look?"
"I'm sure it's fine," she smiled. "I wanted to talk to you about
something."
"What is it?" I asked.
She pulled up a stool and sat next to me. "Walt needs a research
assistant
for a project he's working on, and he asked me about promising
undergraduates.
I told him you'd be great."
I was flattered, but uncertain. "I don't know, Denise, do you think I'm
what he's looking for?"
"I'm sure of it," she said.
"I have a lot on my plate," I said, looking into her eyes. "I
have a son and I'm a single dad. I have to keep money coming in, so..."
"This will be good for you, Sam," she said. "You're
wanting a Ph.D.
here, right?"
"Well, yeah," I replied, hesitating.
"I'm telling you, you'll want to be doing your work under
him.
This is a good way to start."
I went into my head and considered it for a while. Denise wasn't going
to wait
for me to work it out, though. "I've already scheduled an appointment
for
you to talk with him at two this afternoon," she said.
"What??"
"You heard me. So don't make me out to look like an idiot."
I smiled and shook my head. "Oh, all right."
She crossed her arms and nodded her head, in a "my-work-is-done-here"
display of self-satisfaction. "Look," she said, "when you talk
to him today--when you work for him this semester--whatever he asks of
you,
just trust him, because I guarantee he will always have your best
interests at
heart. There aren't many profs you can say that about."
I muttered an assent and she walked away.
That afternoon, I made my way to his office. As soon as I got to
his
doorway, he rushed out of his office, saying, "Hi, Samuel, just have a
seat; I'll be back in two minutes."
I sat down and waited for fifteen minutes, drumming my fingers
and
staring at his diplomas and other honorary memorabilia on the wall.
Finally he came back and sat behind his desk.
"Okay," he said, looking at me intently. "Tell me why you're
back in school."
I explained my plan briefly.
That was the beginning of a long period of grilling. He followed up by
asking
why I was choosing to come back now. As soon as I had I gotten that
answer out,
he asked why I came to this school, and then after that, asked
again why
I was studying biology.
He paused for a moment at the end of that set of questions. I thought
the
interview was about over, when he said, "Tell me about your son, and
tell
me about his mother."
I gulped hard and stared at him silently for ten seconds. I figured if
I told
him my story, he'd think I came from an unstable background and was
thus
unsuitable to work for him. I didn't see any way I could lie to him,
though, or
refuse to answer. So I gave him an abbreviated, but sufficiently
detailed,
account of my marriage to Erica, her troubled family, her sister and
her tragic
death, the struggles with drugs, and our son. He listened with obvious
concentration,
his face radiating genuine concern. Because I could feel the respect
and
compassion radiating from him, I relaxed as the minutes went by.
Next he asked about my family. I talked about my dad's
strictness, about
my mom's health issues. I mentioned that we weren't close. I didn't
elaborate
on why, but I'm sure I couldn't hide the tension and the grief in my
voice as I
thought about that last year in high school.
After I'd told him everything, I knew he was going to send me out the
door and
tell me never to come back. How would he ever allow someone so messed
up to
work with him?
After an hour of telling him the ins and outs of my life, though, he
looked at
me and said, "Okay." Then he led me into the lab and got me started
on a project.
And that's how I became a research assistant for him.
Walt was hyper-involved as a teacher. We used to joke that he would
"hovercraft" over our shoulders while we were working, making sure we
did everything right, asking why we were doing everything, explaining
every
technique: why we did it, how we did it, what exactly was happening in
the test
tube. It was as frustrating as it was enlightening. When he'd get
too
obnoxious, one of us would turn to him and tell him, "Go write a grant
proposal!". He'd
laugh and say that he'd think we didn't love him if we
weren't showing him the proper amount of disrespect.
Academically, Walt was an inspiration and a near-perfect mentor. If he
expected
us to be there for long hours, he was there even longer hours. But it
was as a person
that he touched me the most deeply. He remembered everything he was
told about
people's lives, and he got involved. He regularly asked how Chris and I
were
doing; he even came to his birthday party that first year. He
remembered my
name from the first time he met me, knew that my favorite color was
blue, and
even knew, without being told, that money was tight. He'd take me
to
lunch three days a week to "talk science," but I knew it was just a
cover so that he could buy lunch for me. He insisted that I call him
Walt, even
while he insisted on using my full name when addressing me. He
never
called me Sam; it was always "Samuel." He was like that with all his
students. Walt was the one I turned to whenever I had a question
about parenting.
I could bounce anything off him. He never pried, but he always listened
and
over the years he went from being my professor and mentor to being my
trusted
friend and advisor.
Toward the finish of my undergrad work in biology, he asked me to stay
in his
lab for a Master's degree. I was thrilled at the opportunity: Aside
from his
professional excellence, Walt was more like a father than my own father
was,
and he played a huge role in my healing during those years.
* * * * * * * * *
I was at a place in my life that was unlike anything I'd experienced
before.
For the first time ever, life wasn't throwing turmoil at me. I had a
backlog of
hurt to recover from, and I was finally getting the space and the
motivation to
do it. Part of that recovery involved repairing the relationship with
the
people I'd pushed out of my life.
The first people I knew I needed to reconnect with was
the Walkers. It had seemed to me that being in their lives had brought
the
chaos and difficulty of my life smack into the middle of theirs. For
all that,
though, it was clear that they all cared for me and wanted me in their
lives,
so I knew I had to try to make amends by making myself available. I
wasn't
ready to let anyone get too close, but I finally had the energy to make
the
initial moves. It was helpful that the Walkers, and most of my friends,
actually, were still a state away, back home. The distance gave me a
little
security from which to reach out.
I called up Mary one day. It was a strange conversation, really. She
was a
married woman, now; I was a disastrously-married man who had a son. As
we
talked, I couldn't help but think of those golden times where we loved
each
other and believed our best years together were ahead of us instead of
behind
us. I tried to keep the past--and what might have been--out
of
our conversation, though, and when I finally hung up, things felt good.
It
wasn't all that significant, as conversations go, but it was a step
toward
reclaiming something I'd lost: a place in the Walkers' lives.
Mary and I started talking and emailing regularly, and because that was
going
so well, I started reaching out to other old friends from high school
and
college again too. In retrospect, my time with Neal had seemed to blend
into
the years with Erica, and throughout that period, my attention was so
focused
on the dramas of those relationships, I had shut everyone else out.
During the
time with Neal I simply couldn't face them, and during my marriage with
Erica,
I was busy trying to give her what I could of my love, my concern, and
my
support. Now, the emotional energy and the time I'd expended on Neal
and Erica
were freed up, and I discovered that I wanted--and needed--friends
from the past back in my life. With a little bit of initiative from my
end,
that was beginning to happen with my old high school and college
friends, and
it was beginning to happen with Mary.
But then there was Brian.
Quite frankly, I didn't know what to say or what to do or even what to
want
with him. From him.
To be honest, I was afraid to face the thought of what I wanted. And
beyond
that, for all I knew, I'd damaged our friendship beyond repair over the
years.
Merely by being his friend, I'd dragged him into situations nobody
should have
to face. I knew he loved me like a brother, and I knew it cut him like
a knife
to watch what I'd let Neal do to me. It was unbearable to me that his
love for
me took him through that kind of hurt in my behalf.
That was on top of a final year in high school where people were
whispering about
him, wondering if he was queer because his queer best friend had the hots
for him. And then in the aftermath of Neal, I was absolutely cold to
him. I
wouldn't let him in. I was ashamed to face him. He tried hard to be my
friend
as I came out of all that, and I just gave him the cold shoulder.
And on and on it went. I'd done a horrible job with Brian. I'd failed
him in
every way conceivable. Even though he was Christopher's godfather--even
though
we both seemed to have this connection that we couldn't shake--I was
afraid I'd
put him through more than he could handle, through more than our
friendship
would handle.
I called him up one day, a couple of weeks after I'd first talked to
Mary.
"Hello?" As always, just hearing his voice called to deep
places in me I was reluctant to acknowledge.
"Brian...I...uh, it's me. Sam."
"Oh. Hi,
Sam. How you doin'?
Mary said you called her." His voice seemed guarded.
"I'm doing good," I said,
tentatively. "I wanted to call you
too."
"Oh," he said again. "Good." He paused. "So what did
you wanna say?" My
heart sank. He didn't sound at all happy to
hear from me. He didn't sound angry, but there was a distance in his
voice.
I couldn't think of what to say next. I didn't really want to say
anything; I
just wanted to fix something between us, somehow. I wasn't
even sure
what, or how.
I stammered, "Well, I...I mean, I didn't have anything in particular to
say. I just wanted to touch base. It's been a long time."
The other end of the line went silent for an agonizing twenty seconds.
"Yeah," he said, finally. "It has."
"Tell me how you've been," I said, barging through the awkward pause
and ignoring what was clearly our mutual discomfort.
"Oh, you know," he said casually, "Okay, I guess." He
talked about school a little bit, then grew
quiet again. As if he were
waiting for something.
I jumped in again. "Let me tell you about this biology prof
I'm working with," I said, and proceeded to tell him a little about
Walt.
The conversation went on like that in fits and starts. I kept it
reasonably
short, and we hung up after a few minutes. The contrast with my phone
calls to
Mary was dramatic. With Mary, I began to feel we were on our way toward
becoming friends again. With
Brian...
With Brian, conversation felt like knife wounds. Unspoken paragraphs of
conversation lay underneath our stumbling words. Neither of us could
acknowledge it.
Still, I didn't let that phone call keep me away. I kept trying to
touch base
with him from time to time.
Our conversations were always stilted and awkward. I knew I had done
him an
immense amount of harm with my choices, and I didn't feel I had the
right to
push him to be friends again. But I tried to let him know that the door
was
open, because I knew I'd hurt him before by shutting him out. I was
also
determined to let him know that I was sorry, without forcing the issue
in case
he didn't really want to be friends any more.
That was the problem: I didn't really know what he wanted, and I was
afraid to
ask him. I knew I'd hurt him a lot, but I didn't know how much.
When I
got him on the phone, the conversations were always strained and about
nothing-in-particular. You know, the how-are-you?, I'm-fine,
Seen-any-good-movies-lately?
kinds of
conversations. And always, there would be these huge
chunks of silence between each block of conversation while we both
searched for
something to say.
It broke my heart. All during my teenage years, talking to him had
always been
easy. Even when I was dying inside to kiss him and horrified at that, I
could
always count on his friendship and the easy companionship between the
two of
us. Now it was hard. Next
to impossible, in fact. There was
a huge, invisible wall of
some kind between us and neither of us seemed willing, or even able, to
talk
about it. For my part, I was in utter confusion. I didn't know why it
had
become so hard, I didn't know how to fix it, and I didn't even know
what I
wanted with him.
I'd probably been back in touch with him--if you could call it
that--for about
two months when I'd left a message for him one day because he hadn't
answered. Several weeks went by and I didn't hear from him. Then
one
night the phone rang in the middle of the night.
My heart was pounding as I answered; when the phone rings at that time,
the
news isn't often good.
"Hello?"
"Sammy, izz Brian," I
heard from the other end. It took me
no time at all to realize he was drunk.
"Brian, are you okay?" I asked. "Where are you?"
"I'm home, I'm juz' home,
I'm not nowhere," he said indignantly, as if
I'd accused him of something. "I just had a good day. Goooooooooood day, and I
wanted to call my boy Sammy and tell 'im,"
he slurred.
"What's been going on?" I said, trying to be patient.
"I gotta tell you
'bout this girrrrrlll," he
said. "She was so fuckin hot,
Sammy, you'd a been hot for 'er
too, I met her at this club, and she did stuff to me I only seen in
porn
before." I listened as be babbled incoherently about hooking up with
the
girl in question. As annoyed as I was with his condition, it was
impossible for
me not to envision Brian naked with a girl, kissing, touching, loving.
I hated this girl. I'd never met her and I hated her.
He went on and on about her, so much so that I thought he'd never quit.
It was
excruciating. Then, seemingly out of the blue, he said, "I miss you
Sam, I
miss you so much." And just like that, he hung up.
The abruptness startled me. I was as unprepared for the sudden turn the
conversation had taken as I was for its unexpected termination. It was
agonizing.
Over the next few weeks, I'd have essentially the same conversation
with him,
at the same late hour, about his latest hookup, and invariably at the
last
second the conversation would turn to how much he missed me; then he'd
hang up
before I had a chance to reply.
Those conversations scared me. It seemed as though Brian was
unraveling, and I
didn't know what to do about it. The day after the third such
conversation, I
called his brother Mike.
"Hello," he said, answering the phone.
"Mike...this is...this is Sam."
"Sammy-boy! Haven't heard your voice in ages! What's up, my
man?"
"I'm good," I told him, and summarized my life for him in thirty
seconds.
Then I took a deep breath and said, "Hey, have you talked to Brian
lately?"
"No," he said, "but the two of us were at Mom and Dad's last
weekend. Why?"
"Well," I ventured, "When you were there, did he seem
okay?"
"Yeah, I guess," he told me. "Why do you ask?'
I told him about our graveyard-shift conversations and about how Brian
was
always drunk during them.
"I don't know, Sam," he said. "I honestly haven't had much time
to think about him, and like I said, we haven't talked. But I'll ask
him if
he's messed up."
"No, man, don't do anything to make him think I'm checking up on
him," I said. "Just pay a little attention when he's around. See if
he seems okay."
"Okay, Sammy," he said, "and I promise I'll let you know what I
think."
I was relieved to hear it. "Thanks, Mike," I said.
"Not a problem."
When he hung up, I felt relieved.
My relief was premature, though. I got a call from him one evening the
next
week.
"What's up, Mike?"
"Well, I just wanted to call...hey, look, don't freak out or anything,
because he's okay, but I just wanted you to know that Brian's in the
hospital."
My stomach felt the way it feels when you take the first big drop on a
roller
coaster.
"What's wrong with him, Mike?"
"His blood sugar's out of control," he said. "I've been checking
up on him lately. I'm glad you called, I just haven't been paying much
attention to the sibs. I've been so busy, lately." He sounded almost
apologetic.
"Anyway, I went by one evening and I thought he didn't look so good. He
was kinda
irritable, too, and I've seen that before with him. I asked
him if he'd been checking his blood sugar and he just snarled at me, so
I made
him take it. It was over 600, so I put him in the truck and took him to
ER.
They admitted him to the hospital right away. He's doing okay now, and
he'll
probably get out tomorrow. I just wanted you to know, though. I might
not ever
have noticed, if you
hadn't called."
"Mike," I said, "He's not taking care of himself, is he?"
"No, Sam, he's not," Mike replied. "I'm not sure what's up with
him."
I was. And I felt coals of guilt burning into me.
"Well," Mike said after I hadn't responded, "I gotta
go, Sam. He asked about you, by the way. Maybe if you could call him
when he
gets out..."
"I'm glad he's okay," I said, evading. "Thanks for calling,
Mike."
"Sure. Talk to you later."
When he hung up, I sat there blankly. Everything I touch breaks,
I
thought to myself. Everyone I love gets damaged.
After he got out of the hospital, I did call. We had a tense, halting
conversation. Subtext practically screamed at me from the broken
conversation
and patches of silence: I wasn't clear on what it was, but there were
unspoken
words separating us. But I didn't acknowledge that. Neither did he.
In the subsequent weeks, I would call him occasionally. We
stumbled through those conversations; the easy friendship that seemed
to be so
good for both of us had vanished, replaced by misgivings,
uncertainties, and
guilt.
Brian's trips to the hospital became a semi-regular. Several times a
year he'd
end up there, sometimes for short stays, sometimes for longer ones. His
blood
sugar was always too low or too high. Mike would check in on him and
he'd
either be feisty and combative and irritable, or semi-comatose. So Mike
would
haul him into ER, they'd throw him in the hospital and get his blood
sugar
straightened out, and he'd go back home, only to cycle through the same
thing a
few months later. And throughout all of it, he drank steadily.
His family was worried. So was I. I knew I wasn't being a good friend
to him. I
could never bring myself to go see him in the hospital, though. I would
call
and send flowers and pray that things would get better somehow, but as
for
actually seeing him...I was afraid of what he'd say; I was afraid he'd
tell me
he didn't ever want to see me again. I was afraid he'd tell me what I
already knew...
....that this was all
my fault.
* * * * * * * * *
My life continued to move on. I had school, and I had Chris to care
for. Over
time, my contact with Brian waned to a few phone calls a year and a few
emails.
His life went on, too. Sometimes he would move and I wouldn't know the
new
phone number for months until Mary would give it to me. The
deterioration in my
relationship with Brian felt like an open wound, but I didn't know what
I could
do about it.
There was a time in my life, a time when I had too much else to deal
with,
where I'd simply have numbed out to the troubles with Brian. But I was
getting
better, and, ironically, that meant that the failure of my friendship
with
Brian hurt me all the more.
That wasn't the only thing bothering me. My psycho ex, Neal, kept up
his
harassment, getting more and more irrational as time went on. After
he'd found
out where I lived, he transferred to my school to finish his degree. He
continued to loom ominously in the background of my life, putting in
just enough
of a presence to spook me. He was having troubles of his own, though;
he failed
out at school. He got a job at the university as a computer
administrator, and
he used that position to break into my account repeatedly. That got him
fired.
Still,
aside from an occasional
brush with him, my life had settled into a manageable routine, and I
was
feeling okay. I had my son, I had a direction in life, and things were
quiet
and comfortable.
The months rolled by, and turned into years. Neal would show up from
time to
time to blame me for his life's failures, and I continued to be haunted
by the
rupture in my relationship with Brian, but I didn't walk through life
tortured
anymore. It's odd the way healing worked in my life. I always had
wanted
to think that if I could only work through my emotional issues from my traumatization,
that would
resolve all the problems in my life. That didn't
happen, but what I did notice was that things began coming together in
ways
that I hadn't even been willing to hope for.
One aspect of my life I'd never expected to improve was my relationship
with my
parents, but to my astonishment, even their rejection of me wasn't
permanent.
It all started with Christopher. I had called them when I found out
Erica was
pregnant, and then again when Chris was born. My father and I hadn't
said a
complete sentence to each other since I moved out, but my mom would
call every
six months or so after I told them the news. It wasn't comfortable, but
she did
try to keep in contact.
Something about being a grandfather softened my father's attitude
towards me as
well.
They drove down when Chris was six months old. I remember
watching my
father hold Christopher. He looked so lost and sad. He still didn't say
much to
me, but for the first time I could remember, he hugged me and told me
he loved
me when they left. It was a start.
My mother had been in poor health most of my life. She had
contracted
polio when she was young, along with her younger sister. She recovered
almost
fully, but her sister didn't. Throughout her childhood she had to deal
with her
younger sister getting the lion's share of the attention. Additionally,
her
mother blamed her for bringing the disease home from school and giving
it to
her sister. So she carried a lot of baggage from childhood. As an adult
she
developed additional neurological problems. She hadn't been
able to walk
at all since I was in grade school. The combined effect of her
difficulties was
that she had been an angry, bitter woman as long as I knew her, but she
did
have her good side too.
She developed an ulcer during the trip to visit me and Christopher that
she
didn't take care of until the tissue had eroded down to the bone and
she had
become septic. She was hospitalized for months. Right after
she
went in, she called me, sobbing hysterically, apologizing for being
such a
terrible mother. We had the first real conversation I think we had ever
had. I
told her I loved her and always had, and that I forgave her. She said
the same.
I thought we might have a chance at repairing our relationship
finally.
She went in for surgery the next day to try to close the ulcer and
remove the
infected tissue, and had a stroke while she was under the anesthesia.
She wasn't the same woman when she woke up. The stroke affected her
personality, bringing out all her worst traits and eliminating most of
the good
ones. Her short term memory was all but gone. She had lost her ability
to
reason through the consequences of things, so she was almost like a
child: a
petulant, demanding, bitter child.
My father told me not to bother coming up that Christmas. Every time I
suggested a visit to any of my family after that, I was told not to
come. That
went on for two years.
Then one day I got a call out of the blue from Mary.
I was delighted to hear from her. She'd just had a daughter--her first
child--and I'd sent a card and some flowers.
"Thanks for the flowers, Sam," she said. "They were
beautiful."
"I'll bet not as beautiful as your little girl," I said. "Mary,
you'll love being a parent. Take it from me."
"I know I will," she said. "I'm in love with her
already." She paused. "The baptism's coming up, Sam, and I
really want you there."
"Of course," I said. "I'll always love you, Mary, and I want to
be there for the important times in your life."
We finished the conversation, and I felt a wash of gratitude that I'd
gotten
Mary back as a friend. When the day came, I went back home for the
baptism. I
stayed at my parents' house during that trip. There were ghosts there,
but I
was ready to face them. What I wasn't quite prepared for was the change
in my
parents.
My dad met me at the door when Chris and I showed up. "Sam," he
nodded. We shook hands perfunctorily. He looked awful.
I came in with Chris; we sat down in the living room. "Your mom's
asleep," he said. He looked at Christopher and smiled a little.
"Dad," I said, "You don't look so good. Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," he said.
I discovered that he wasn't fine. He was exhausted from caring for my
mother.
When I asked him about it, he snarled, "What am I supposed to do? She
won't let anyone else help."
We talked for a while, and after about an hour she woke up and wheeled
into the
room.
When I saw her, I was stunned: She was almost unrecognizable.
Her face
wore a permanent scowl, and she directed her anger at everyone and
everything.
I discovered during my stay that she was spiteful and aggressive;
violent,
even. She had a motorized wheelchair, and during my visit, she tried to
run
over Christopher when she thought I wasn't looking. She wouldn't even
speak to
me. I watched as she slammed her wheelchair into the wall several times
during
that visit, just because she could.
Chris and I went to church for the baptism Sunday and stood with Mary
and her
family. Brian and I spoke briefly, but didn't say anything of
significance to
each other. My mind was occupied at the time, I guess. I wanted to pay
the
proper attention to Mary, for one thing, and my mother was heavy on my
mind,
for another.
After the
service we went back to my
parents' house, packed up, and said goodbye. My mom refused even to
acknowledge
my presence in the room.
She died two months later. Aside from immediate family, there were only
five
people at her funeral; all were friends of mine there to support me.
The priest
said Mass, but his homily was perfunctory at best.
It was heartbreaking: She had spent so long being bitter that, by the
time she
died, almost no one cared. I felt I had never really had her, so the
loss
didn't hit me as hard as it probably should have. I grieved the
lost
opportunity to make things right, but I'd never had much of a
relationship to
lose.
* * * * * * * * *
For all the hurts and disappointments and guilt I'd wrestled with
during those
years, though, I had a sense that I was regaining myself. And there
were other
blessings.
During my senior year in high school the Catholic Church had let me
down. Some
congregation members who had accepted me before shunned me when word of
my
feelings for Brian got out. Even priests treated me like dirt. As a
result, my
faith took a pretty severe beating, and my feelings about organized
religion
turned sour.
I didn't think much about faith as my life began to repair. But I
walked past
the Society of Friends meeting house every day on my way to class, and
something about it pulled at me. I barely knew anything about the
Quakers
before then, but suddenly it seemed as though I was hearing references
to them
left and right.
The first instance came from an interview I'd read with our state
representative. In the interview, he said he thought the Quakers were
the most
effective of all the religious groups at lobbying and getting their
views
across.
The next week, I mentioned reading the article to a faculty member and
added
that I passed by the Quaker meeting house all the time.
"Interesting that you should mention that," he said. "I actually
attend the worship meetings there."
"Really?" I asked.
"Yep. You ought
to visit."
I shook my head. "I don't know, I'm a Catholic," I said. "Officially,
at least. Anyway,
I'm not so sure about church these days."
"That's fine," he said. "But you'd be welcome. I think you'd
like it, too."
I didn't think much more about that conversation. Then one day I saw
the woman
who drove the bookmobile to Christopher's daycare coming out of the
building.
That very same day, a friend in the lab sent me one of those online
quizzes to
determine which faith was the best fit for you. I took the quiz, and to
my
shock and surprise, Quaker was number one on the list, followed by
Unitarian.
I don't much believe in signs, but it was starting to get way too
spooky for
me. So I started reading about the Quakers, and I discovered that I
liked what
I read. The Society of Friends seemed to embrace everything I believed,
and
brought me back into contact with my faith. Growing up I'd had
inspiring
examples of faith and loving role models in my congregation, and in my
school,
which was run by the congregation. But the bureaucracy, the power and
wealth,
the judgmental self-righteousness of the organization made me leery,
especially
since I hadn't seen a whole lot of charity and compassion directed my
way after
I was outed. As I began to research the Quakers, though, I felt a
strong inner
pull to check out the local worship meeting of the Friends.
I ignored
my inner voice for almost
a year because of my misgivings about religion, but finally I couldn't
any
longer. So one Sunday morning I took a deep breath and walked through
the front
doors.
It was the most welcoming, warm group of people I'd encountered outside
of
Brian's family. They brought me in, accepted me instantly, and
demonstrated the
kind of love that the Bible talks about but churches don't often
demonstrate.
That day began a whole new chapter in my life. I found my faith again
with the
Society of Friends; it was bruised and battered, but it was there.
And I found something that had eluded me most of my life:
Peace.