So, during all of the 80s, I raised 2 kids (my ex-wife's; I've never had any biological offspring), worked on fixing up her WW2 house; made money (the economy took a turn for the better); muddled along in the congregration.
(I love those kids, to this day. In a recent conversation wife my ex, I asked her to convey my feelings and concerns to them. I seriously doubt that those feelings on my part were ever relayed. )
btw, I said from the get-go that I wouldn't name names. However, for this part of my story, I name Alan Feuerbacher for 2 reasons:
1) He gave me his explicit permission to so do, and
2) He's been a pivotal person in my getting out of the WTS, and to this day supports me in every way he can. We oftentimes agree to disagree, but that's what friends are all about, eh?
At some point in time, my folks got to know AlanF's folks; how, I can't remember, except that it had something to do with that they all had roots in New York.
Anyway, AlanF had, in the early 80s, lost his belief in the "ransom." My Dad asked me, at the request of Alan's folks, if I would be willing to talk with Alan about this, because (after all) I was still an adamant Bible-believer. I agreed. I wasn't really too interested in pursuing the matter, and it came to a fairly quick, though mutually pleasant, end. My folks were, quite naturally, disappointed in my inability to convince Alan to rethink his position.
The years rolled drudgingly by, and in the course of visiting various "Bible stores," (looking for concordances and lexicons and such-like), I became aware that Ray Franz had written a book titled "Crisis of Conscience." Quite naturally, I was intrigued, and ordered the book (there were none on the shelves).
When it arrived in the mail, I ripped the package apart, with great interest in what this former GB had to say. My glee quickly turned to serious internal pain, as I read one page after another after another, chronicaling many of the things that I had myself experienced, or had become aware of over the years. My anticipation turned to anger, and then disgust. All the crap that I'd tried so hard to bury was suddenly thrust straight back into my soul, like a dagger. I yet again chose the "ostrich defense."
I pulled off the road, into a park, took the book out, and ripped it literally to shreads, and threw it into the trash can. I just couldn't take it.
Alan and I had separate courses for the remainder of that decade, but, in the early 90s, he called me up, and I accepted his invitation. He came over, and after the obligatory niceties, he offered me, with somewhat trembling hands, a 500 +/- page printout of his investigations into evolution and the biblical Flood. I read every page, and was thenceforth convinced that there never was any "flood" in the biblical sense, and that, insofar as I could (nay, was compelled!) to consider the scientific evidence, that "divinely guided" evolution was the most logical explanation for the existence of the human species. To this day, I imagine that "Jesus" was tinkering with various DNA combinations, and as his experiments went for better or for worse, then "God" gave him a few helpful bits of advice.
Now, can you imagine what that meant to me? Here, a life-long, absolute believer in the Bible, though sullied by the inaccurate predictions of my supposedly Bible-based religion...how that affected me? And how, in good conscience, could I support such doctrines by making comments at a Watchtower Study? Well, I couldn't, and I didn't.
One by one, the grip of the WTS, and of Biblically-oriented thinking, was losing its grasp.
Two last things remained: College, and 1994.