Tis the season, so to speak.
This is the time of year the darkness descends like a proclamation of doom, and the light retreats like a rank and filer encountering an actual, thinking, reasoning person during the failed misery.
I don't exactly operate at a hundred percent in the dark and cold, ironic considering where I live.
So one day, we have a relatively clear parking pad, and the next we get a ton of white shit dumped on us.
Such lovely fun, shoveling all the global warming from the drive.
Got to take the truck out and let it strut it's stuff, that bad ol' aposta-truck was in it's element and unstoppable. Like the unfailing assault of reason on the last tendrils of mind control left in my wetware.
See, I've been thinking again, in spite of all the trouble it's gotten me in before it's a hard habit to break. I drive around and everybody is getting their Christmas on, and I have always felt so smug that I 'knew better'.
See, here is the witless take; you gotta get all vestiges of pagan influence out of your life, no saturnalia, no lupercalia, no all hallows eve, no 'bless you' to a sneeze, no 'pot lucks', bleh blah yadda.
Yet, every day of the week and month of the year is named for a pagan deity, the planets are too. The wedding ceremony, dress, ring, I could go on, but I only have a few decades left to rattle and cough so let's leave it at that.
Inconsistent to say the least, not that I ever settle for saying so little.... Yet, I had to find a way to rationalize my stance, I mean it was of comfort to me, let me feel I was doing something good, and although I wouldn't ever admit it, the smugness and the self righteous judgemental-ism made me feel right at home as if I were still nestled in the bosom of the Mother Org.
So here was MY take after thinking I had 'gotten free'; I can't be free of pagan influence without leaving the universe, so I'll just keep myself free of pagan religious influences, I mean they are pagan and that means 'bad juju', right? So turkey day was in, YAY!. Birthdays, Memorial day, National Ammo Day, it was all good, and I still got to pretend I wasn't judging all those deluded fools who were angering the most high by painting eggs or maxing out their credit cards on solstice presents. Although, I figured they were probably in hot water only if they knew so I was grateful not to be going door to door dooming them by informing them anymore.
Then along came the WT Wizard. Yes I am naming you, you ol son of a gun. You never fail to be strident, obnoxious, toss it all right up front, and fricking awesome. I LOVE reading your rants, man. And you would invariably mention the six screens site, I almost wondered if you were getting paid for a while. Yeah I razzed you about it, but I also went there and read it up like Bounty absorbing intentionally spilled "mystery liquid" on a cheesy television commercial from my stolen youth.
Turns out Jesus was hung on a CROSS, not a STAKE, and that started the ball rolling. I had never really thought it was a big deal, I mean who cared what he was hung on? he died for us, and that's what mattered to me.
This turned out to be a pivotal point in my theological construct.
See, the cross is actually used IN SCRIPTURE as symbolic of Jesus sacrifice. 'if anyone wants to follow me, let him pick up his cross' or words to that effect. With the cross indisputably having a pre christian pagan significance, and equally indisputable Christian symbolic significance I was now faced with biblical precedent of something pagan being used in true worship.
This required a bit of pondering on my part, but then came a thread about holidays and it quoted the scripture 'let no man judge you' I think it might be in Corinthians... And I got the gist of it for the first time in all my life.
These folks were now Christian, but used to be pagan, and were either celebrating or not as their conscience directed them, and both were right. And if they did, it was 'to the Lord' but if they didn't it was also 'to the Lord'....
I have been judging. I ought not be doing that.
So I set my sights on not getting pissed off at people just being normal, but didn't really wrap my head around how absolutely subnormal, how mind-numbingly anti-normal I had been raised and still was!
It's just normal and natural to have some encouraging celebration that cheers you up in the depth of the long dark winter, it's only natural and normal to have something in common with your fellow man, what are YOU doing for Christmas?
The Bible Students under Russell celebrated, it was only under Rutherford that it was banned, and since my breakthrough I could see it was only for the purpose of alienating the dubs from 'the world' so they wouldn't notice Toto tugging on that curtain stage right. The WT would drone on about the worst of it, depression, suicide, debt, blah blah blah, such a 'happy' people.... They would fail to properly interpret the scripture so that we would think it mattered that there were pagan roots.... And we remained stuck like bugs on pins in a collection.
Tonight I got really angry. I realized that every winter it wasn't just the weather that dumped on me, it was the WTS as well.
They alienated me, stole my childhood, made me view normalcy as something to be detested, subverted and perverted, twisted and tortured the scriptures, human nature, natural affection, and my developing mind... It's like that song 'can God fill teeth' by Lard.....
Thank you WTW, and the rest of the JWD crew for being here, THANK YOU Simon for making this place available, and THANK YOU Becky and Angie for showing so much patience with me until I came around...
I better get shopping I guess, I got a LOT of holidays to make up for now that I know that the Loving God isn't going to toast me alive for hanging a glass ball on a tree or painting an egg.
I'm done getting dumped on, time to be more normal.
Well, maybe just a bit, heheheheh.
RD