[This is the true story of my life. I'm posting it in installments. The final installment will include post-script-type thoughts, with acknowledgements to those who've helped me along these last two years, as well as those who've been an inspiration. I hope you enjoy reading. -dp]
Chapter 1: http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/6/155373/1.ashx
Chapter 2: http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/6/155429/1.ashx
Chapter Three
Time does wonderful and amazing things. Even after these trials, our family found a way to move on and become more and more active in the truth. My brother excelled like a spiritual rocket and soon made Bethel his goal. It almost felt like an announcement, like he was going to get married. Except he was dedicating himself to the service of Jehovah, a dedication not many could make due to their responsibilities and obligations. He had begun pioneering prior to the announcement, briefly considering his secular options. In the end, he took the proficiency test and received a high school equivalency certificate at the age of sixteen. There was no point in pursuing high education; we were from a poor background, a blue-collar family, and neither did we have any interest in furthering the system of things.
He stuck to his schedule regardless of who met him for service, conducting all service meetings. He gave more talks in the Hall, and was loved by everyone who valued his seriousness. I looked up to him like I had always done, but still didn’t quite feel my own “calling” or affinity with this method of worship to Jehovah. Service was painful. I hated walking onto other people’s property and being refused by them over and over again. I came to believe that either I was not humble enough for the work, or just didn’t have the desire, going through the motions. However, I knew this wouldn’t last; I knew I had to make a stand for what was right. My mother had repeatedly made it clear that she was not going to tolerate a son that served Jehovah half-heartedly. I would either follow him or be kicked out of the house when I turned eighteen. Regardless, I found a way to make the truth my own.
The coercion didn’t set well with me, but it wasn’t a cause to rebel against what I knew was right. I had long been familiar with the routine of spiritual life: prayer, meetings, service, getting ready for the meetings, prayer before meals, family study, more meetings, conventions, looking up scriptures in the Bible, cross-referencing, taking books off shelves, meetings again, and prayer at bedtime. I could perform all these tasks faithfully, but it was hard to make it personal, which, I suppose is a contradiction. The only thing that felt truly mine was prayer in my own bed before I went to sleep. It was my chance to feel a connection with Jehovah. I prayed hard, but was never satisfied, only making me try harder. Because what was it all worth if I did everything, but at the end of the day didn’t feel his loving hand, his comforting warmth that I was told he has? It must be due to my sins that I couldn’t feel his guidance. After all, I was a masturbator, a procrastinator, an occasional liar, prideful at heart, selfish in the eyes of my mother, and in the end, just plain lazy. For a time, I was terrified that I was committing the unforgivable sin, until I convinced myself that that would constitute actively working against the Holy Spirit, which, to the best of my knowledge, I hadn’t done. But then I would read statements in the Watchtower, condemning people who sinned repeatedly and who didn’t change, and get worried all over again. I have spent the majority of my life honestly not knowing whether I was acceptable to Jehovah or not.
At the time, I tried to make up for my sins by praying for extraordinary lengths of time. I thought that if I could just enter into some sort of other-worldly spiritual plane, I would be able to feel Jehovah. Entire days I would spend locked in a sort of haze, mumbling words through my lips, walking around at school hunched over, like a monk. The teachers were worried about me because I was an obvious loner and wouldn’t eat lunch. I prostrated myself (once I found out what that was) on the floor of my bedroom at night, praying with as much tenacity and intensity as I could physically muster. I had to drive everything bad out of me and also beg for the few things I wanted: a peaceful, happy life with my own family in the new system, the love of the girl I had a crush on for over seven years straight, and peace and sanity for my mother and sister. I suppose I spent too much time asking and not saying other things, but if I knew what those other things were supposed to be, I would have done that instead. I tried to imbue my prayers with the eloquence of the Psalms, imitating the intensity which they portrayed, and the tone used. I found some comfort knowing I was doing all I could to communicate with Him. After all, wasn’t Jehovah going to grant us the requests of our heart? I believed this absolutely; it was all I had.
The day came when my brother got accepted to Bethel. Suddenly, our family was famous. No one had gone to Bethel from our congregation since the seventies, or so I was told. We were all tremendously proud of him. I was a little sad he was going, but tried not to think so selfishly. The congregation had a big party for him; it was a celebration, an achievement for everyone, because they were producing a Bethelite! Everyone was proud and brimming with joy. People lined up to give presents to him and made little speeches of appreciation for all his loving service that he had performed. Much of it, I think, was due to the fact that many of the long-timers had seen our family go through trying times and watched this young man emerge like a glorious, praising dewdrop. Others could have pitied him, knowing he had such pure ideals that he could only someday suffer defeat from the inability to live up to them. The party went on and I milled around the periphery, already sullen with his loss. I now felt truly alone. He was the only one who understood what it was like in our family, as a person caught up in trying to help others heal, but secretly planning to escape from it all. I was the youngest child, and so had developed a complex that I was always being left behind. My brother leaving only solidified that; however, my being left behind also planted the seeds of my ambition, for which I am eternally grateful.
For a couple years after he left, I spent a lot of time wandering around, not knowing where to go or what to do. Since I was the last child in the house and my mother was starting to come out of her mental reverie, her disciplinarian-like approach to child rearing eased up a bit. I had more freedom than either child before me had, and took advantage of it by spending as much time as I could out of the house. We moved again when I was thirteen or fourteen and started attending a new congregation. This was also a blessing.
I hadn’t even joined the ministry school yet, and it hung out there like a terrible fate I knew I would have to face. I postponed my initiation for as long as possible. In fact, I started regular pioneering before I joined the school.
I’m not too sure when exactly I made the decision to pioneer; it just felt like the natural next step of adolescence once I was baptized. Baptism was also one of those fateful events I knew I would have to face, but it wasn’t as if I didn’t want to do it. I knew I wanted to, but I was still nervous, barely containing myself during the baptismal talk. I couldn’t hear a word the speaker was saying, just my own thoughts shouting in my head and a great buzzing noise like bugs and the surf of the ocean. I was the last one to get dunked: the water had a slick film on the top from whatever body products the earlier candidates were sporting, but in I went.
And then, it was over. It felt like I had always been baptized. At a later date I heard about how some people pray to God and dedicate themselves before getting submerged. When I heard this—I think at a book study for which I was serving as reader—I nearly dropped my books. Dedicate myself to Jehovah? Hadn’t I already done that, long ago? In fact, hadn’t my parents done that, when I was a baby? When did it become my decision? I knew it was my decision, but I could never pinpoint when and for what reason, it became mine. I made up for this by finding some quiet place as soon as I could and praying to Jehovah, saying things that I thought were appropriate, and asking forgiveness for getting baptized before I had dedicated myself to him.
After my family regained their grounding and my mother found a way to heal whatever mental anguish had afflicted her so suddenly, she became extremely self-righteous. She waged a spiritual war against anyone who crossed her path, including my sister, who by this time was married several years and living in the next town over. My sister could never live up to what my mother thought a worshipper of Jehovah should be, and found fault with her housing decorations (she hung crystals), her dress (the skirt was too long, too short, too whorish, too see-through, the wrong color, etc) her husband (he didn’t pay his mother-in-law the utmost reverence), and always her spiritual routine (her health was bad and she rarely made the meetings). My sister’s marriage was a rocky one, but I suppose everyone except me expected they would separate. One day they did, and my sister found another man—not in the truth—that loved her and respected her. This meant, of course, that she would have to be disfellowshiped.
My mother was always on the side of Jehovah. More accurately, Jehovah was always on the side of my mother. She was so righteous that she disfellowshiped my sister before the elders did. And in our house, that was the law. She encouraged me to write a final letter, telling my sister how much she hurt me by leaving Jehovah and the “tough love” I would have to inculcate. At the time, I believed my mother was right. She had been right all my life. How could I disagree when she based all her decisions firmly on the Bible? The scriptures she recited were very clear; the Watchtower articles on the subject were even clearer. She took my sister’s sin against Jehovah as a personal effrontery, as if she were the conduit through which the spiritual life of her offspring streamed.
Throughout all the turmoil in our household, I found solace through two things: pioneering, and the companionship of the best friend I ever had. Not soon after we moved to our new house I befriended the witness kid who lived down the street. He was an only child, and his parents saw our arrival as fortuitous. We did everything together, even though we had opposite personalities. The day we met, he showed me around my new neighborhood and took me down to the creek area under a rail road bridge. The banks of the creek were made of clay, and we both covered our hands with it and imprinted them on the sides of the wooden bridge, high up, where we could barely reach. We also drew in our initials and the date, and to this day they are still plainly visible, even after fifteen years.
I was generally the leader, and he the follower. I was irritable and discontent and he was easy-going and relaxed. It did my soul good to spend so many years hanging out with him, getting into trouble together, and divulging our secrets and dreams. In the summers we used to camp out on the roof of his house with our sleeping bags and a telescope to look at the stars. We fantasized and speculated about all sorts of possibilities for the new system. We loved each other as brothers, and I eventually became closer to him than my own flesh and blood brother. I used to sit in the bushes in front of his house waiting for him to get home from school (I was in home school—another scheme by mother), which would have been ordinary behavior for an eight year-old, but not so much for a young man of sixteen, seventeen, or eighteen. The happiest times of my teenage years were with him. As long as we were together, whatever we happened to be doing, I was happy and could forget about my own family. Sometimes I would even talk about it and he would listen patiently and then say something nice. It was a simple word, nothing much, but I hope he knew how good it felt. His acceptance of me and my failings was probably the first experience I had of someone loving me unconditionally. I’m glad I’m writing this; because this is the first time I’ve realized it. James, I love you with all my heart and I always will.
I pioneered for three and a half years. During that time I quietly ascended the congregational ranks, serving faithfully, giving talks, conducting service meetings, doing territory even though it was the last thing I wanted to do, going out in early morning field service by myself—all because I wanted to. No one can ever say I did it out of a sense of obligation, or that I didn’t have anything better to do. I loved Jehovah and enjoyed serving the congregation. I had many responsibilities and assignments, and gave talks at least every meeting night. I became known for giving good talks, with brothers and sisters mentioning that it was clear I really felt it, that they could see it on my face and in my voice. I stepped off the stage after every talk swelling with the energy that I understood as the Holy Spirit. However, throughout this, I was also comforted with the goal I had in mind. Eventually I made this known, although I knew it would draw unwanted comparisons: I was going to apply for Bethel once I turned nineteen.
My mother was quietly ecstatic, my step-father tremendously proud and congratulatory, and my brother very excited. I had corresponded with him since a few years before this time and gradually gained a very strong desire to go there and serve. It sounded like the perfect place—a place where I could finally gain intimacy with Jehovah, where I could feel him more. I wasn’t too proud to tell people I wanted to go to Bethel and serve with my brother, although it did occasionally bother me when the inevitable phrase of “following in your brother’s footsteps” was used. I wasn’t following in his footsteps; I was following in Christ’s footsteps. And in a sense, I was blazing my own trail, defining my own terms of success. But also, in addition to my spiritual reasons, Bethel was a way out for me, a shining holy city of possibility that would wash away the burdensome remnants of my family and allow me to become the man Jehovah wanted me to be.
I pioneered and served patiently, sometimes unbearably, and desperate. I dreamed constantly of leaving my hometown and going to Bethel. I knew, without a doubt, that Bethel was made for me and I was made for Bethel. The more my brother told me about it the more my appetite was whetted and the more I had trouble biding my time. When not out in service, I worked nights in janitorial work. Most of the time this didn’t even feel like work, since any time I could spend out of my house was golden. I worked with my best friend James and another friend, having a lot of fun and making many memories. I felt like I could be myself, while still not knowing how prudish, straight-laced, and critical I probably seemed in the eyes of others. I had long since picked up some of my mother’s self-righteousness and judgmentalism, and was just beginning to have the faith and compassion of others to compare it to.
Finally, the day came when I could apply. I filled out the form, gave it to my proud elders, and then tried to forget about it. I don’t even know if I wanted to be content during that period. It goes back to my feelings of always being left behind and wanting to catch up with everyone else and supersede them. I didn’t see Bethel as me following my brother; he being there was incidental other than the fact that he helped to stir my desire to go.
I had attended every Bethel meeting at the conventions and assemblies; it just seemed like the natural thing to do. One year at the circuit assembly I was the only person to go to the meeting for those interested and had the circuit and district overseers all to myself. I knew so much about Bethel from my brother that I was brimming with little tidbits. They asked me questions about the latest news, and, in retrospect, they probably did this to entertain me, but it was nice of them—I’m sure they noticed how excited I was.
I knew exactly when the mail was going to come each day. But what I had thought was my fateful day actually turned out to be a ruse: one afternoon I opened the mailbox once the mail carrier was safely out of sight, and found a suspiciously thin letter from the Society. I ripped it open only to find that I had missed one of the boxes on the application and would have to answer it in reply to their notification. My mother knew who the letter was from, and was busy stamping her foot nervously with a wild look in her eye, but then she relaxed as I told her it was only a small technicality. I sent it back, and within another handful of weeks received my appropriately-sized fat letter. The Society welcomed me with gracious words, calling me “brother”—their brother; I was touched. I was happily accepted and was being assigned so I could serve with my brother at the same complex. An aura of warmth followed me around from room to room, outside, wherever I went. It was a sense of relief that would only be surpassed by being spared from death, which was also to come.
One of the best parts about preparing to go to Bethel was how supportive my mother was. To have her work with me and not against me was a blissful thing. If she knew how it felt I think she would have regretted being so domineering and abrasive in years past. Once my congregation found out, I underwent a similar type of jocular envy, adulation, admiration, and congratulations as my brother experienced almost five years prior. It was all surreal, however. I didn’t care about anything anymore; I was already gone. My mother threw me an open-house party and set up a donation box in the shape of an airplane. At the end of the day, I had nearly a thousand dollars in cash. This paid for my airfare and gave me some spending money to start out with.
Between the time when I received my invitation and when I actually left, every once in a while I would have to fight overwhelming feelings of panic and desperation, like something would happen and I wouldn’t get to go. It didn’t feel real until I was in the airport terminal, hugging my mom and step-father, waving goodbye, walking down the boarding platform.
The flight was heavenly. I prayed several times to Jehovah, thanking him for allowing me to serve him at Bethel. I was starting to feel closer to him—my prayers were finally being answered after all those years weaving through His worship in a daze. I remember pondering the peace I felt and looking down at the earth’s surface below, the sweeping expanses of snow stretching out over the horizon. The east coast was just beginning to emerge from winter, starting a fresh new year.
I arrived in Newark at night, and although New Jersey air is only a few grades above the scent of raw sewage, I breathed in with zest. I saw my brother in the distance and we slapped each other on the back, all smiles and exuberant jokes. He drove me up to Wallkill and we talked the whole way. I was taking everything in; I was eating it all. For the first time, I felt what it was like to love life.