So, a guy I know and would sometimes chat with briefly at work came to me recently. He said he'd been invited by his neighbor to attend the upcoming JW convention. Apparently, he had heard that I used to be a JW and wanted to get my thoughts about whether he should go. I was caught by surprise, but I thanked him for coming to me and shared with him my own experiences in exiting the group. I was able to send Ray Franz' books to him after I got home, and gave him some links and other books that would be worth looking into. Jwfacts.com got a plug there, I might add, so hopefully he checked you out, Mr. JWFacts.
I tried not to make a big thing of discussing my exit from the JWs with co-workers, since you never know how that sort of topic might be taken. But I did talk in depth with co-workers I felt comfortable with about it. I guess that means they have been talking about me. I usually tend to stay to myself, and don't much socialize with my co-workers--definitely not outside of work or anything--so it was interesting to have that happen to me. I'm glad I was able to help that man to avoid potentially getting recruited by a JW convention.
I don't go out of my way to broadcast some sort of anti-JW message in my day-to-day life, though. I think I toned down my discussions of religious stuff once I started to question Christianity itself, which seems to make people really uncomfortable.
I just thought I might share this experience with you folks, since I've not really done any threads on a personal level in awhile. I don't think I'll be going into my home life or anything in much detail, but I guess I can add a little about that, too.
The good news is, I'm not going to be attending the international convention this year. Heck, I won't even have to give the Mrs. a ride to the site. Well, not that I ever had to. She is finally learning how to drive, so...soon she'll be all over the place, which is pretty cool for her, I guess. If I had actual money, I'd enjoy the time by catching a double feature at the movie theater--maybe Guardians of the Galaxy and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes...or if I can find X-Men: Days of Future Past or The Amazing Spider-Man 2 somewhere, I'd check them out. But I can probably just do like I usually do when there's an assembly I'm not attending--have a Lord of the Rings Blu-ray marathon. Or maybe an X-Men marathon. Well, something like that. So, I won't be offering any notes or what have you from the convention. Looks to be decent weather this week, at least from the forecasts I've seen so far, so at least the family probably won't be baking out there in extreme temperatures.
But I'm doing fine. All in all, a fine witness was given, and so far, I've disinvited 1 person to the convention. How we rejoice to hear such thrilling news!
--sd-7