Posts by c5

28

If you had to change one thing you did while being a JW, what would it be?

by MelbaToast in

jw
friends

.

i have seen so many stories here that invoke guilt and shame on innocents, what one important momyumental thing would you have changed if you had it to do over?.

mine would be not getting baptized.

c5

Hi!

If I could go back and change things, I dont think I would . Because of the choices I made as a JW, it eventually led to where I am at now, freedom from them!

But, if for fun I could go back and change something, I would have stood my ground and not attended the circuit assembly (winter/spring 1991). Because I attended the that assembly in 1991, I lost my job.

The story is this: I worked at a local grocery store where a bunch of other jw's also worked. Since they all asked off the assembly ahead of me, I was not able to get an "ok" to take that Saturday off (incidently the busiest day of the week for the store). My boss told me I had to find a replacement if I was to go. So I asked everyone and thier mother if they would fill in for me. No one could since all the other jw's were obviously going where I was, and the "worldly" people who were lucky to have that Saturday off did not want to work it. I finally convinced an older lady to fill in for me, and even at that, she could only fill half my shift. I explained this to my boss, and he reluctantly gave me permission to make the switch. This was 2 weeks before the assembly.

The day before the assembly, the lady calls me and tells me that she forgot she had a funeral to go to, and that she was sorry, but she could not fill in for me. I was mortified! I did not know what to do. My jw driven dogmatic conscience told me that under no circumstances could I miss a meeting or assembly. So, Saturday came and I went to the assembly.

I came back to work on Wednesday (my next scheduled day) and my boss was furious! I explained that I could not miss my religious convention, but he was still very mad. He told me that because I did not show up, all the workers including him had to work extra that day and I had put them in a huge bind. I believe he was not exaggerating, we were understaffed as it was. All I could do was say I was sorry. He then told me that he wanted to fire me. Before he told me I was fired (I knew it was coming), I said I quit. So, I did lose my job.

At the time I believed it was persecution, but as I look back now, it is apparent that I was very immature in assuming that I could just leave everyone at work in a hole while I went to the assembly. I can't remember if there was any law at the time saying one could not be fired for religious stuff, but to my boss it did not matter. I was too naive to know what to do anyway.

The kicker was, I found out that my "replacement" lied to me, and that there was no funeral she went to that day. She just found an excuse to back out of working for me, leaving me in a bind.

I would have made different choices in that situation if I could change anything. I also would have started to stand up for myself more back then as well.

22

Service Time Records and Recording

by c5 in

jw
friends

does anyone still have thier old service time slips?

i still have all of mine dating back to when i first started counting my time!

i always kept a copy for myself besides the one i turned in.

c5

Confucious,

Toward the end of my pioneering days, the majority of my time was "laundrymat-to-landrymat". I always hated service, but it got to a point where I could only bear quickly sneaking in the laundry mat and leaving the mags, making a mad dash back to the car, then slowly driving to the next laundrymat in a town far far away!

Glenmore,

Yes, if I recall, that was well above the national average back then! You should have been proud, lol!

I was talking to my X, and he told me that he would count 10 hours on his time when he never even went out at all that month! I wish I had not been such a "good jw" in my heyday. Seems lots of people got away with lying on thier time!

22

Service Time Records and Recording

by c5 in

jw
friends

does anyone still have thier old service time slips?

i still have all of mine dating back to when i first started counting my time!

i always kept a copy for myself besides the one i turned in.

c5

Shame on you Qwerty! Just kidding.

I have aquired a few new hobbies since leaving the JW's RR, but I think they are still are pretty boring for most!

Yooooooo hooooo, Noapoligies,,,where are you???????????? Did you every cheat on your time?

22

Service Time Records and Recording

by c5 in

jw
friends

does anyone still have thier old service time slips?

i still have all of mine dating back to when i first started counting my time!

i always kept a copy for myself besides the one i turned in.

c5

Hello!!

Does anyone still have thier old service time slips? I still have all of mine dating back to when I first started counting my time! I always kept a copy for myself besides the one I turned in.

It is kinda fun to go back and see what I did back then. I even recognize the different writing styles I experemented with.

Along these lines, were any of you meticulous about keeping track of service time? I knew some people who kept track of thier time down to the minute! The older I got, the more likely I rounded up in my time, but only in 15 minutes increments.

Did you know of anyone who fudged thier time in order to keep up with the national average? I admit to doing so a couple of times. I promptly made up that time and did not count it the next month.

Curious to hear your service time tales!

60

What Was The Stupidest Rule In Your Hall?

by minimus in

jw
friends

....or even, "what's the stupidest organizational rule that you know of"?

c5

Hello.

We had the "white shirt only" rule in our hall wayyy back in the 70's and probably before. They did not enforce it when colored shirts became popular in the 80's.

My brother got in trouble for wearing a "bolero" type suit while operating mikes at a meeting. There was nothing immodest or extravagant about it. The cut was not all that short. My friend and I had picked it out for him and he looked very nice in it. It reaffirms that anything just slightly in style was looked down upon, at least for a few years until more people tried to get away with it.

I remember that there was a rule that sisters HAD to wear nylons. I always hated wearing them in service, especially on hot sticky days. I had no clue to why the older sisters and brothers thought is was immodest to go without nylons. You could see through them anyways.......I just don't get it. What does one-one-millionth of see through fabric have to do with immodesty???

There was a circuit-wide rule of no mini-skirts, or in thier terms,skirts above the bottom of the knee. I say it was only circuit-wide because in the big city circuits, the sisters were allowed to get away with skirts that were a little more showy than we were.

No slacks for sisters was a common rule. In some congregations near mine, a few sisters in the 70's and 80's tried to get away with a "nice pant-suit", but were immediately marked as bad association.

Pertaining to the comment from another poster on this thread about number of earring holes, we were looked down upon if we had more than 1 hole per ear!!! It was extremely worldly to have 2 holes or more per ear.

Oh, and no ankle bracelets. I tried to get away with this one, but was severely critizised. They told me that ankle braclets were tied in with prostitution. Maybe they were in some culture in another time, but not now! I still have those pretty ankle bracelets tucked away somewhere,,maybe should get them out and wear them.

93

Post your ugly mug

by SC_Guy in

jw
friends

ok, this is kind of a silly thread... but... since i haven't seen any really recent "post your photo" threads, i'll start one.

you know how it goes... post a recent picture of yourself - don't be fooled by the topic title, lol... it doesn't have to be ugly.

ok, me first... ugly mugshots are easy for me to take being that i am just utterly hideous.

c5

27

What's The Most Traumatic Thing That's Ever Happened To You As A Witness?

by minimus in

jw
friends

when you look back at your witness life, you probably can see that you were regularly exposed to traumatic conditions and situations because you were a jw.

thinking back, was there anything that stood out in your mind that especially wounded you?

c5

My most tramatic experience would be dealing with angry householders out in field service. We had one man so upset at us he got his shotgun out on us. He was convinced that we were there to rub it in about the Jim Baker debacle way back when. I never felt better when the car group driver tore off as soon as he got back to the car. I remember getting into the car and ducking. Very very frightening. I was 15 at the time.

The other angry householder happened a few years earlier. I was about 12 or 13 at the time and I had my best friend my age come with me. I was always naturally shy when preaching, in fact I was so nervous talking to strangers or worrying about running into classmates, I had horrible stomach cramps everytime. Those cramps never went away, even when I was an adult. Anyways, my friend and I see a man working in the garage. We go up to him. I was super nervous to start cause it was a guarantee I had to talk since he was right up there. No hope of a not-at-home. The man see us and stops his work on his car. I go into introducing the WT and Awake. He throws down his wrench and starts yelling and screaming at me. I was so scared. He then proceeds to chase us all the way back to the car. I do not know how I managed to un-freeze myself from my shock and fear and make my feet move. Imagine a 30 something year old huge man chasing down two 12 year old girls in modest dresses. Yes, the guy was a jerk. I will never forget the fear that I had. Needless to say, he was marked as a "do not call". To this day, I can drive by that house and see it all happening again as if it was yesterday. Field service was never ever the same after that (and the gun incident) and I hated it with a passion. Funny how I was able to force myself to pioneer years later despite those bad experiences. Each and every door in my mind was another potential crazy person who was going to blow up come after me.

:-)

c5

18

RUPERT!

by Princess in

jw
friends

.

i'm so sad to see him gone.. what would you do to jon if you met him in real life?

he creeps me out like nothing else.

c5

It was a sad day in Survivor yesterday, my most favorite all time Survivor was voted out. I think Ruepert deserved to win out of all of them. He is on the jury panel now, so there is a chance for him to make a statement back.

75

Camping Fest - June 2004 - Canada

by pettygrudger in

jw
friends

okay guys - planning my summer vacations and i wanna know - can we make this happen or what????.

decent campgrounds fill up pretty quick, so i'd like to look into some.

i know nova scotia & ontario are many moons apart, and there was discussion of 2 separate fests.. if there are 2 separate ones, owens sound area, ontario has some pretty cool campgrounds.. who's in???

c5

Camping is great!!! Is this going to be an official Apostofest? If so, I'd love to travel to Canada in 2004!!!!!!!!! Count me in!!!

88

What Was "IT" That Finally Made You Leave The "Truth"?

by minimus in

jw
friends

anything in particular, or was it a combination of things??

?

c5

The big thing that did it for me was the "Generation" change in the mid 90's.

I had struggled and endured so much being a witness only to realize that I may have done it all for nothing. The nearness of the end to come was the main motivation for EVERYONE I knew to keep going, cause it was so difficult to be a witness. Once I realized that I may never see Armageddon, I started questioning WHY I was in the Organization. The articles asked if you were in it for selfish reasons, and I had to admit I was. Thinking to myself: If I was the only witness on earth right now, would I do what I was taught? The answer was no. I realized the only reason why I was a witness was because I was raised one, it was expected of me, and I did not know any different. Huge realization for me. That was the point where I started thinking for myself. I started to really examine all those "little" doubts I had always tucked away in my mind.

All this combined with the personal problems and self-doubts about myself drove me to make my exodus.

So glad I had the courage to leave, ,and I am proud of all you who have done the same. I have been JW free for 4 years now and have no regrets. Life has so much potential now.