So last Thursday was meeting day. My wife knows my thoughts on this religion and respects my fade and is completely ok with it (which surprised me, and also made me love her even more). I think she must know it's all crack-pot stuff but seeing as her whole family are all in and about 98% of them cant even explain their beleifs without a Watchtower on hand i think she's just going along for the friends/family/social side of it. I have no doubt she'll leave on her own too in a few years.
Before the meeting my 2yo runs off to play with the other kids. I sit in my seat and load JW app up ready. An elder says hello to me and is then dragged away by another elder to talk about loft conversions. A newly married sister approaches and asks how my job is going, we make small talk and she doesnt get my humor (she's from another part of the country), and i think i've offended her by saying "you look different today, must be all this sunshine we're having. You look well.". She makes her excuses and dissapears.
Meeting begins.
Meeting finishes (thank Alla/Odin/Thor/Marduk/Ba'el)
I'm wandering around. The cliques are in full swing. No way for me to join in their conversations about sports (yawn), Brother so-and-so STILL hasn't asked sister gagging-for-it out on a date yet (just f***ing doing it already or leave her alone!). So i approach sister gagging-for-it-but-pretending-that-she-isnt and ask how she is (making sure im holding my daughter so she knows im not coming on to her) - unfortunately, im a married man, so no chance of me fawning over her and giving her compliments so she doesnt want to speak to me. So she gives me one word answers and then starts talking to my daughter.
Thats fine.
Really, it is.
Then on my way out i meet brother fading-in-secret-who-has-some-GREAT-reasonings-about-how-this-religeon-is-bullshit and tell him "i made an effort today to speak to people i dont usually speak to. And now i remember WHY i dont speak to them" (we both laugh) and he says "i know what you mean".
Oh well. I'd rather have just one "worldly" friend that likes me for who i am than 8 million "brothers" that really only speak to me when they need to.
On another note, some of you have PM'd me asking how im doing since my very first post and subsequent ones. Im doing good. I'm over the sadness/anger/gratefull phase now but still get the occasional pangs of sadness. Not of losing anthing by leaving this publishing house/cult but of what might have been. I passed up studying medicine when i left school (it was offered to me) because "armageddon was just around the corner". But at the same time, i wouldnt have met my wife and had my daughter had i not joined this cult. So that's one good thing to come out of it.
One sentence alone justifies my fade when my wife asks... "have you noitced that its impossible to leave this religion with your reputation in tact?" that was a major wake up call for me and that began my doubts. No wonder we shouldnt look at critical websites... because they're FULL of, not rumor/lies, but FACTS and EVIDENCE.
Right, rant over.