The chair crashed and shatters on the thin carpet floor and I twitch in reaction as I hide in the utility room.  The utility room that houses the freezer with all the many flavors of ice cream.  The utility room where my BB rifle is stored and pies are often hidden away while Thanksgiving dinner is being served.  The small room you must walk through as you enter my grandparent’s country rock home.  But today it is my hiding place as my Pa (grandfather) gets angry.  He is either drunk or upset because he is being kept from indulging himself in such a way, I truthfully cannot remember.  I can’t truly remember if this cowering away in fear is something I actually experienced or if I have just been told it in such a way that it has drilled itself into my memory.  But it is there and it is a stepping stone to understanding who I am.

My Pa is a great man.  Don’t let the alcohol fool you.  He shaped much of what I would ultimately become as a human being.  He is caring and intelligent.  A jokester and a bit stubborn, maybe quite a bit stubborn.  He would often get “angry” with the wall for jumping out in front of him.  I’m sure now that he was making it a joke for my benefit but he was also a bit more than a tad upset that he had run into the wall.  The anger was just there below the surface.  But always at surface level was a smile and joke and a way of showing you how to become better.  A book or a question to think about.  A way of letting you know that soon you would be thankful for a good nap and a fire to build.  A story that told you more than you knew at the time.

I went with him of course, I don’t remember if he asked or if I insisted, but I went.  I doubt there had been or ever will be that many young boys in a room full of alcoholics, but I was privileged to be a part of something that would help my Pa and myself become whole as individuals.  I remember the old coffee pot and the stories.  Paths taken of regret and triumph over addiction.  I remember the creek that ran by the meeting house that I would go to when I probably shouldn’t be in on this part of the story.  I remember the plastic chip and the pride.  The smile on adult faces, a smile that I would later understand to be tired and have been through life in a way that some are lucky enough not to have to endure.  I remember standing together at the end of every meeting and saying the Lord’s prayer.  I don’t remember how many times I went, but I know that it stays with me to this day.

As with many people that grew up in Oklahoma, or states like it, religion played a significant role in my life.  Sometimes a defining, sometimes a background presence but always there.

As I pace up and down the tower of stairs that at the time I imagined went much higher than would later turn out to be the case, I contemplated life and the role that faith would play in my life.  I was thirteen and about to go through confirmation at the United Methodist church that some of my family and I attended.  The same church I would, a decade later, be leading adult Sunday school classes with a passion and a disregard of my natural fear of public speaking that the boy pacing those stairs would never have believed possible.  I sat for a moment on the seemingly far too thin iron rod staircase and wondered if I believed in God enough to face an overwhelming fear of walking down in front of my congregation and accepting Jesus into my heart and receiving my personalized Bible or if, as the tiny voice inside me whispered, “Do you have enough information for this?”.  It was a long time before I got back up and slowly descended the number of flights I had nervously paced up in the first place.  I don’t know if my belief or my worries of letting people down won out, but I did, palms sweating, walk down the aisle and pledge myself to God.  I was rewarded with a frosty from Wendy’s and a red with gold lettering, leather bound Bible.  A Bible I would read through most of two full times.

When they asked, who wanted to volunteer to teach the following Sunday, to my surprise, I gladly raised my hand.  I was in my early 20’s with a wife and a young daughter.  At the time, living in a mobile home and wearing a second-hand suit, pretending to fit in with the upper middle class people that made up the young adult Sunday school class we had decided to join.  I was determined to “make it work” at the church I had turned my life over to Christ and He was asking me to teach.  So, I put my whole self into it.  I studied and read and purchased teaching aides on particular passages.  I made notes and wrote talks and timed myself until I was sure I could fill the entire class.  And it worked.  My wife and I would walk down the three tiny stairs in front of our tin metal home and get into our red SUV, that leaked so much oil you had to always have some available, and we would attend church every Sunday.  I would teach with a fire and excitement that for the most part won me the spot every Sunday, or maybe no one else wanted it anyways, there is always that possibility.  My teaching and passion for the Word eventually lead me to attend more advanced classes and interact with the pastors on a regular basis.  I was even encouraged to seek the cloth myself, but that was not to be my path.

A severe head injury and a final realization that a couple that starts in high school is not always the best life decision, moved me towards a place where I was no longer surrounded by Christians.  I asked myself many times after our separation if I was angry with God or I blamed him for a parting that I was not fully prepared to oblige.  Through all the heartache that is involved in a divorce and being apart from your children, I can say, in retrospect, with full confidence that I am glad my ex-wife decided to push this next step of our lives into being.  We have become much better communicators and parents apart then we would ever have been able to under the same roof.  The further apart from Sunday school and church I got the more that turmoil of the staircase re-entered my mind.  That same pacing, those same questions rose in my heart once again.  When I was no longer surrounded by people feeding me back the speeches and lines that I was giving to them, I was again able to have a young person’s ability to evaluate in a way that many lose in the midst of faith.  I reread the Bible without the weight and pressure that comes with the expectations of your peers.  Once your eyes are opened to the thing, it can be difficult to avoid the anger and frustration caused by the thing still being a part of the world.

Today I would, if pressed, describe myself as a Deist akin to Thomas Jefferson.  Although I would much prefer to avoid labels.  Many in the atheist community would tell me that I am wrong, that I am also an atheist.  By some definitions that may be true.  But I believe that there is something that is more than this world, more than the parts of this universe.  I am ok with the thought that thing may be the multiverse or universe creating pixies.  I have no answers as to what that thing may be or how we can ever know it more intimately, but I do believe that the faiths of man are without merit and lacking in sound evidence.  This blog is not an atheist blog, but I will approach all the subjects that I will be writing about in a way that reflects my belief in humanity and fair thinking.  I hope to be able to look at all sides of an issue and come to a conclusion that best describes the reality in which we find ourselves.

I now live with a beautiful woman that gives me the most gracious gift of allowing me to be me.  I no longer have to try to be the things I’m not, or act in ways I do not truly believe in order to fit into a group.  I am allowed to say what I feel and believe with no fear of other’s reactions.  There is no better relationship then the one in which you are truly allowed to be yourself.

My daughter is in college and my son a teenager.  I’m certain that they sometimes despise me for not just going along with the things we all hear in life.  The questioning, the need for valid reasons for thoughts and desires.  On occasion, though, I will hear a phrase from one of them that lifts my heart to new heights.  A discussion that lets me know I have, at least, attempted to do right by them and I hope to be able to do right by anyone that honors me with a reading of my thoughts.  Thank you for taking the time.