Didn't get enough sleep again. Why do I always insist on staying up too late playing stupid games? I mean really, is it that important for me to lose sleep trying to get to the next level of towerball? Since C. isn't napping I realize nighttime is my time to relax, but man, I gotta get to bed earlier so I don't always feel like trash every morning. No deep philosophical thoughts to post today, too tired. I go through phases where it's all I think about and then I won't think about it at all. I did get 2 new books I ordered: The Christ Conspiracies and The Book your church doesn't want you to read. Trying to work my way through them slow but sure. Still over FIL's comment this weekend. It's bad enough to know racist people exist, why do they have to bring their ignorance into my world and near my child?

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3/2/04 The more I think about it, the more upset I get. I realize my parents did what they thought was right and tried to teach me what they believed in and didn't mean any harm. But when I look at my daughter (and granted she is a lot younger than I was when I saw the play, but I still think I was awfully young), I can't imagine purposefully implanting fears in her mind about death and hell! I try to understand from the Christian standpoint that instilling a fear of hell is a good thing if it draws a person to God, but even then I can't say I don't think it is right. And if they really thought about it and saw what they were doing, I would hope they would be disgusted with themselves. DH and I have been planning to send her to the Christian school. We want her to get a good education and be in an educational environment where it won't be a free-for-all (can't think of how to explain it) like in the public schools. But there are 2 issues I have: 1. You have to attend church for your child to go to school there. I am not sure if ANY church qualifies or if it has to be in the fundamental Christian vein. If it can be any church, I am assuming we could attend the UU church and be ok. Of course that irritates me that I would have to go to church somewhere just so she can attend, but I realize it is a private school and they need to make up rules according to what they want because they own the place. I also wonder if this would make me a hypocrite? 2. And more importantly, do I want to risk her being brought up with all the same fears and confusion I was? If I don't believe in it, why would I send her to a school where it's a main component and the education she receives will be filtered through a Christian viewpoint? I'm not saying there isn't any good in the Christian faith, just that I do not want that to be her main source of influence and the blinders through which she views the world. I'm torn because I want her to get a good education, but at what sacrifice? I do know that we will teach her what we want at home, but if it conflicts with what she is taught at school, I wonder if she'll get kicked out anyways if she questions them or if they realize we're not the "right" kind of religious folk.

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Updating old entries from old journal: 2/29/04 Today I was reading again in the "Leaving the Fold" book where it talks about the inner child. The book has visualization exercises to help contact your inner child but I'm not too sure what I think about that. Anywho, it got me to thinking about me as a child. My sister told me that when I was really little I was really outgoing and happy, I would talk to anyone and was the life of the party. Then something happened and I became quiet and withdrawn, very shy and nervous. I wonder if that happened around kindergarten when dad had his first heart attack. I'm not sure. But it also got me to thinking about what's happened to me (in a religious context) when I was a child and how those experiences have shaped me. One memory I have is from when the church was still over at the old location, so I had to be younger than 10. They had a play about a person going to heaven, something like that, with big white sheets strung across the stage and people dressed like angels. There may have been a hell part too but I don't remember it specifically, just an awareness that there might have been. I do remember feeling afraid and guilty - knowing that I'm a sinner and I'm going to hell if I don't get saved, any moment now I could die and be in the flames of hell, and how horrible hell is and look how nice heaven is with the nice white sheets and the smiling angels. At one point they let us walk on the stage in the heaven part - I remember that. That night when we got home I prayed to God to make me a Christian as we were walking to the house. I didn't feel anything so I said the sinners prayer again when I went to bed just in case the first prayer didn't "take." I felt fear because I didn't FEEL anything happen when I said the prayer and I feared that maybe I didn't do it right and God didn't let me in. Even though I didn't feel any different, or feel that God was there with me,I soothed myself with thoughts that the angels were all dancing around in heaven, happy that I had chosen to be a Christian. Looking back on it though, I wonder what was in my parents' minds to let me see something like that, to scare a young child about hell and dying, etc. Like they're burdening a young child to understand something they aren't old enough to understand, and putting fears into them that they can't handle. My whole reason for asking to be saved was not because I understood or believed in anything other than a very real fear of dying and going to hell. I was scared. I know my parents weren't trying to be cruel but still.... As far as I can remember I have never been the happy go-lucky child my sister remembered me as. I have always been quiet, always been fearful of mistepping somewhere along the way and ending up in hell, of never being good enough and going to hell, of dying, of just generally being a bad (sinful) person, which of course is what we all in the Christian faith are taught. We are nothing but slime without God. So is it possible that all this religious teaching changed me and not for the better? Did being instilled with all this fear of death and hell, being told to love others but also taught to hate the self (my self), did all this change me from who I was supposed to be? All these years I felt lonely and quiet and depressed at times, separated from the rest of the "sinful" world because I was a Christian, all this time I thought something was wrong with ME but perhaps all this quietness and shyness, etc. was part of a coping mechanism against what I was taught? As a child I had no defense against this. And now, years later, I am having to wade through it all on my own. It stinks.

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