And so it begins. . .

I've been contemplating blogging all day, and I'm taking this way too seriously for my own good, so I'm just going to jump in! The main reason I want to blog about my experiences and feelings of the past year is to help myself gain some clarity. So this is mainly for me. But, I may, on occasion, send this to various relatives who might be interested in what I think, and maybe they will gain some clarity as well! High hopes, pie in the sky hopes......
I love analogies and metaphores. They help paint a picture that I can't quite formulate with words. And my favorite analogy this year has centered on tomatoes. I hate tomatoes. I have always hated tomatoes. The smell nauseates me, the taste haunts my nightmares, I hate the gooshy squishy feeling I get between my fingers when I have to cut them to fit into bottles. (When I can't get out of canning, that is.) One of my earliest memories is of sitting at the kitchen table with a bowl of stewed tomatoes over home-made white bread in front of me, and my mom hovering over me until I ate that odious offering. I remember the disgust I felt, and the resentment, and the hopelessness that I'd never be able to choke it down and would therefore spend the rest of my days at that table in tears while my brothers ran off to play without me. And I didn't just hate the tomatoes; I hated my mom for making me eat them. I hated her for not understanding the depth of my dislike. I hated her for not seeing me for the tomato-hater I was, and for expecting me to just buck up baby because that's what we eat around here and you will damn well eat it and like it!! Maybe not in those words, but that was the idea. All these years later, and I can almost taste the bitterness in my mouth! I'm salivating as I write!
As an adult, there have been various occasions when I've been ribbed for not liking tomatoes. My brother-in-law, who I don't like anyway, told me that as an adult I need to learn to like them. My own daughter, when told that I didn't want tomatoes on my half of a shared salad, said, "You're an adult! Get over it!" I don't want to get over it! I don't like tomatoes! I don't like them here or there, I don't like them anywhere! And I don't expect that to change! Ever!
And that's how I feel about church. Right down to the resentment I feel at the expectation that as an adult I should just get over it. I think maybe I was born without the devotion gene. I don't like the rituals, and the forced reverence, and the pretense that I understand the hidden meanings behind what we do. I don't like being judged, and I don't like the assumed authority of the men on the stand watching that we all sustain with our right hands and take the sacrament with our right hands and don't wear flip-flops or more than one modest pair of earrings or a denim skirt or a colored shirt. I don't like the idea that I've given away my power to choose because of some covenants I made under duress (yes, sitting in a special room wearing strange clothing accompanied by family members and friends who are all watching me as I attempt to follow instructions seemingly in code that will allow me into the celestial kingdom constitutes duress). I was born with taste buds that dislike tomatoes, and my innermost self responds the same way to religion. Since leaving my parent's house, I haven't eaten tomatoes unless they were blended, mixed with herbs and spices, spread on dough, and covered with pepperoni and cheese. Or with my french fries as ketchup. Or in a few other culinary delights. So why have I spent the last 30 years forcing myself to partake of religion on a daily/weekly/monthy basis? Isn't it time for me to decide how to feed my soul?