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Tuesday, November 7, 2023
Thursday, November 2, 2023
"I Found Jesus In Prison..." Ethan #17
"For it is true, we can seldom help those closest to us. Either we don't know what part of ourselves to give or, more often than not, the part we have to give is not wanted. And so, it's those we live with and should know who elude us. But we can still love them - we can love them completely without completely understanding."
Norman Maclean ~ A River Runs Through It
Tuesday, October 31, 2023
Husband Material?
This past weekend, Angie and I were working out at our local, crappy YMCA, and within minutes of us moseying in, a middle-aged guy introduced himself to me, all smiley and exuberant-like. Because strength training (if it's done correctly) involves physical pain, it's unusual to encounter folks therein who're in such high spirits.
This energized exerciser recognized me, but not my bride, yet he couldn't quite put his finger on how he knew me (I came to find this out later). From there, he actually encouraged me to chat with him during my workout routine, but alas, he soon discovered that he'd picked the wrong gym guy for that.
An hour or so passed, and from there, Angie brought me up to speed regarding this dude. For he'd eventually introduced himself to her too, and she immediately recognized him as one of our neighbors. One of our recently married neighbors. Who'd just happened to betroth another man.
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Back in late December of '22, I reached out to a Samson dude (via Slack) who'd been in a breakout room with me during a virtual Samson Society meeting. My follow-up request was to hear his story, and in order to instill some trust, I decided to divulge mine first (along with a link to this blog). I was grateful that this allowed me to gain his trust. He quickly followed suit, and within a few weeks, we were off and running with our friendship (rarely, if ever, did we see each other within virtual Samson meetings on down the road).
For the next six months, he and chatted consistently once a week. And when I say chatted, these were thoughtful exchanges with absolutely zero frivolities. This guy's voice is one that's overall, truly a pleasure to listen to. And that's a result of standalone speaking skill, region of the country he was reared within (dialect) and - most importantly - intelligence.
And when I say intelligence, I'm referring to strong intelligence.
Yet, his persona is demure. Almost to the point of being bashful. Nonetheless, there's a whole lot about him that I am absolutely drawn to. At least taking into consideration the portion of this Samson brother that I know, constraints notwithstanding.
This man was at the '22 National Samson Retreat, but I didn't know him then. Nor did I have the opportunity to meet him.
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22-23 years ago, I was already on the hunt for "group therapy / help" in whatever form I could find it locally. Back then, my primary issue was loneliness stemming from the shame / confusion surrounding my homosexual desires. This loneliness, I feared, might eventually drive me to cheat on my newish wife (Angie). Hence, I somehow caught wind of a local Methodist Church that had a "group" for "guys like me" (whatever that meant), and I attended after speaking over the telephone with one the church pastors who reflexively referred me to one of its regular attendees.
The group was a "Sex Addicts Anonymous" gathering, and every man that regularly attended (the same few meetings I attended) thoroughly creeped me out. Some of the things they shared during those hour-long meetings were so far beyond my comprehension relative to my mundane existence that I felt as if I literally had landed on another planet. It didn't help matters that most of these men weren't at all close to my age.
But the original guy (who was just a few years older than I) who'd been my initial SA point-of-contact had been super friendly and accommodating. And he too experienced strong homosexual tendencies (& had been reared in MS). Therefore, we made a point to meet outside of the SA troupe in order to fill each other in on our individual stories.
It was obvious from the beginning of our friendship that this man was entertaining the idea of somehow moving our relationship from the platonic to the romantic. And it wasn't necessarily due to any overt attraction to Rob. Instead, I believe he was solely looking to conveniently "scratch an itch". But I was married and couldn't relate to his itch. As a result of this, I began to slowly back pedal.
What made the most distinct impression on me regarding this experience was how out of place I felt at the end of the day.
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Yesterday morning, I received a call from my demure, highly intelligent Samson brother confirming his intention to attend next weekend's '23 National Samson Society retreat. In spite of his low-key demeanor, I could tell he was excited to be relaying this to me whilst confirming (yet again) my intentions to also attend.
I'll be honest with you, dear reader, I'm just as excited to finally meet him.
But mostly, I simply want to be present for him. For this will be my sixth National SS retreat. For me, they're routine. For him, not so much, since it's only his second.
In closing, I'm hopeful this physical coming together will serve our friendship well relative to confirming our mutual trust in each other. For trust between men is a true gift. Plus, this dude's just so freaking cool headed. What fun it will be to see if he'll actually let his guard down as he so readily did when we were telephoning regularly.
"The Toxic Tornado" - JR Everhart
The biggest problem with the human experience is that we’re all trying to get someone to see the wondrous art that is who we are, whilst being buried under trauma and shame. And typically, no one stays around long enough to dig through the dark forest of our dysfunction to actually see our true selves / the inner child that is so desperate to be known. Therefore, we just put on a smiling mask of independence to hide our pain and need for connection. Then one day we wake up in our fifties to realize we may very should have exposed our wounds more readily decades prior. Hence, we mourn the time lost before morphing into a robot of responsibility, wondering if anyone will ever truly see us (most don’t).
And this, my friends, I believe, is the greatest loss to/in the modern world.
This ragamuffin, still today, grapples with this twisted mindset, and in various circumstances, lived it for decades. Below are my observations interwoven with my own experiences / thoughts / feelings regarding.
Some didn’t survive this lonely walk through the dark carnival of brokenness. Some overdosed trying to dull the pain of such suffering and others took their own lives. I myself have stood at the exit door of life many times. And the only hope I was ever able to find, the only relief I ever got was by unconditional surrender to Jesus Christ. I know how cliché that sounds. But I’m not talking about joining a church or being conned into something by some slick talking preacher. No! I’m talking about having lost everything, having nothing to live for, and Jesus standing over my broken life and reaching out his welcoming hand to me. In those moments, it’s not about religion or all the junk that comes with it. It’s about one man’s soul hanging in the balance and a loving savior walking away from the 99 to save one like me. I myself have been the prodigal son more times than I could count in this lifetime. So much so it makes me want to puke with disgust as to how many times I’ve returned to the same sewer of dysfunction he'd already delivered me from. But the surprising thing is, he’s never once made me feel bad about that process no matter how many times we did the dance of repentance together. But boy, the enemy was there to remind me of how much of a loser I was every time that repeated cycle occurred. But that was to be expected. He is the accuser and father of lies; why should I be surprised when he accuses me and whispers lies into my ears, wanting me to follow his evil ways? It’s just all part of the journey here on earth. Hope is only truly found in Jesus Christ. Everything else is a heavily medicated lie attempting to convince us we don’t need God. The only thing that drives out darkness is light. The more we stand in it, the more freedom from toxic self-talk we will find. It’s really not complicated, it just takes the faith of a mustard seed…
Monday, October 30, 2023
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