Whinging It

Names are my hobby.  When I can’t sleep at night, I choose a specific sentient being (be it red-headed male human, black and white cantankerous female goat, sleepy red-eared male turtle or capricious asexual glow worm) and give it an appropriate name for every letter of the alphabet.  Part of this game is that I can’t just pick any old name for each letter.  It has to be the RIGHT name for that letter.  My female goat can’t just be Ann.  That’s preposterous.  She must be Agnes.  You see?  No?  Well at least you see that I’m insane.

One of my friends and her husband have agreed to let me name their child.  It’s entirely possible they didn’t actually agree, but they DID agree to let me present them with a PowerPoint slide show with the name I want them to choose and why they should choose it.

I just asked them to contribute names they’re considering, along with their heritages and potential middle names.  Sadly for them, this alerted them to the fact that I wasn’t kidding.

Stay tuned.

It’s no secret that I’m not genetically superior.  I’m smart and everything, but when combined with a complete lack of ambition, it’s not like I’m going to cure cancer…or even remotely threaten it other than with a donation for someone else to run a marathon.  But even physically I seem to be unable to handle anything outside of a temperate, semi-humid climate.  Too hot?  I feel faint.  Too cold?  I can’t feel any of my extremities.  Too wet or too dry?  No go.  Same with sun, wind, high altitudes, and/or locations with a high olive pollen or redneck count.

It pretty much all comes down to: Thank God I found my way to Oakland, as I don’t know that I would have survived in any other location.  Higher crime rates I can handle but a desert climate would do me in.

Wife and I went to D.C. and Pennsylvania last week, and lo and behold: We found yet another occurrence in nature that cripples me.  While standing in fifteen-minute conversation with some delightful strangers surrounded by a lovely forest outside of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater, there were a few errant gnats.  We all occasionally waved a hand in front of our faces, but no mention was made of the bugs, as it’s not like they were ticks or mosquitoes or anything.

Twenty minutes later, it looked like I had the pox while Wife emerged with no discernible reaction from Fallingwater Midge Attach 2010.  I counted the bites, and a conservative estimate (i.e. not counting any possible multiple bites) arrived at 106. I have spent the last week with a permanent calamine coating while cozying up to any scratchable surface.

I’m reading the third and last in the Millenium series (Girl With the Dragon Tattoo series, and what do you mean you haven’t read it?  Go read it!), and I’m on a weird time crunch.  The book was lent to me by a co-worker/friend whose mom bought it in the UK (it’s not yet available in the US) and has passed through about ten lendings already.  Wife and I have to finish it by next Friday because my friend is going to visit her sister, who has already claimed it on that date.

All of this time-sensitive reading makes a tense plot even more tense, and I kind of like the self-inflicted terror that I might not make the deadline in addition to the twists and turns of the plot itself.  I could easily have just ordered the book myself from Amazon UK, but instead I choose this method.

———————-

Giant break-through in therapy yesterday.  I am convinced that therapy could be resolved by recording the first ten sessions and then just re-listening to those sessions over and over until one is ready to hear what is being said.

In this case, I was convinced that any inadequacy I exhibited in confrontation (namely avoiding it at all costs with detailed and thoughtful aversion techniques and/or running and hiding when it inevitably occurred) was because I was not courageous or lacked moxie, which was off as in a lot of ways I am brave and…moxie-full.  Over and over and over my therapist tried to help me figure out that a lot of these interactions just require skills I never acquired or that situations were just untenable and I could leave them instead of just concluding that everything, everywhere in the world, was my fault.

Finally, on what must have been approximately repetition hojillion, I understood yesterday that Oh! SKILLS! Confrontation and processing icky feelings are just a few things I’m not naturally good at, like math, but that I could practice and look at and emulate and get better (if never great).  Apparently I just wasn’t ready to hear it before… either because I couldn’t handle not being in control or because of how I prefer to wallow in my own misery.  Emotions are weird.

I’m fairly confident my therapist did a touchdown dance after I left.  I may fuck with her next week and pretend I didn’t understand that skills aspect again.

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Even though I have an IT background, I hate gadgets.  I don’t care about the convenience of carrying around a tiny computer.  I want a robust, fast system that sits in one place and always works.  This confuses a lot of folks when I stare blankly at their blackberries and can’t figure out what turns on what.

Things that Wife has done in the past year:

- Constructed a printing press using leftover wood and a bottle jack.

- Used said press to do a run of cards.

- Dismantled said press to use bottle jack for transmission replacement in truck.

- Re-finished the interior of her truck using scrap parts from the wrecking yard.

- Attempted creation of Ugg boots that I’m positive would have been successful had I not informed her that I had already purchased some for her birthday.

- Constructed portable self-watering tomato planters.

- Created own belt buckle out of truck parts.

- Made a Frosty at home.

- Made a kajillion cocktail recipes that I could enjoy while I looked on at all of these shenanigans.

With many thanks and apologies to petergoodman at 43 Things, from whom I borrowed a lot of this text, and for doing the research on asking to be excommunicated by the Catholic Church:

April 16, 2010

Father _________________

Dear Father ________,

Re:      Actus Formalis Defectionis Ab Ecclesia Catholica

I am hereby formally defecting from the Catholic Church and request an execution of the Actus Formalis Defectionis Ab Ecclesia Catholica for myself to begin this process in accordance with canons 1086, 1117 and 1174 of the Code of Canon law as well as notification Prot. N. 10279/2006 from the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts (PCLT). I understand that the motu proprio Omnium in mentem of October 16, 2009 suppressed some of these canons, but it also appears that the suppressions had to do with Church law regarding approval of marriage.

This request is being made by me personally, freely and consciously in order to sever all bonds of Catholic communion—faith, sacraments, and pastoral governance. This process shall be configured as my true separation from the constitutive elements of the life of the Church as a willful act of apostasy of my part.

I am providing herein all necessary information with an explanation for my decision.

I was born on _____________ at ___________ Hospital in _________________. I am not in possession of any original church documents, but parish records should indicate the exact date of my  baptism was ___________, 1976 at ____________________.  My first communion took place at _____________ in the Spring of 1984, and confirmation was held in the Spring of 1994, also at __________. I have copied _____________ at _________ on this letter to inform them of my wish to sever my relations with the Catholic Church.

I have chosen to leave the Catholic Church for three simple reasons:

1. I am homosexual;
2. I do not believe in a God as depicted by the Catholic Church; and
3. I want nothing to do with your organization.

I have not considered myself to be Catholic for over 15 years and have always been resistant to the Church’s teachings. I arrived at this conclusion after many years of study, observation, research and introspection.

This request stems from a recent discussion with some former nuns of my acquaintance.  In talks where we were criticizing the Pope’s inaction in dealing with rampant pedophilia in his ranks while outrageously blaming the gay community when this information was revealed, I noted that I grew up Catholic but left the Church years ago.  I was reminded by my friends that, regardless of my personal sexual orientation, beliefs and choices, the Catholic Church will always count me as a member due to my baptism and confirmation.  This is why I have decided to formally cut all ties with the Church.

1. I am homosexual.

Father, I am gay.  I am aware that the Church deems this at best a “lifestyle” and at worst an illness, but the fact remains that I am gay and no one is hurt by this.  I was born gay, and I do not believe that God errs in any of his creations. I am in a loving relationship with my wife of nine years, and we are daily blessed by God’s love for us and our affection for one another.

I volunteer at a hotline that supports gay individuals in times of need or stress, and I am troubled by the number of youth I talk to who, because of the Church’s teachings, are under the impression that they are not beloved by God. Often, their parents and other family members use Church doctrine to reject their gay teenagers, leaving these children homeless and suicidal.  I do not feel it is appropriate, ever, to leave a child without a home, food, or familial love because of something he/she cannot control.  And believe, me, Father, that if these children could choose to not be gay, they would.  Some have even been sent to Church-funded organizations that promise to turn them into “ex-gays.”  As the 0.05% success rate of these organizations attests, it only serves to make these children self-loathing. This is abhorrent.

I realize that the Church has a caveat in that it feels that homosexuals could simply choose to not have sexual relations (and, following the no-masturbation rule, can also not self-pleasure).  This is silly in the extreme.  Self-denial of an act that can seal love with a spouse, regardless of whether he/she is of the same gender, is martyrdom without reason.

2. I do not believe in a God as depicted by the Catholic Church.

I have felt God’s presence and God’s love all of my life, but I believe He is all-forgiving and loving of all of his creations.  He sees our souls, not our color or sexual orientation.  Like the best possible parent, he loves us for who we are.  God requires no intermediary to interpret our thoughts and intentions; He sees us as perfect beings who he created.

3. I want nothing to do with your organization.

I cannot be a part of an organization that protects pedophiles but believes in denying life-saving condoms to AIDS-infested Africa.

I cannot, in any way, condone a religion that would rather stop all support for orphaned children than see them raised in a loving gay household.

I refuse to have my name associated with the idea that God requires any sort of red tape or intermediary in which to grant forgiveness.

I do not condone the Church’s use of fear and superstition to cajole its followers into doing what it wants.

I will not be a part of anything that does not acknowledge that males and females are deserving of equal status, nor that they have equal control over their own bodies.  I atone for my past Catholic participation with donations to Planned Parenthood to make birth control more accessible to women who have no other means of obtaining it.

I do not dispute that, historically, the Church has made many advancements in civilization and has helped a lot of the world’s poor and needy.  However, in this day and age, essentially the only thing I do like about the Catholic Church is its art collection.

* * *

I have turned a blind eye long enough. I thought because I no longer attended mass, I was not complicit in any of these atrocious behaviors, but the fact that my person is counted among the Catholic faithful is anathema to me.

Please do not construe any part of this letter as argumentum ad hominem. You have just as much right to believe what the Pope directs as I have to not believe. Nevertheless, I offer the following personal declarations which clarify my commitment to this liberating personal milestone, for the record:

I hereby reject all of the dogmata and official teachings of roman catholicism that conflict with the idea of a loving God.

I renounce all blessings, benefits, graces, sanctifications and advantages supposedly conferred on me by the Church or by any religious act done by me, to me or on my behalf with or without my informed consent, in the past, present or future.

I condemn as preposterous the idea of original sin, and renounce any and all baptismal rituals done on my behalf to wash it away.

I reject the sacramental bond of belonging to the body of Christ that is the Church, conferred by the baptismal character, and I strongly refute any claim or acceptance of this as an ontological and permanent bond.

I reject as absurd the idea of an atoning sacrifice and spurn its presumed benefits.

I do believe that a charismatic man named Jesus could have walked the earth, and deduct that he was an enlightened, extremely empathetic figure who preached the power of love and whose message could be stated simply as “Do no harm.” I do not believe that the Catholic Church bears any resemblance to such a man.

I do not believe in any form of a God that requires constant praise and adoration from His creation.

I do not believe that any book written by man can be the direct word of God. The only true inspiration is imagination and the Bible has plenty of that. I enjoy it as a fascinating anthology of historical fiction. I know that such a work reflects the culture and society of its own time, in which illiterate nomadic tribes suffered under repressive and corrupt theocracies. I cannot follow such ancient rules to guide my life today.

I thank God, but I also thank scientists, artists, doctors, soldiers, entrepreneurs, writers, firemen and others who have made the world a better place simply because they care about humanity.

For these reasons, I hereby request to be officially unbaptized and excommunicated as soon as possible, to have my name removed from all church accounts, to provide that this act be noted in the baptismal registry (cfr. can. 535, § 2) with explicit mention of the occurrence of a “defectio ab Ecclesia catholica actu formali” and to record that I am no longer a member of the Catholic Church according to the PCLT. I want no association whatsoever with this Church for the rest of my life and expect these wishes to be honored.

Should you require further information to proceed, please advise accordingly.

I look forward to receiving official confirmation of this action at your earliest convenience. Should I not hear from you within two months, I will send a registered letter to ensure its delivery.

Sincerely,

Whinger

cc:       ____________