Out of the Box

How did I feel about God after all of this? Again, there has never been a day in my life where I didn’t believe He was real. I had heard too much from people I deeply trusted to even think about doubting. I even had a couple of experiences myself.

First, it sounds trivial, but when I was in 2nd grade, I had only one Christian friend. Her name was Julia and I think she came from an even stricter (if that is possible!) background than I did. She was the only one I felt I could relate to & I loved her to death. At the end of the school year, I was terrified because I didn’t know if she would be in my 3rd grade class the next year. Every night that summer, any time I had time to think, I prayed to God that she would be in my class.

I was overjoyed to see her in my classroom that first day of 3rd grade. I couldn’t prove that it had been God, but I was pretty sure.

Then in 1986, when I was 10 years old, my grandma (my dad’s mom) died from what I think I remember being a gall bladder rupture. Although I had never gotten the opportunity to really get to know her well because of her hearing impairment and the divorce, I had still known her. She had still hugged me and kissed me and fed me the tortillas I begged for with the one word I knew in sign language.

I had never known anyone who had died before. To think of someone I had always known as a living, breathing person suddenly as dead and buried was far beyond my realm of comfort. Seeing her lifeless body in the coffin at the viewing proved to be more than I could handle. That night, I laid in bed and tried to comfort my panicking mind. Life’s mortality was suddenly haunting my thoughts, and I wasn’t so sure there weren’t such things as ghosts. I began to shake so hard that my teeth were chattering and I almost couldn’t breathe. Then, it came to mind that I might try to pray about it. I had read my little Children’s Bible, and I remembered all of Mom’s stories about God’s power. Maybe there was a chance He could help me?

I cried out to God for help with my all my heart and soul. Immediately the shaking stopped.

It was almost as if God had snapped His fingers and granted my request. I felt such peace that I drifted off to sleep, thinking something in between, “wow, God does exist” and “Thank you, God”.

Still, there were so many things I didn’t even come close to understanding. Of course, I heard the name Jesus and I was told He died for me and I should be grateful — but I couldn’t begin to explain to you why. And I can’t remember if anyone ever told me that God loved me. Even if they did, I didn’t absorb that part. The God I believed in was a fierce, angry God, constantly on the lookout for people sinning so He could throw a lightning bolt at them.

I read the Children’s Bible my dad had given me for my birthday, partly because it was kind of cool to be involved in something my dad gave me. I read the stories … and I was certainly interested in them, but in the back of my mind I felt dark. I studied the illustrations as hard as I studied the words, and they produced such a heavy dread in my stomach that I can’t explain.

Some nights my mom would call all of us into the living room and she’d talk about the Bible. She broke out her guitar and sang us some songs, too. I wish I could say that I enjoyed those times. But I didn’t.

Some of those songs honestly made me feel so dreadful I could hardly stand it.

The preachers on TV gave me the heebie jeebies.

My mom received a newsletter in the mail from a preacher she followed. It was called “The Endtime Messenger” and that terrified the daylights out of me.

The gospel records my mom listened to, even the ones by more mainstream artists – Loretta Lynn, Roy Acuff, even Elvis Presley — They were singing “Peace In the Valley”, but that just freaked me out more than I could handle. The Spanish church music that she picked up scared me even more for some reason…and I didn’t even understand it!

I remember one time, I was sitting in a chair in the living room, thinking about the end of the world. The thought was so overwhelming that I suddenly leaped up and began jumping up and down screaming, “I don’t want it to come!” My mom looked at me in shock and told me to calm down.

Again, when you’re a kid, you don’t question things. You take things at face value. I figured Grandfather was right about everything he said. How could he be wrong? He was clearly very close to God. I saw him as close to “without sin” as anything I could imagine. He was the epitome of holiness, the standard we should all live by.

If Heaven was going to be as serious and melancholy as going to Grandfather’s house was … if God was as condescending and miserable as Grandfather, I really wasn’t sure I wanted to go there. To be sure, it sounded a whole lot better than going to hell and burning forever — But still … not the greatest place. The mere thought of eternity became so incomprehensible to me. I couldn’t breathe when I thought too much about it. I came up with a plan though.

I was going to be as good as possible until the end of the world. Somehow I was going to attain Grandfather’s level of “holiness”….one day. Being THAT “good” would be miserable for me, but at least I would be safe. Then when God said I could get into heaven, I was just going to ask Him if he could please have mercy on me and kill my spirit so I would go in neither direction. That brought me a tremendous amount of comfort. Enough to go on without obsessing about it.

And then ….

…..there was my other problem.

Mom worked really hard for us and we really enjoyed our family. She managed to save enough money to buy a brand new mobile home and a good car – and she was STILL was at home on weekends and evenings. She made most of our clothes, cooked us good dinners, baked all kinds of goodies and even sewed us home made Cabbage Patch Kids. We had everything we needed, even without the child support my dad was supposed to pay. Every now and then, Mom would take us to the store and let us get a Barbie or a My Little Pony. Looking back, I don’t know how she did it.

One thing she just couldn’t do, though, was fill the hunger I had for a male in the family. Grandfather really didn’t count because he hadn’t talked nicely to us in years. My Uncle Jerry was the only male in our family and we only saw him on special occasions.

So …. from very early on, my life started becoming defined by one big problem:

An obsession with boys.

Not just an interest. We are talking full-blown o b s e s s i o n.

Looking back, I can divide my entire life by which guy I was “in love” with at the time. Those are the eras in my life … even all the way back to before I started school.

I was between 5 and 6 years old when I noticed my very first love – the most handsome man my little-girl-eyes had ever seen. He seemed so nice, caring, gentle and genuine. He was just so darn cute on top of it all. I’d wake up every morning before everyone else and turn on the TV to watch his daily show. I was probably the only 5 year old tuned into a health and exercise program. When my Grandfather found out, he was appalled and told me I shouldn’t be thinking about someone who would be an old man walking around with a cane by the time I was old enough to look for a husband.

Nevertheless, I adored him.

One day, I even wrote a letter to him to tell him how much I loved him. He sent an autographed picture in return and I showed it off to everyone. I couldn’t believe THE Richard Simmons had written back to me.

I started school in first grade. (Kindergarten wasn’t mandatory back then) From the first day of school, I immediately had crushes. First there was Rusty, then Luke, Miguel, Jacob, Terry….the list goes on. One of my favorite books was Leo the Lop, about a bunny with floppy ears. Inside the back cover of that book, I wrote in crayon:

I love: _________________________________

There were about 8 names on this list. And I meant every one.

In second grade, I was desperately in love with Justin. I thought about him every waking moment, wrote letters to him, chased him on the playground, stared at him in class. He was a pretty cute kid, but man… was I obsessed. I sent him one of the notorious “Check yes or no” letters in class one day. HE CHECKED YES!!!!!!! I was on cloud nine!!!!!

After second grade, Justin moved away. So in 3rd grade, I moved on. I was in awe of several guys in class, but no one worth getting too nutty over.

In 4th, along came Trey, along came obsession again. However, Gramma caught on, and being the hopeless romantic, she did her best to encourage it. Since she worked at the school, all the employees knew her. She talked to my teacher after school one day and convinced her to change my seat to be close to him. At first, I thought it was downright awesome, but then after so much teasing and pushing, I was eventually disgusted by the thought of him. By the end of the year I couldn’t stand him…I’d moved on to Jason who was MUCH cuter anddd had an adorable Texas accent.

By the time I was in 5th grade and 10/11 years old, I was starving. I’d see other classmates who had dads and brothers and uncles, even cousins — such a stark contrast to the string of females that characterized my family! I daydreamed about what it would be like to come home to two parents, but the idea was so foreign to me that I couldn’t even develop those images.

Sometimes I’d lay in bed and cry about Daddy leaving. But to really be honest, I couldn’t even pinpoint exactly what I was crying about. I had never known what it was like to have a dad….so what was there to miss? I wasn’t really heartbroken, but for some reason, the tears kept coming. I guess something in my young heart knew God had never intended families to be this way.

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As I grew older, I understood a little more how staying on the path was my responsibility and no one else’s. Keep your eyes looking forward and stay out of the river that leads away from the mountain! But something in the river caught my eye … something floating by. It captured my attention ….

Next: Chapter 3