Tina, Tina, Tina

In fifth grade, my family moved for the first time. It wasn't your classic kind of move, mostly because a big truck came along and pulled our first house off the foundation, put it in our back yard, then moved our bigger house back in. Ah yes, the classic trailer switch. For some reason, our family decided to make the switch in the middle of the winter, but because of the complicated nature of assembling the two pieces of a doublewide, we had to live out of the singlewide for a week. Most children would be concerned about not being directly hooked up to water or heat, but for me, the only issue that existed for me was--we were going to miss the premiere of Survivor: Australian Outback.
I was obsessed with Survivor, mostly because I would sit in class and contemplate how I could vote all of my classmates out but somehow manage to make them all still like me afterward. The year before, I watched Kelly Wigglesworth be completely undermined by the nakedness/baldness of Richard Hatch. It was both disgusting and enthralling to watch--but this season was going to be different: I could feel it. I demanded that we were fully moved into the new house before the premiere happened--there's not a lot of things that I demanded as a 5th grader, other than a full size recreation of Zordon from the Power Rangers and the premiere of Survivor. In reality, only one of those things were possible, and I didn't know at the time how important it would be for my development as a young man.
Once we got the all clear, we began to move furniture in--logically, I suppose we should have started with the couch or the bed, but we went straight for the television. Just by the skin of our teeth, we made the move just in time for premiere night. At the beginning of every reality show season, my dad and I pick favorites to win. The battle goes back to classic battles such as Clay and Reuben, as well as Carrie Underwood and Anthony Federov (which wasn't really classic at all, as much as it was just a really terrible decision on my part). But as the didgeridoo sounded from our old television speakers, I immediately knew who my pick would be. As the faces flicked across the screen, I saw her. No, she wasn't an Alecia, nor was she a Kel (obviously, because she would never be accused of stealing beef jerky. Hello), but I knew in my hear that she would win the game. Her name? Tina Wesson. She was from Knoxville, my hometown, and to me, if she came from Rocky Top, she was surely going to win. My dad told me that I was crazy right after he chose Colby. I wouldn't be moved though--I didn't care what happened because I knew that Tina was going to win.

Tina Wesson/Justin Kirkland, 2001

Looking back, as a fifth grader I was entirely too invested in the lives of people I didn't know. I would huddle the family around the television every Thursday night, hushing any company that might be over for dinner or to pick up a gun/bow/dead animal from dad. I was amazed by what I saw because as much as I love Tina, she wasn't that great at winning things. But still, at every tribal council, no one cared. Everyone just kept voting for other people and Tina lived on week to week all the way to the final three. I think maybe that's why Tina resonated with me so much--I wasn't good at winning things either, but people liked having me around. I imagined that if 2001 Tina and fifth grade Justin played Survivor together, we would probably make it to the final three as well.
Finale night came--I was a nervous wreck for a number of reasons. I was leaving for my first major trip ever the next day: a four day trip Washington D.C. I had never been away from home that long, and on top of my completely irrational anxiety over Tina's potential winning moment, I was on 24 hour nervous vomit alert. Colby won the final immunity and my dad immediately when into celebration mode. Colby was surely going to win against Kei... no. He took Tina. At the final tribal, Tina smoothly talked her way into the prize with a million-dollar-brand of Southern charm.  I cried that night--still not exactly sure if that was because of Tina's win or the pending trip, but either way, it was a lot of emotions. I boarded the coach bus the next morning with my special edition Survivor Entertainment Weekly, and I channeled that Tina Wesson power to make it through the trip. Mind you, I didn't eat and lost seven pounds in four days because of it, but I liked believing that was part of the whole "Survivor" mentality.
Throughout that summer, I begged my friends to play Survivor with me, which probably explains why I had such a tough transition into middle school the next year. You see, when you invite your friends over to play games that you've designed and made the rules for, then win every challenge, then vote each of them out of the game, sometimes you end up alone. Didn't matter to me though--I wanted to keep up that Knoxville Legacy. Eventually, my friend Lindsay told me that Tina was coming to speak at her church and that she would get me an autograph. With very few friends left and fewer and fewer people interested in playing Survivor with me, I decided that I needed to let this "Tina-hero-glory" go. I put the autograph on the back of a blue church flyer in my scrapbook and tried to let Tina go. My love for her was alienating. Everyone else's hero reports were on their grandpas or presidents or movie stars. Mine were about the 42 year old woman who once played Survivor. It was time to move on.

***

Skip forward four years: Tina was going to to be on Survivor: All Stars. She was voted out first. I choose to not recognize that it ever happened.

***

By the time I was a junior in college, Tina was a fond memory of my childhood--I had found other heroes, but like an old teddy bear, she had this place in my heart even if I didn't force my friends to play Survivor with me anymore.  Down the road from our college, the local Chili's would host a special night a couple times a year that part of the proceeds would go toward St. Jude's Hospital research. We would always try to make it down to grab dinner, and like usual, I had ordered a margarita and some kind of entree. 

My friends and I sat around the table trading stories from the day when it happened: out of no where, Tina Wesson walked in the door. I suppose the entire thing should have been simple. It had been ten years since the show premiered, and no one else seemed to make a big deal out of her being there, but I was frozen. Imagine if Superman walked in the door while you're casually sipping on margaritas... then you spit up that margarita on yourself and then go into a state of catatonic shock.

My friends had heard about my previous love of Tina Wesson at one point or another, most of the time after I had drank a number of margaritas and went back to those tender memories of elementary school. They kept telling me to go over, but I couldn't get up. It all seemed too crazy to be true. No matter who it ends up being, your childhood hero is kind of invincible. But the idea that mine was sitting about twenty feet away presumably weighing the benefits of fajitas over steak with her husband just seemed unreal to me. Eventually I asked the waitress to do a little investigation for me--she had confirmed it: Tina Wesson was in the restaurant.

I finished my margarita and mustered up as much courage as I could. After getting up from the table, I wasn't exactly sure how I wanted to approach the situation. It's not every day that you meet your hero. Somehow, I decided on some kind of walk that resembled a mix between a serious limp and a grapevine dance step. I spent so much time deciding on how I should walk that by the time I actually got to the table, I had nothing to say. Tina and her husband looked up at me and waited for me to say something. I couldn't look her in the eyes, and then all of that nervousness from that pre-Washington D.C. night/Australia finale came flooding back. All I could think was, "Please don't cry or throw up on Tina Wesson's table at Chili's." Eventually, words just came flooding out in this weird whisper-grumble, "Hello Tina Wesson. My name is Justin Kirkland. I saw you sitting over here, and I wanted to say thank you because you're my hero and I watched you when I was younger and I thought you did great."

Justin Kirkland/Tina Wesson, 2013

She looked nervous, and I probably would have been too, honestly. I don't like being interrupted when I eat, and though it's never happened, I'm assuming my unsteady, borderline creepy vibe didn't really help my case. Of all the responses I thought she was going to say, she said, "How old were you when that came on?!" I told her about fifth grade, strategically leaving out the details about voting out my friends and the haphazard hero reports I did based on less than reliable information from Survivor fansites. I don't remember much more from the conversation because I think I started to faint or something.

***

Tina finished fourth last night in her third season of Survivor. I was still an embarrassing fan girl sitting on the couch screaming at the television, unable to eat my pizza because that fifth grade Survivor anxiety was back all over again. Every couple of seasons, I apply to be on Survivor hoping to be the next Knoxville rockstar on the island. People have asked me why Tina--there's been more impressive winners or sneakier players, or hell... people like presidents and celebrities to write hero reports on. But for me, it wasn't about Tina changing the world... it was more about Tina changing my world. She wasn't just a woman on a television show to me, as much as she is proof that you can do whatever you want, even if you're from down in South Knoxville. As long as you're not walking over to meet her at Chili's, that is.

God and the Stars

For Mom and Max and anyone who has ever been confused

I don't pretend to understand the world or how it works anymore because there's not a lot about it that makes any sense--I suppose that's something you learn as you get older. Every day is kind of a mystery, and it can get the best of you. Yesterday, someone in the world decided to set bombs off in the middle of a marathon... just athletes running for the sake of being alive, for the sake of being a human who can. And then out of no where, someone decided to change the course of too many lives to count, and we're left wondering what happened. There's still no one to blame, and even when there is, what are we supposed to say? There's nothing to say because life, again, failed to make any kind of sense.
The night I left to move up to DC, the car was almost completely packed; I hadn't shed a tear up until that point because I was more excited than I was scared. I was about to start this journey away from everything I had ever known, but then my mom told me to look up into the sky. I stared up and the night was as clear as it had been in weeks--every star possibly visible was shining brightly against the amphitheater of trees that surround our house. When I looked back down, she was staring at me with tears in her eyes, and she told me, When you look up at those stars, just know that those are the same stars I'm looking at, too. Look at them every night and know that I'm right there with you. And then I cried.
It's really no surprise because I've cried my entire life. I like to believe that it's become less and less frequent the older I get, but it's a recurring theme of mine that's haunted me since that first time I threw up in kindergarten. And a lot of times I've cried, I do it because I haven't understood what was going on in the world--things that other people come to accept pretty easily. It took me years to understand the concept that if my mom left me at school, she would eventually come back. Why that was such a hard concept for me to grasp, I really have no idea. It's like I believed that Kimberlin Heights led to Hell or Mexico or some other place that you don't come back from. But then, without fail, after one hour of throwing up and crying, two hours of learning, three hours of me showing people my puppy wallet that had a picture of my family in it, and an hour of recess, my mom would come back and get me, and we'd do the whole thing over again the next day. But when my mamaw died when I was six, I specifically remember crying once. I cried because, even at six, I understood that I wouldn't see her alive again, and after that, I didn't cry about it again.
The concept of death made sense to me because our bodies have a timeline, a specified amount of time that we are allowed to live, and then like all other things (puppy wallet included, though I miss it so), the wear and tear becomes too much. My papaw died seven years later, and I'm not even sure if I shed a tear. It was never the expected things that were difficult for me to handle, and at times, I had trouble relating to other people who cried when those things happened. We weren't meant to live forever--but we were meant to live for a while.
Things like Boston, or 9/11, or Newtown happens and the whole structure of things gets screwed up. The world's plan gets all screwed up, and we don't understand the whole of it. And though those events are devastating and stupefying, it happens every day. People are killed in car accidents or get cancer or drown or die in some other way that was never expected, and it doesn't make any sense why it happened, or specifically, who it happened to. And then I meet people, and occasionally they tell me that they are thinking about suicide. They've thought about ending their own life, prematurely, and it breaks my heart because I know they didn't decide that on their own. I know. My heart pours out for those people because it's another mystery of life--it's a catch 22 of sorts. And I know because I've been in that position where the only thing that breaks your heart more than the idea of being dead is the idea of having to stay alive--it's not a choice to feel that way. It is however a choice to choose life. But it doesn't change the fact that there is a God, or whatever force you choose to believe in, out there that allows these things to happen. When we're not being shaken by a freak of nature, we're attacking one another, and when we're not attacking one another, we attack ourselves.
So it makes sense when people give up on God or hope or life because, honestly, there's a lot of reasons to. But then with all the pain and hurt we experience, I have a friend who has been consistently updating Facebook with the status of her infant son, and when we're talking infant, we're talking baby. He had a lemon sized tumor at the base of his brain, and his chance of living was pretty much slim to none... but every day I'd get on Facebook, Jessica would be asking for prayers for Max and maintaining that God was watching over them. Max, against the odds, has steadily been getting better and better, and there's a very real chance that he could go on and live a normal life. And it's the first time in a while that I thought to myself, Maybe, in a way, God doesn't have so much to do with all the pain we experience in the world. No, I don't get it, but it's God or hope or whatever you believe in that makes life okay when everything else doesn't seem to be making sense. Yeah, there's the things in life that confuse us, but if we take the time we use trying to find someone to blame and use it toward finding someone to lean on or believe in, then it makes the healing time that much more bearable.
And then I return to the stars. I stare at them, and I know that scientifically the only thing that holds them up is nothing--the lack of gravity, and I've been told that the stars we're staring at have already burned out. But still, I use the thing that everyone says is already gone or non-existent as a way of finding my way back home. In that non-existant thing, I find love and comfort and peace, and whose to say that star that I'm staring at tonight is one that is already depleted. We see the stars in the same way that we sometimes look at the world: hopeless and all but gone, but when I look at them, I see something that isn't supposed to be. Something that defies the odd. Something that shakes me to my core and helps me believe in something bigger than me. And sometimes when I see them, I still cry.

My Life, On The Oregon Trail

As a small child in elementary school, I would tune myself out from the rest of the world and invest everything I had into the teal Apple computer in the back left corner of the classroom. Nothing anyone said to me was of any importance because this was a special time. For an hour or so, I was God. After the computer actually got started up after about 10 minutes, I double-clicked it: The Oregon Trail. And even from early adolescence, my inability to let trivial disputes go and my speedy attachment issues prevailed--exclude me from playing Four Square? You're going in the wagon. You told me we were best friends while we were learning about multiplication tables? You're going in the wagon.

Yeah she does. And she probably deserved it.

A lot of different things could get you in the wagon, but the most important factor in a venture on the Oregon Trail was the mood I was in that day. If it was a rough day at school, you could be sure as shit that I was going to ford the river every time. Looking back, if anyone had found out that I was using The Oregon Trail as a virtual means of revenge, I probably wouldn't have been allowed to play it anymore... actually, I probably would have ended up on a list somewhere. But in the end, I never cared too much about finishing the journey--that took like... four more hours than I had, and I never cared enough to save it to my floppy disk (YEAH, that was a thing). The Oregon Trail was my fix, similar to what I imagine someone feels after doing cocaine.
But after my seven to eleven year old vengeance was completed, I realized that there was no Oregon Trail in middle school, and that's a shame because middle school is definitely the time that you need some revenge-Oregon-Trail. The game persisted in my mind though, and even through college, sometimes I imagined who I would put in my wagon. I would assign people roles, and I contemplated which weak friend would be the one to come down with typhoid of dysentery. But when I moved up to DC and started living in an apartment and doing more adult things, I realized that The Oregon Trail, much like life, is not something that you plan. The Oregon Trail is something that happens to you. Life is pretty much reflective of everything on The Oregon Trail: sickness, lost materials, negotiating with people you meet along the trail, gathering over 200 pounds of food and having to leave some behind. But most of all, I realized that the more alcohol you add to the situation, the more out of control the trail becomes.
So one night, all us pioneers (Jill, Andrew, Ben, Nicole, Catherine, Catherine's brother, Nicole's boyfriend--yeah, I know you can only include five people in your wagon. This is my Oregon Trail, I do what I want) decided that we were going to go out for a night in Arlington. Everything seemed to be going well:

Weather: Fair
Health: Excellent
Food: Enough, I guess
Miles Traveled: 0

We all met at Jill and Catherine's and started to drink before going out to a nice place called Clarendon Ballroom, an establishment that houses a good 85% of Arlington's frat boys and hipsters. They only play 45 second clips of songs, and epileptics are not encouraged to go there. But while waiting for Nicole and her boyfriend to show up at Independence, Missouri, or the apartment, everyone had imbibed enough that we decided no one was going to drive, and thus, our first game move: wait for a ferry (taxi) across the river.

Weather: Fair
Health: Silly
Food: Less than before, but still okay
Miles Traveled: 1.2

We had to take two ferries to get to the bar because apparently Arlington doesn't have ferries big enough for everyone. After we got to the establishment, I regretted choosing farmer instead of banker because I needed to stop at the ATM. (By the way, why was farmer ever a good option?) I walked with Nicole and her boyfriend to retrieve money, and then soon after we entered. With me at my resting annoyed-rate of 4, I decided not to drink but rather watch those around me. I made people come out to the dance floor, and eventually, everyone started consuming more and more alcohol. People began to get more and more intoxicated, but it didn't matter because that's how you play the game--at a grueling pace. Nicole told me that I didn't know how to dance, and then her and her boyfriend left. I can only assume they were eaten by a bison or perhaps contracted cholera and died. Either way, they were off the trail. RIP.

Weather: Whatever
Health: Fair
Food: This will be more applicable later.
Miles Traveled: 1.2

Because Arlington is comprised of mostly rich, old people, the bar was closing at 1 that night and by that time, it had become painfully obvious who was going to be hung over and who was not. As I was ushering people out of the bar with Catherine and her brother, it was apparent that some members of the wagon had lost some wheels, axles, and approximately 45 pounds of food along the way. Soon after we got everyone outside, Catherine and her brother left, probably in passive disgust that they were even on the wagon to begin with. So, there I was--sober as could be with three people left: Andrew, who ran across the street without looking, Ben, who looked as if he had contracted typhoid, and Jill. Jill seemed to be fine, so while Andrew and Ben went inside a 24 hour diner, Jill stayed outside while I smoked.
Jill began to tell me about her life and how everything seemed to be different. At that point, she asked me if she could have a puff of my cigarette. By this time, I was just happy to have someone to talk with who could speak in complete sentences. But after just a couple of puffs, everything changed. Jill began to cry, and I asked her What's wrong? And with smoke still seeping out from her lips, she announced, Please don't tell the boys, but I think I'm pregnant. And then I went into panic mode. This is that point in Oregon Trail when everyone's dying, health is poor, no one has food, and the weather is hot. I immediately grabbed the cigarette from her and instructed her to go inside.

Weather: We're inside the diner, doesn't matter
Health: Terrible
Food: Way over the 200 pound limit, everyone ordered too much
Miles traveled: Too many

Within the first five minutes, Jill announced her "pregnancy," Andrew wanted breakfast, and Ben didn't have his debit card. So I had to go negotiate with the people at the bar, Indian style, to get the debit card back. By the time I returned, the food had arrived, and Jill was taking a leave of absence in the bathroom. She had forded the river, Virginia Woolf style. At this point, she was a goner. For my troubles, I left a substantial tip for the waitress on Jill's card because she was still in the bathroom, and then we got another ferry to take Jill home. Finally, it was just Ben, Andrew, and me. As soon as we got in the car to drive home, Andrew "fell asleep" in the front seat, probably from measles, which left on two surviving wagon members: Ben with typhoid, and me. I managed to get the wagon back to our apartment, but only after losing six of the original wagon members, seven oxen, all the food, and at least 4 boxes of bullets.
But that's the thing about The Oregon Trail, and life in general... you don't really play to be a hero and make the highest score--you just play to survive. We found out the next day that Jill was not pregnant at all--apparently that was just something she needed to say whilst on the trail. Andrew's measles nap was apparently completely premeditated, and everyone else's departure was made with clear minds. However, what happens on the trail is nothing to be ashamed of, and it's nothing we should hold over one another's heads for revenge because the Oregon Trail is a messy place. If life were as easily planned as a game that can be saved on a colorful floppy disk (mine was yellow, for those interested), then it would probably be a lot easier than it is. But we ford rivers and lose axels and sometimes people get cholera, but it's not about what happens on the trail--it's just about making it to the end.

Sinners in the Hands of an Angry Cat Toy

Yesterday, when I was sitting in class, two girls were up in front of the class giving a presentation. Meanwhile, I was on Facebook, Twitter, my email, my school email, and by chance... the same website that the girls presenting were on in front of class. All of a sudden, the girl's computer died and she was stranded. The military guy sitting next to me looked over and saw the similar website and volunteered me, or rather my computer, to be the proxy in the middle of their crisis. Immediately, I started minimizing tabs, but not so many that it would uncover the up close shot of Jennifer Lawrence that is my wallpaper. Right as the girl got to my computer, I had an unreasonable number of windows minimized, and then it hit me. Dear God. What if they get on Google?
These people weren't my roommates or a best friend... this was a giant class of people looking at my computer screen, which by this time, was reflected on a giant projection screen. And of course, they didn't just need it for that website--they needed it for two or three websites. So, they opened up tab after tab revealing my most visited pages, which happened to be much less revealing than I had anticipated. But it wasn't the most visited pages that I was worried about... it was what happened when you type that first letter into the search bar. There were safe letters and... well... not safe letters. And I sat there going through the alphabet in my mind, saying a silent prayer that they didn't need the letters G or O or P or L or F or K or N or Y or S or T in particular. What if they found my Neopets account, or the one time I searched "How to Make Meth?" There were too many Google searches I worried about, and not a damn thing I could do about it. My life was on display and the only thing worse than typing one of those letters was the sinking feeling in my stomach that those letters might get pressed.

I'm sorry, Skeeter. I'm just... sorry.

And it reminded me that I've always been that way... the guilty one. That was my computer, and it didn't matter what came up... But the embarrassment of what happens if people find out my personal details is something that has always haunted. And one of the first occurrences of it happened when I was 11 years old.
As an 11 year old, I was pretty much pure of heart. I attended church every week, and it was actually my preacher that gave me my cat, Skeeter. Middle school was rough, so Skeeter was my best friend. We would hang out together all the time and do cool stuff like watch television and walk around the house. Skeeter's favorite toy was a small mouse that cost about 1.99 from Wal-Mart. The way it worked is that you would pull out the toy mouse's tail and it would vibrate around the room, and Skeeter would chase after it. One day, Skeeter and I were doing our thing, hanging out in my room, and tossing the vibrating mouse. He would chase after it and then carry it back to me, like a dog. I'd pull it's tail again, and we'd repeat the cycle.
But on this day, everything changed. I pulled the mouse's tail out, but because of my fantastic coordination, I dropped it. In my lap. And all of a sudden, I felt something. I started to pick up the mouse, but then, well, you know... I just kind of left it there. The mouse stopped vibrating, and I stared down at my lap, then I looked at Skeeter. He didn't need to be there for this--actually, I'm pretty sure that I didn't need to be there either. Skeeter waited there in front of me to throw it again, but I wasn't sure what to do because I wasn't really sure what was going on either. I picked Skeeter up and put him out of my room because even at a young age, I really wasn't feeling the whole voyeurism thing. I sat back down in the butterfly chair in my room (because we all had butterfly chairs... don't lie) and held the mouse in my hand. As an 11 year old, I think that was my first insight as to what it might be like to do cocaine, or heroin maybe.
I went and listened at the door to make sure everyone, including Skeeter, was away from the premises. With no one in ear shot, I pulled the mouse's tail again and "accidentally" dropped it again in my lap. And this is the point in the story where I move on to more pertinent things...
So, two weeks later, no one in the house knew where Skeeter's favorite toy had gone. We had searched and searched, and when they asked if I had seen it, I remember becoming really defensive, Why would I have seen his stupid toy? I don't know where it's at. It's no where that I could find it. My skills and persuasion and lying had obviously not began to fully develop at this point, so I might have well said, Hey guys, go check in the pocket in my butterfly chair--it's there. Promise. But other than that, I kept my mouth shut. We all have our secrets, mine just happened to vibrate in ten second intervals at the pull of a tail. But even with all the secrecy and, um, other stuff, there was this sinking feeling that what I was doing was wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Nothing was making sense anymore because I had been introduced to this new, shaky world of happiness and confusion. But with all the positives, the negatives seemed to always outweigh the positive. I couldn't look at Skeeter because I took something that he thought was innocent and made it into... whatever I made it into. So after the longest time, I broke.

I don't think the brand name is a coincidence.

One night as I was going to bed, I called my mom into my room. She turned the light on, and I sat up in bed--already crying, because that's what I do--and she asked me what was wrong. I broke into confession mode: Skeeter can't play with that cat toy anymore. I did something to it, or with it. I can't let Skeeter play with it anymore. My mom wasn't quite sure what to say because from the way it seemed, I was just really irrationally upset about this cat toy. I continued. Mom, I took the cat toy, and I put it on my lap. And then I kept putting it there, and then "something" happened. And then my mom pressed her lips together--at the time, I thought she was going to kill me in the same way that I imagined God was going to. Looking back, I'm pretty sure she was trying not to laugh. And God's mad at me too because I'm pretty sure this is a sin. I shouldn't be doing this. I know I shouldn't, but I can't stop, momma. And then I burst into the dramatic tears, and she hugged me.
After I calmed down, she asked for a little more of a thorough explanation of what was going on with the cat toy, and then she calmly tried to explain that all little boys eventually did what I did--albeit not with a cat toy, but that's neither here nor there. I wasn't quite sure how you happened upon the same effect without a cat toy, but that's not what concerned me at the moment; I was more concerned about my eternal damnation via cat toy. My mom had to explain that God doesn't send 11 year olds to Hell for assaulting their torsos, and even after the fact, it took months for me to be okay with it all. My mom ended our conversation with, Just be careful and don't bruise yourself, which is advice that I hold near to my heart to this day. I never gave Skeeter back the cat toy, mostly because that just seemed like a really weird thing to do. I threw it away soon after the conversation I had with momma.
So zoom forward. The presentation ended yesterday and no critical letter was pressed. A sense of relief flooded my body, but a small part of me still felt guilty that there could ever be anything on my computer that I would restrict the world from seeing. But when I think back to the conversations I had with my mom about the numerous acts I thought would send me to Hell over the years, I think we both came to the conclusion that sometimes secrets are best kept secrets. And with that revelation, I closed my computer and left class.

Testify!

The week after I was saved, the Southern Baptist obligation was to become baptized, so I duly scheduled for my sins to be washed away the following Sunday because... these things have to be scheduled, you know. A lot of church was like that: you came in fifteen minutes early to shake every ones hands, then you sit and doodle on your bulletin. If you're between the ages of 15 and 24 or what those below the Mason Dixon line like to call "Small Group Age," then you raise your hand above your head while older-church-goers stumble through the words of a Steven Curtis Chapman song that has come to replace the songs within the hymnals that have merely become a sturdy surface to write your offering check on.
Eventually, you wade your way through a sermon and get to the invitation where three teenagers from the youth group mosey to the front to rededicate their lives to the Lord for the third time this year as everyone nervously shuffles waiting on some unknown face to approach the alter to potentially, sincerely give their lives to the Lord. I always loved the girls that would rededicate their lives because we would always give them obligatory congratulations afterward to which they would respond, I just really wanted to give my soul back to the Lord, as if you can just petty theft from Jesus. And then afterward, we would go downstairs and have lunch. Being Southern Baptist for the first sixteen years of my life was one of the most methodically inspiring things I could have ever been apart of.
The first couple years were the best, but it's funny because the Baptism is where things started to go downhill. As I prepared to be dunked in the holy water that could burn your sins off with its chlorine content alone, the pathway to the baptismal pool was cluttered with too much Jesus. On the way to the bleach pit of Heaven, I climbed over discarded crosses and boxes of pageant pamphlets. All of these things promoting Jesus were actually blocking me from getting to my baptism, and even as a 13 year old, the whole thing seemed kind of ironic. Once I had been cleansed, I joined the youth group and said prayer requests for all the people we were worried about. Prayer requests were our chance to gossip about the people in our lives while also hanging out in the circle of God. If our lives became too uneventful, we would just say "unspoken," which alluded that we knew something that was just too juicy to say to the group.
Eventually after bouncing around three churches, I decided that maybe church just wasn't the right place for me to find God. I had decided that men (or at least the Baptists) couldn't be trusted with the power of God because all of the community softball teams and youth retreats and van rides on the way to youth retreats touched on a number of things (pun intended) but none of those were Christianity. I had been on church-hiatus for about two years, cleansing myself of all those MercyMe and tobyMac lyrics when a woman my mom works with invited me to go to church with her. At first I was kind of surprised that my mom relayed the message to me because momma didn't really trust me to be around any other adults. That might have been because our neighborhood was dotted with meth houses, or Surprise Fireworks as I like to call them. Either way, there was a very short list of people I was allowed to go out with, and apparently, fellow-telemarketer and fierce-black-woman Teresa was one of them.
Teresa had found the Lord sometime during and/or after her stay in prison. I worked as a telemarketer with them both and heard Teresa break down a remix version of "Jesus Loves Me" multiple times before. She attended a Church of Zion, and after weighing the pros and cons, I decided that it couldn't be any more misdirected than any other church I had been to. I got up early on Sunday, and mom drove me to the Weigels in East Knoxville--the same Weigels that had been on the news a week earlier because of a neighborhood shoot out. For the record, East Knoxville is not where you go to have a picnic, let alone worship the Lord... or so I thought. Either way, I took solace that the police station was just a football field's length away.
I turned to Mom and asked, Are you sure this isn't going to be awkward? Mom looked back at me and said, Don't worry. I'm sure you'll have fun. Thanks, girl. I wasn't really asking if I'd have fun or not, but that's a super consolation prize. I was obviously not dressed appropriately for what we had simply deemed "black church" in my neck of the woods. Teresa spun into the parking lot and emerged in a bright purple dress, and there I was... standing there in a white short-sleeved button up, light khaki pants, and my semi-translucent skin... just like Oh hey. I'm not a klansman. She was having trouble getting her giant purple hat out of the car, so she hollered out, Aw, shit on it-- language I'm confident that she never brings into the house of God. I was quickly ushered into her Cadillac, and we were off to meet the Lord, one way or another.

This is Black Jesus, which can be used interchangeably
with White Jesus. The interesting part of this is that
Black Jesus wears a puka shell necklace, and White Jesus
does not. Even though Black Jesus is light-skinned,
we still like him. #irony

As we entered, I felt like the entire congregation must have greeted me--it was obvious that I was the standout guest. I searched the room and found one familiar face in the back. I don't know what inspired me to say it, but I leaned over to Teresa and said, Oh, look! There's a white woman sitting back there! Not only did I look like a completely insecure racist, but an ignorant racist at that. Teresa brushed it off and responded, Oh, no baby. She's just... 'light skinned.' Her eyebrows rose above her rolled eyes. Got it. So far I had learned two things that I still hold close to my heart: you don't know what it's like to be the minority until you are the minority and we don't like light skinned black girls. But back to the story, it seemed that black church wasn't too different on the surface, but there was something obviously different. I know it sounds crazy, but it seemed like these people genuinely wanted to say hello to each other.
The service began with a string of hymns that we don’t sing at the Baptist church. We’re a very call and respond kind of people. I sing a line; you sing a line.  We sing approximately a quarter of a song, sit down, and pass notes back and forth about how slutty everyone in the youth looks that morning. In this church however, the congregation would add in makeshift lines about how God had transformed their lives. I decided to call upon my mentors at the Baptist church and clap along enthusiastically. I looked around and people were on the ground, crying. I wondered if there was call for an exorcism or if God was throwing people to the ground for shits and giggles. I kept thinking to myself why are all these people crying?
Theresa chimed in with her personal story of finding God, in verse of course, then my biggest nightmare happened. The reverend found me; just a poor whitewashed Caucasian boy sitting somewhere in the middle of the congregation.

Do you love the Lord?!, he screamed.

I bit my lip, scanning around me for hope that maybe, his inquisition was not directed at me.
You, in the white shirt! Do you love the Lord?!
After realizing that I had been passed the metaphorical crown of thorns like a hot potato, I nodded vigorously.

Then say it!
At a volume just a decibel louder than a dog whistle, I mouthed, I love Jesus!
Say it louder!
I smiled extra big, convinced that would make my whisper that much louder, I love Jesus!

He screamed back at me, in the volume that I probably should have vocally embraced Jesus, AMEN!!!

I determined that I had passed the test, but then... it happened. All of a sudden, I felt like I was the ringleader for the Circus of Christ. I was all torn up about Jesus, and I felt something that I had never felt in all of the youth groups and Baptist luncheons. Then, like magic, I felt something... something wet. I reached up and there they were: the tears. Why am I CRYING?
Somehow, in all of the mix and the quiet white judgement, followed soon after by white guilt, I had stumbled upon something I had never found in the walls of a church before: true inspiration from being in the company of Jesus. Even crazier, I had found people that seemed to be there for the reason of being close to God. I walked out of the church, still wiping tears from my eyes, and I noticed that their parking lot had not been redone in years. The mission trips they spoke of were in their community, speaking to the same people they passed on the street daily. No one was going to a Guatemalan beach to bring the Lord to local tourists--what little money placed in the Church of Zion's offering plate was money given to do something greater. It was to actually benefit the people that needed God.
I haven't been back to church since that day because I'm afraid of what might happen if I do. I don't want to jinx church because I went out on a good note, kind of like how Shania Twain ended her career. Instead, I just pray to God pretty regularly. I hold on to that feeling I had at that church, and I remember the people that so graciously welcomed me into their congregation. No one rededicated their lives to the Lord because they understood that everyday was a constant struggle to stay close to Him.
I don't think that religion exists within a church because if you're doing it right, all of your love for God shouldn't be able to fit into a church... that's why everyone was crying--not enough room. Instead, I think that the time you spend in church and the time you spend posting Facebook Bible verses could probably be better spent actually, you know, being nice to people. Even to the light skinned black girls.

Go Ahead and Cry For Me, Argentina

So, I cried tonight. We're not talking some sniffles and a couple gasps... these were big old bitch baby tears. The kind of snotty cry that leaves you looking at yourself in the mirror just because even you are surprised that someone can contort their face into something that looks so simultaneously pitiful and confusing at the same time. It makes me want to be a puppy, because even when puppies are whining and crying, we want to hug them and love them and be their friend. But when I cry, at least like I did tonight, it makes me look like something akin to Cher's son in Mask. (And because I just Google searched that, I won't sleep for the rest of the night. Super.)

But in the long run, I think I like crying; sometimes, I think I do it for sport. And other than that one commercial that comes on during Christmas when that girl's brother comes home from African and fixes himself some coffee, then she puts the bow on him and says You're my gift this year, I usually don't cry that often. I learned to control it, especially the intense ones, because of my excessive tears shed in elementary school. If one could dehydrate from tears, I would have from ages five to nine. But every once in a while, a good cry is fantastic... cathartic even. It's your moment to completely own everything inside of you, and if you're going to take the time to cry, just go ahead and cry about everything. Sure, your boyfriend just broke up with you, but don't forget about the economy and those one-eyed dogs on the ASPCA commercial, and how Mags died in Catching Fire (spoiler alert!), and all those smallpox blankets the Europeans brought over to the Native Americans. Just go ahead and ball your eyes out about everything that might have bothered you because in such a fast paced society, you may not get the chance to cry again for some time. I think I may have even cried about how Gabby Douglas didn't do so well on the uneven bars this week, and then I cried because it was time for a nice African American girl to win the all around. I cried about everything, and it was great!
And I'm no stranger to a good tear fest. Back my senior year of high school, during what was supposed to be an assembly about graduation, I received my second consecutive D on an English paper. I was done. Capoot. I'm not saying that grades regularly brought me to tears; I like to believe I cry about mostly important things, but with graduation at hand and so many Ds served all at once, I think I was well overdue for a cry. So, I walked into Mrs. Freels' Art I class full of a bunch of freshman with tears streaming down my face, threw myself into the darkroom revolving door and just cried in that extremely dark photography corridor. Mrs. Freels followed behind and I explained everything to her: the graduation, the Ds, my fear of everything in the world, probably something topical I had seen on TV that week and she responded, Well, just cry. Keep crying until it's all out. I can't remember the last time that I cried... most adults can't. That's why we're all in therapy because we're too embarrassed to do exactly what we all want to do: cry. This is healthy; I wish we could all be this healthy. And then her words made me stop crying because I was confused. I didn't understand... why don't adults cry? I know after a good cry, I'm ready for a nap because my eyes are tired, and I usually rest like a dream.

And from that day, I've never stopped a good cry from happening because if my absolute distain for celery, running, and daily vitamins doesn't have me in the ground by forty, then I really can't afford to not be mentally healthy by withstanding a nice cry. And I'm sure I'll cry more in the coming weeks, and you know what, I think you should, too. Maybe not about me (but honestly, you can cry about me if you want.), but find a reason to cry about something: rising gas prices, the unrest in Israel, not having another episode of Dallas until January, what I'm sure is to be an overwrought and complexly historical closing ceremony of this year's Olympics... there really is a multitude of options that await you. And in all seriousness, who are we if we stop crying. We hold back all these emotions because we've been taught that as we grow older, we should. You don't dance in the car in fear that someone will see. You don't laugh or smile because we're in the professional world now. You don't cry because if Hilary Swank has taught us anything, it's that boys don't cry. And then what do you have? Another generation of jaded, angry adults. Life doesn't have to lead anyone down that path. Take time to laugh and take time to smile. And for God's sake, if the knot in your throat is the size of an apple and your eyes are watering like an efficient landscaper in July, then cry. Even if it is just about those dogs that Sarah McLachlan won't quit singing about.

Pudding Tears

It takes a lot of work to be me. A lot of caffeine, and if it were legal, I'd probably dabble in narcotics. I realized it today at work; when in the public eye of society, I can be unusually positive... almost optimistic to a fault. I can essentially be called ugly and will respond with, "But at least I'm alive!" It's obnoxious, but it's what people have come to expect out of me. That's why every morning before I go to class or work, I drink a Monster energy drink and eat at least two Little Debbie cakes. The sugar delivers me to my audience in a way that they would want. I work for everyone in my life, and they'd be devastated to know the thoughts that circulate through my head as I wear a nearly creepy smile on my face. The thoughts are mean. Vindictive. Sometimes illegal. And the worse the thought, the bigger the smile, until I look nearly Asian because I'm smiling so hard that my eyes are squinted closed. Don't thank me for my upbeat behavior. Thank the bottling company that makes Monster. Before I got out of the car this morning, I sang to my Monster... Let me give your heart a break, let me give your heart a break, there's just so much you can take. And as I sang, I began to think about the semester that I drank so many Monsters that I was nearly confident that my heart would explode. That's how I anticipate my death will happen: caffeine induced accidental suicide. I imagine that it will be in the next four months, but the closest I've gotten yet was sophomore year.

Sophomore spring semester was my Marissa semester.

Sophomore year of college was a rough time for everyone. I was trying to balance about seven different major life events at once, and in the midst of it, trying to be more and more personable with each passing day. I was juggling a life of about seventeen different student organizations, the aftermath of my parents' recent marriage debacle, an unrequited love that could never be matched, keeping the biggest secret of my life, being an RA, 16 hours of class, pledging for a fraternity, and the dissolving of my close friend group. In response, I just kept drinking more and more energy drinks. I was doing fine for a while, but then I started to crack. My grades began slipping, and I eventually started to give up on everything. One of my favorite fall-outs was the day that I skipped all my classes to go to a private Ingrid Michaelson concert. I'm sure that sounds a lot less rebellious than I thought it was, but you don't understand. She's so complex and different, like me, so skipping class and meetings to see her was essentially the most badass thing that I could think of. When I was confronted by a staff member about skipping the entire day and what would later be referred to as my Dale Earnhardt semester (I was on top of my game, then I crashed hard in the turn), I responded, Okay. So? What are you going to do? Kick me out? Not my finest moment.
I could see myself deteriorating. I was spinning out of control, kind of like Marissa on The O.C. Actually, it's pretty much exactly like season two Marissa. The pseudo-bisexual relationship, the dabbling in drugs, the complete dismissal of authority and everything that mattered in life. One could even say that the events at the end of the semester were somewhat similar to her shooting Trey. Nothing was making sense anymore; no one understood me, but I looked fantastic throughout the entire year. Marissa would have been proud, but I'm not sure anyone else was.

If you really need to deal with life, take a
cup of refrigerated Swiss Miss. Add chocolate
covered nuts to it. Eat it and cry baby. Cry all
you want. You deserve it.

I remember the day that it all came crashing down, or at least one of them. I like to refer to it as "The Pudding Disaster of 2010." I was in the middle of my pledging process during Signature Week; it may be one of the most hellish things I've ever been through, because like most fraternities, it requires you to chase down your future brothers and do mostly pointless tasks for their approval. At the time, I was also running for Student Body President, regardless of my recent apathy for student organizations... actually, apathy for my life all together. I had just gotten the news that I had been elected, and I came back to campus from a fraternity meeting; it was super humid that day... one of those days that you can feel the moisture suffocating you, Othello style. Like most days during the week, I went into my boss, Aja's, apartment and plopped down on the couch. Most of the time, I stared blankly at the television or took a nap... which in retrospect was probably inappropriate, but whatevs. But on this day, the air condition was out in her living room, so I sat there recently anointed successful college politician and DKE brother, and Aja appeared from her kitchen. You want a pudding? All I could do was nod my head.
I had spent most of the semester with a giant knot in my throat, hoping at some point, I could muster up enough saline to cry, but alas... it hadn't happened. She handed me the pudding, and I put the first spoonful in my mouth and immediately looked up at her with tears in my eyes. All I could say is This pudding is so cold. And then I cried. And I kept crying. And I'm pretty sure I cried that night for almost two hours. The energy drinks and caffeine and everything else had ran out, and all I had left was pudding. In between heavy cries and crying hiccups, I would eat another cup of pudding until Aja ran out. I'm not sure what happened, but like most humans... it wasn't my fault. I still maintain that theory, and I refuse to admit that maybe... just maybe... I had let myself get out of control.
Eventually, I replaced the energy drinks with cigarettes, and when people tell me how expensive they are or how they give you cancer, I've trained myself to smile and say I know, it's a bad habit. But the reason that I puff, puff is because of the people in my life. Look at what they've done to me. They make me smoke a cigarette like an emphysema patient gasping for oxygen, which is kind of ironic because that's kind of where I'm heading. But we all have our roles; I just happen to be the eternal optimist running on excessive amounts of B12 vitamin boosts and nicotine. And in private, I come out of the pudding closet and cry myself to death while watching the episode of Grey's Anatomy when Denny dies. It doesn't make me less of a man; it makes life a little more bearable, you know?