Monday, July 10, 2006

Ventilation

Oi ... so I have a car now and stuff, and that's all fine and dandy (aside from having to drop a new battery in it, and probably replace the tires pretty soon here), but man ... I just think about how behind I am. I'm 20 years old. I just got my first car, I just got a cell phone, I've held a job for longer than 4-6 months ... and really, it's only my third job ever. I had one when I was 14-ish, another when I was maybe 17, and this one when I was 19. I have almost no friends here in the area. The friends i used to have don't really think much of me that I know of. Not that I really did anything wrong, I just didn't join them in going to get drunk and doing other stupid stuff. I was with my dad the other day for his birthday, and we were talking a little bit about those years (14-19ish) - he called them my 'recluse days.' But that's like 1800 days that I've spent not really accomplishing anything significant. But now that I can actually move around, I feel motivated to just go out and do stuff and be part of something good. But I still feel like there is a whole lot holding me back. I should probably address them. But yeah, I don't really know a lot of people. I know this stemmed when I switched from grade school to high school. I go from an environment where pretty much everyone is who they say they are, to an environment where pretty much everyone was two-faced. I was raised Catholic, my freshman year was at a Catholic high school, yet was everyone there a practiced Catholic? I don't believe there was a soul in there. I found [i]one[/i] person, who wasn't even Catholic, who actually was true to who she was. Had standards and stood by them. Being the way I am, I was attracted by that. I think after a while, though, I just sort of lumped everyone into the same boat. I didn't believe there were really any people out there, at least my age, that ... I don't know ... stood for something I guess. I'm heavy on morals and values if you can't tell, and I try my best to live up to them. My dad said he was talking to some relatives of his about how I'm almost 21, and they told him "I bet that will be a fun experience," and he just told them that I've never ever had any interest in drinking. I don't support it in the least. I drink responsibly by not drinking at all. I don't smoke because you shouldn't in the first place. *gasp* I've never had sex! There are 13-14 year olds who can't even say that. Just because I'm old enough to do something doesn't mean I need to go out and do it. I went back to a church for the first time in 4 or 5 years today. A Christian church an associate of mine mentioned to me, a good one that teaches straight from the Bible, not their own interpretations and opinions. First things first, it was definitely a different experience. It wasn't your typical church setting you'd think of, the one I grew up in. There was no sit, stand, sit, stand, stand, kneel, sit, kneel, stand, sit. There was no communion, there was no reading of the gospel or homily. It was so different, but I liked it a lot. They do exactly what I've always wanted: teach relevance, not facts. They teach the Word and how it applies to modern day, instead of beating the same stories into your head over-and-over-and-over-and-over again. On top of that, the pastor has a sense of humor, so that makes it even better. I think it lasted like, an hour and half (supposedly started at 9:30, ended at 11), but it only seemed like it was half an hour at most. The service today was about modesty, but I'm not going into that. There was a general statement made, though, about how people take for granted the freedoms available in this country. Not only take them for granted, but abuse them and go wrong with them. But it was said, and you may have heard this phrase before, but they said "Freedom isn't the right to do what you want, but what you ought." And that definitely left an impact on me, that's like ... my entire thought process in a nutshell. I'm not really sure where I was going with this, but yeah ... it's not like anyone reads this anyway, since I update entirely at random.

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