Taking off the mask

well guys, i gots some good news and some bad news.

let's start with the bad so i can end this on a good note.

I resent my Dad for the fact that he's never been a Dad to me. That he's chosen alcohol over me for the eighteen years I've been alive.

but here's how this might change.

rather than hold it in and keep the pain bottled in, I'm going to tell my Dad how i feel.

and also, he might be getting a divorce, so he won't have a bi polar psycho beast of a woman around to call the cops on him when she starts fights.

so maybe after that he can quit drinking

then i can have my dad back.

all are big maybes.

but i know my Dad is in there somewhere, i see him all the time when he's sober.

but the sight is rare and hardly seen, even by family.

and my family is VERY close down here.

but here's the good news i mentioned.

while at church camp, God laid down a little truth for me.

he told me everyone isn't Johnny. that it's okay to accept the love of others. that it's almost impossible to love others if you can't do this first.

but that's the next step, and I'm not sure how, when or where I'll get to it, but I'm taking steps.

but I've made a covenant with God on the youth room floor, looking him in the eye, and he's going to keep up his end, and my end really was that i wanted him to keep his end no matter how much i resisted.

so now my path has guard rails on it.

oh, and i got a new sword.

it's big and shiny, and it makes me happy.

that's it for now, so until next time...

Got No Strings To Hold Me Down

Okay, my last post was kind of depressing, but the good news is this one might not be!

I took a step yesterday. And this time in the right direction!

okay, story time.

so I'm sitting in church, listening to stuff i feel as if I've heard my entire life (pretty much have) and feeling nostalgic i go to what was once the youth room. (no longer in use due to no more youth... or at least no one tells me when or where the meetings are anymore. anyway i went in there and was going to read a little bit but then i got to thinking. i thought of how God scared the ever loving crap out of me, but i realized i was more scared of the path i was heading down. The one that ends up in me dying. so i stretched out on the orange carpet (it looks as bad as it sounds, but it's fitting at the same time) and looked God in the eye... or at least that's what i was aiming for. i told Him He scared the ever loving crap out of me and that i didn't want to change. i also told him that what i wanted wasn't what i needed and what i needed was to be what He wanted me to be... expected of me. then i did something i hadn't done in a while... i looked at myself in a mirror and held my own gaze. all the shame, the brokenness, the hate... and i decided to love myself. that was my first step... hopefully the first of many.

i felt at peace for the first time in a while... it wasn't big and flashy, it wasn't all consuming, but it was what i needed.

for now, my smile isn't plastic...

i haven't broken the mold yet, but i think it might be cracked.

if you guys get tired of the mask symbolism let me know and I'll cut it out.

until next time...

putting the MAN in mannequin

okay, i figured it was time for an update since i haven't done any updating in a while...

my sister Emma has been taken by social services to a foster home and i don't know if I'll ever see her again

my mom is talking to someone in Colorado... the last Internet relationship she had, the guy ended up scarring me emotionally for life... or at least I'm still trying to get over it...

my step dad beat up my mom

he is also suspected of touching Emma

the more i read about how God is loving, and the more i learn about Him, the more he scares the ever loving crap out of me and the more i feel as if i can't possibly live up to the expectations

like how he wants me to forgive the aforementioned person that scarred me emotionally...

i mean i got a prank phone call the other day from a guy that sounded like him and i had a mini panic attack...

and i have problems letting that kind of stuff go...

if God expects it of me, then obviously i CAN do it... i choose not to... as if not hating him for what he did will mean I'm weak... too weak to stop it from happening again...

but all the hating I've done has just reminded me of it over and over again...

but i still don't want to let go...

so even though i want to walk the right path... I'm still walking towards the left...

which scares me even more... because i know how the road is going to end...

it's going to kill me...

more later... hopefully the drama plays i am producing will go better today than yesterday...

seeing what I'm doing might help a little bit...

I'll try and update more frequently so i don't unload a butt load of troubling things at once again, but thanks for listening...

later

a new design from the same mold

I learned something of great importance recently. You are who you choose to be. Sounds so extremely simple doesn't it? But for the longest while I was letting my emotions define me, I let my friends define me, and I let my insecurities define me. But it's my choices that ultimately determine who I am. Not what I've done, what I haven't done, because those actions revolved around my choice on whether to act or not. Which means the me I don't want to become will never be me unless I choose it. So all I need to do is just not choose it and I'll be okay, right?

Not really.

Choices are never that easy to make... I'm going to make wrong ones but every right choice I make is another step in the right direction. As long as I don't lose more ground than I gain in the struggle, I'll be alright... maybe.

Man has always had this ability.

Cain, before he goes mental on his brother, actually was confronted by God concerning his anger. In which God says, "Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it". Meaning even Cain, the first murderer in history had the ability to choose a different path, to not let his anger define him. This ability to choose is both our greatest gift and the very reason there's evil in the world. Although really there's not evil in the world so much as there's evil inside of me, and you, and the people you see on the news that killed a seven year old child in a most horrid way. We are who we choose to be... nothing else defines us but that.

This was very good news for me... maybe it will be to someone else that stumbles upon this

Forsaken Legacy...or Just Forsaken?

The sins of the fathers become the crucifix of the sons...

How many die in vain?



I saw my father in a friend of mine today...

I saw who my Dad was at my age, the way he thought, the way he felt... all I had to do was mentally envision my face to my friend and there he was... Dad looking back at me.

I've watched my dad cry himself to sleep because of the choices he's made... all the things he could have done and didn't... should have done but wouldn't... did but shouldn't have.

I saw in my friend the moment my Dad wanted to take it all back...

My friend lacks this wisdom...

I can do nothing but hope...

Hope lives...

Mirrors No Longer Have Purpose

I'm so tired of looking in the mirror and seeing dead eyes look back at me. I'm starting to split in two about what I want to become. Half of me wants to change the world through love, and the other half wants to see the world burn. I'm currently standing at a crossroads and can't walk both roads anymore... I have to choose. I either have to remove my mask or become it, and both of those ideas terrify me. To take off my mask I would have to both cleanse my soul and leave my shame with God... and i have issues with not picking it back up again. the concept of it not being on my shoulders anymore doesn't really click with me... and I'm not sure how to do it. Is it a metaphor that i have to forgive myself? Becoming my mask would mean i would throw my life away and become anger and hate... those are the things I hide away. I hate Johnny and people like him for what he did to my sister, and I'm mad at the world for allowing him to live...

This is what i mean by hiding behind masks... I preach forgiveness but inside I want Johnny to suffer for what he did. I want him to hurt and I want him to die and I want to be the one to carry it out. That is my mask... I hate the world for hosting a legion of Johnny's but I want to hope so bad that it doesn't have to be that way... That through love no one else has to go through what me and my family went through. But the pessimist in me isn't sure it can happen...

I just don't know anymore...

But I'm pretty sure i took off my mask... if only for a moment...

Maybe there's hope yet...

I love masks...which is why i hate my own...

I'm not sure how to start this... the beginning is usually the hardest part... but for the sake of formality i think I'll start with a hello. Hello to all of my fellow mask enthusiasts out there reading this. If you aren't a fan of masks, then truth be told we have something in common. Part of me enjoys the concept of masks... it allows you a certain freedom from your identity... you become a fake person to allow the real you to bubble to the surface. The flip side to this is that everyone wears a mask to cover the shame of who you are from the world around you. You become a fake person to keep the real you from bubbling to the surface. No matter what we do we wear a mask because the thought of being imperfect terrifies us. That's why i love the masks that covers your face... but i hate the mask that covers my soul. The physical mask cancels out the emotional mask to the extent that the shame for my actions isn't associated with me... just the mask. The feeling of shame stays with me no matter what i do though...

I think that's enough for one post... I'll talk about my own mask later...

feel free to talk about yours...

feel even freer to take it off...