How well I know “ the sections of sheet ice, when you have to carefully work around thin patches, avoid the open cracks, and try to keep a consistent speed and your concentration levels very high”.
Sometimes maintaining concentration requires superhuman effort and tension. And the hardest thing is maintaining a constant speed of movement when you really want to stop!!!!
“ Months or years of lying will leave stains on your soul that are very hard to scrub out.” I can clearly remember, as a kid in convent school, going to confession for the first time. It was vaguely terrifying, going into a little booth at the back of the church and having to fess up to the priest through a screen. I knew it was our priest, and he for darn sure knew who I was. Mortifying, as a child, to think up sins to confess because we were made to go on a weekly basis. What kid sins that much?! But I remember vividly a kindly nun taking me by the hand as I staggered weak-kneed from the confessional that first time, and whispering that my soul was now clean and white again because Jesus had scrubbed all the stains of my sins off it.
Very odd experience to put a child through. Though weirdly only yesterday I was thinking how, for true believers — and perhaps just for people who need to articulate — confession must offer some kind of comfort.
I think it does. And that is okay. We all get comfort from somewhere when we face challenges or confront our deeds or our mortality, and religion offers a structure for that. There is redemption in owning up to your errors and being forgiven. But it is a weird power structure, to go into a little box and fess up and have a man in robes tell you it’s all good, a few Hail Marys will seal the deal, and nobody else need ever know what you’ve confessed. That’s the bit that sticks a little, for me. How many sins were forgiven under the seal of the confessional that just…. could have used a little more light and air, and a little more genuine remorse, and maybe a few more consequences. How many sins were repeated, because ‘forgiveness’ came easy, and not from the person who had been wronged.
Your last one is so true. The curiosity and possibility of something heavenly keeps me going, though I know full well I haven’t gone through anything hellish yet. What’s odd right now is that we all have an ongoing parasocial connection to the extremes. I don’t really know what that means. It feels like being in an experiment I don’t necessarily want to be in, but I don’t want to leave either.
I don’t think I’ve mentioned this enough, but reading these has been such a joy! I’m so grateful you’ve given us the chance to experience them.
Thank you April :-) It's been an interesting process digging back through decades of notes... I'm really glad some of them are worth reading!
How well I know “ the sections of sheet ice, when you have to carefully work around thin patches, avoid the open cracks, and try to keep a consistent speed and your concentration levels very high”.
Sometimes maintaining concentration requires superhuman effort and tension. And the hardest thing is maintaining a constant speed of movement when you really want to stop!!!!
That is absolutely key at some points in life — and it's so hard!
I still can't believe you did that snowmobiling thing!
Me neither. But it was a hell of a thing and I'm glad I did :)
“ Months or years of lying will leave stains on your soul that are very hard to scrub out.” I can clearly remember, as a kid in convent school, going to confession for the first time. It was vaguely terrifying, going into a little booth at the back of the church and having to fess up to the priest through a screen. I knew it was our priest, and he for darn sure knew who I was. Mortifying, as a child, to think up sins to confess because we were made to go on a weekly basis. What kid sins that much?! But I remember vividly a kindly nun taking me by the hand as I staggered weak-kneed from the confessional that first time, and whispering that my soul was now clean and white again because Jesus had scrubbed all the stains of my sins off it.
Very odd experience to put a child through. Though weirdly only yesterday I was thinking how, for true believers — and perhaps just for people who need to articulate — confession must offer some kind of comfort.
I think it does. And that is okay. We all get comfort from somewhere when we face challenges or confront our deeds or our mortality, and religion offers a structure for that. There is redemption in owning up to your errors and being forgiven. But it is a weird power structure, to go into a little box and fess up and have a man in robes tell you it’s all good, a few Hail Marys will seal the deal, and nobody else need ever know what you’ve confessed. That’s the bit that sticks a little, for me. How many sins were forgiven under the seal of the confessional that just…. could have used a little more light and air, and a little more genuine remorse, and maybe a few more consequences. How many sins were repeated, because ‘forgiveness’ came easy, and not from the person who had been wronged.
Your last one is so true. The curiosity and possibility of something heavenly keeps me going, though I know full well I haven’t gone through anything hellish yet. What’s odd right now is that we all have an ongoing parasocial connection to the extremes. I don’t really know what that means. It feels like being in an experiment I don’t necessarily want to be in, but I don’t want to leave either.
Very true... there's an awful fascination to it, like standing outside the open door to Hell.