a is followed by b is followed by c…

At this time eight years ago, I was completely at ends over one of those messy, hyperdramatic, toxic, online-and-in-the-head dalliances that most have either had, or watched a friend endure. I gained more than I lost:

I was introduced to these ideas as a stream of epiphanies that arrived over the space of less than six weeks, as I was laboring to extricate myself from what I’d wrought out of a general sense of contrition.

The contrition started as remorse over the way I’d treated an ex-girlfriend some years earlier — which brought me to the ugly realization that we often treat those the worst who love us the most, if only because we can trust them to put up with our shit.

The ex-girlfriend and I remain dear friends fourteen years and counting from the end of the relationship, and the only thing that stops us from remaining constant confidants is the general agreement that I should be, at most, a backup for her husband in that regard. She and I are still waiting for him to man up and take the role that is rightfully his.

While I came out of that experience better off as a human being, the sad truth is that the experience stripped away much of my ego, neutralized much of the anger that had kept me going, and heightened my awareness of anxiety to a level that made my emotions too often unmanageable. I’m still struggling with those consequences after all these years.

Out of hiding

I sent the e-mail that sent that “dalliance” into motion, on a Sunday — one of those rare Sundays when I’d consented my grandparents to drag me to Mass. The missal that day raised Matthew 5:13–16:

You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt has become tasteless, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.

You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.

Fr. Tom’s homily, workmanlike as always, drilled home the point that faith in oneself is inextricable from such faith in one’s Maker as one might hold.

That was also the first Mass I attended after learning that I was one degree of separation from one of the principals in the then-exploding U.S. Church child sex abuse scandal.

After Mass and breakfast, my grandfather was relentless; he was mystified why I spin my wheels. Even now I only rarely understand why I do it, myself.

I had cause today to point an online acquaintance at those verses from Matthew (more accurately their analogue in Luke), and it got me to thinking: what is my “basket” woven from?

We are all that salt, we are all that lamp, and we all feel tempted by the basket — regardless of belief in a Maker or lack thereof. I, however, can only speak for myself.

A catalog

When I look at myself and listen to others, this is what I find:

Guilt and shame