Church, Emotions and More .

That title is stated as such because I honestly have no idea what to call this. I often have ideas for posts on the tip of my tongue, but they turn into jumbled messes, partitions of ideas and concepts and other weird puzzle pieces. Anyways...

At church today, I had a lot of stuff on my mind. I don't really enjoy going to the 5pm mass on Saturdays, but it's a necessity if I want to go during the weekend because I usually have to work both Saturday and Sunday mornings from 6am to 2pm (which honestly is totally cool with me; I love getting up early so I can get out early). The Saturday evening mass used to be the mass that lots of younger people went to, because they didn't like getting up early to go on Sundays. What I realized today was that it seems that a lot of those people only really went because their parents made them. Now, perhaps I started that way, but I came to find that going, for me, is a healthy thing. Even if some weeks I don't get as much out of it, it is a healthy break from the chaos that is everyday life. It's a break from struggles at work and struggles at home, a time when I can pray and gain reprieve from my emotional rollercoasters (and yes, often there are multiple).

I suppose an easy explanation could be that all these kids, now graduates of college, are out of the house and moving on with their lives. I have a feeling that's not the case given the job market (and man would I consider myself to be in a sad state of affairs if that were the case), however, and that instead my age group just decided church wasn't worth the time. What a fucked up world we live in. Of course, I'm well aware that not everyone likes it, and that not everyone is going to stick with it, and heck, not everyone is even going to ever try anything remotely close to church, and that's totally okay.

During the homily, the deacon (who was subbing in for the priest) mentioned that we should "live every day as if Jesus himself were coming tomorrow." Am I prepared for that? Would I be happy with myself inside if Jesus were to show up on my doorstep tomorrow? I think I literally need to take things a day at a time for that to be the case. But I can't imagine living every day assuming I was going to die tomorrow. I'd do things completely different if that were the case. Imagine trying to knock out a new bucket list every day; it'd be exhausting! Despite the jokes and whatever else, I wouldn't be ready if the second coming were tomorrow. I am not fully satisfied with who I am. And while there's always room for improvement, there are basic building blocks that are crumbling, and mortar that needs to be replaced to solidify a base I've spent 20 years attempting to build.

For reasons unknown to even me, I almost started tearing up today during mass. Maybe my emotions were too overwhelming. Maybe I made a connection spiritually that I haven't made in a long time. Life has been so hard, busy, and chaotic and I just needed a break. Vacation was really good, and it was nice to relax. But I never really checked out of the real world. I brought my laptop and maybe that was a mistake. I wanted to be able to work on music and blogging and all that other stuff. Instead I ended up working on stuff for my second job. All that said, though, I have been much less involved in Twitter and other things that generally waste time... Social media is great for keeping in touch; but I prefer writing a letter (Sidenote: If you want to start mail correspondence send me an email!). Tonight felt lonely, but sometimes that's just how things are. Not much to be done about it, but head to bed and hope that tomorrow will be a better and less exhausting day.