Five years ago, I was the shit. I was a man, not that I'm not now, but I was a man with fucking established determination and vision. I was a full-time student at UCSD, finishing a Bachelor's in Philosophy and Sociology. I was a full-time intern at New Hope Church in San Diego. I was taking three seminary courses per semester, as well as creating, inventing, and working at an Inner-City Community Center at least 20 hours per week that focused on education for children and adults. I lead worship, gave sermons, taught music/guitar, for the Junior High and High School programs as a part of my internship. I was reading three books a week, prayed daily, worshiped daily, and met with a mentor 2x per week on my own. And finally, I was engaged to be married.
Five years ago my future-wife left me for our college pastor. I was on a mission trip, living in India for three months as a part of my internship. The weekend I came back my fiancee and I had a conversation, in which she could not say whether or not she wanted us to be together, just that she "loved me". Ever perform an open-heart surgery and dissection on yourself? Over three hours I cut open my own heart, using her hands and words, dissected every investment she made into it, removed every tumor of falsehood and "I love you, but..." and returned them to her, then placed what was left of my heart back into my chest and closed it up. So finally, I verbally forced her into an anti-people-pleasing and pacifying corner, wherein she stated "I don't know if I want to marry you." This took hours for me to get her to say, and as abusive as I may sound, she would never express this on her own even though she had already been on multiple dates with our college pastor while I was gone.
What is this I don't even fuck I don't understand if why this... I asked for my ring back and I left her home (after just getting back in the country hours earlier). She called me one hour later, stating "I know I just made the biggest mistake of my life. I'm sorry." Keep in mind, I didn't know anything about her and the pastor, but nevertheless I told her that she made her decision to be undecided and that wasn't good enough for us to be married. I kept driving home, to my parents' house, and there I stayed for two years.
During that two years, I enrolled full time to get a teaching credential in Social Science. My father's mother, my grandma had been diagnosed with two different forms of cancer, and she had moved into my parent's house at the same time. So, my normal daily routine was to take care of her while I wasn't at school, whilst still maintaining a healthy lifestyle. My fiancee visited, mostly because I was hesitant to visit her parents' house where she lived, on rare occasion but with frequent emotionally-passive protest. She would drive up, calling me while on the road (two hour drive) completely stressed and in need of promises for attention and spoiling when she got here. I still wanted her, so I did everything to make her experiences around me pleasant and relaxing. We did this for a year.
Oh, by the way, one year prior I was fully intending to marry this girl, so upon my return from India I had already arranged a job at the USC police department (where my fiancee was intent on attending for grad school) so that she could get 50% off tuition and I could pay for her education. That, of course, fell through, took many called-in favors from my former employers to arrange, but fell through with the "I don't know, but I can't say" marriage commitment. As such, I rearranged my entire life in one full weekend. The works.
After a full year of her saying "I want to marry you, but..." I decided (funny word here, as I felt I had no other choice except to kill myself due to pain) to end it. I told her over the phone on one of our many long phone conversations. She was so upset, crying, blubbering, speechless but asking why, asking if I loved her still, etc. I was empty but felt relieved, if not a bit guilty too. I was relieved because I knew I would no longer be strung along, but felt guilty because if this girl actually loved me but didn't know how to be with me....?
Thankfully, that only lasted two weeks. You see, I called my fiancee to ask her to please remove her number from my cell phone plan, as I was paying for both of our cell phones. She sounded quite happy to do so, which surprised me. What shouldn't have surprised me was her response to my next question: So, how are you doing? "Good, I'm dating someone. Do you remember Jeremy [our college pastor]?" This was a facetious question. Of course I knew Jeremy, we hung out together on multiple occasions, as well as in a group setting with my fiancee. I squeaked out a "yes" before my heart sunk and my lower face started to go fuck itself. After she finally agreed to get off of my cell phone plan, I hung up.
Damnit if I didn't do everything right. Respectful, loving, virgin for my entire life and through two years of dating, praying, working more than full-time for a better future not just for me but for my future family, going to counseling for personality tests/profiles of compatibility prior to the engagement, continuing to go to therapy on my own to prepare for marriage... There was nothing I didn't do. No suggestion was too small, no obstacle to big for this. I did it all.
And what was the result? My fiancee's mother being a two-faced bitch and my fiancee dating our FUCKING COLLEGE PASTOR FOR A FULL YEAR that was more acceptable to her mother without telling me a god-damned thing about it. What I thought were the problems, what EVERYONE told me MIGHT be problems, I addressed with full commitment. And yet, NOT ONE PERSON imagined or advised me on what was actually the key problem: my fiancee wanted to marry someone else.
I haven't stepped back into a church since. Been to a few Sunday services, but stayed outside, so I could just socialize and connect with friends. The few times I walked through the doors, I also walked through the bullshit character of everyone I saw: my pastor who was "struggling" (FUCKING FUNNY WORD!!) with affair(s), my female friends who were engaged to other men actually telling me that they thought they would cheat on their husbands with me (FFUUU!!!), my college friends who got married early in college getting divorced and fighting against each other using "Christian" guidelines for divorce (e.g. "He was smoking pot. His body is supposed to be a temple." "She's so obsessed with her career, it's like she doesn't care about me anymore." etc). It was like my entire core belief system was resulting in people I loved becoming insane, narcissistic, vigilantes.
I left. Five years ago I cut out my own heart without anesthesia and returned it sans falsehood. I was left with a new perspective. Five years ago I was the shit. I could've gone to any country in the world amongst any people eating any food or not doing anything or not and been successful. But, I loved and lost.
All of that is to say, none of that matters now. Five years later, not one of those people or experiences is significant enough to inform my present life. Nothing I did, built, accomplished, sacrificed or love-lost is significant. Why? I am. I remain not as the sum of my past but as the sum of my present, with character and wisdom tempered by the trust of life experience. The specifics of them don't matter, I'm the product. I can still go anywhere in the world to do anything with anyone eating whatever, but I can do so today with tempered character to love that which can be and hate that which deserves it. I fucking love this shit.
