I stood on the back porch this morning, clutching a mug of steaming coffee and looking out over the rolling hills, visible between a split in the trees. I sipped my coffee and I felt the world around me, and my thoughts turned inwards, and when I went to work, the train of thought continued. I stood making drinks, and I served drinks to one of my ex-girlfriends, Julie. She is getting married soon. She smiled at me and I smiled back. Pleasantries. She sent me through hell. It wasn’t her fault though. The emotional cycles of a creature like me stem from inward rather than outward influences. I watched her go and sit with her fiancé, and I continued making drinks, and I looked at my life, all that has passed over the last four years, from my freshman year of college to—now—my senior.
When I was a freshman, I had such high hopes and dreams. I was going to plant a church that engaged postmodern culture, and I was going to find a wife and get married and have kids and serve God both vocationally and within the family structure (quite a beautiful ministry, despite how it is viewed as inferior even within some Christian circles). I believed with my whole heart that this would come to pass, and by the time I graduated, I would be stronger, wiser, and engaged or even married. Confidence in this surged through my veins.
That confidence was ill-placed.
My relationship with God is strained, and this strain is due entirely to my own actions. I am not as devoted to God as I used to be. I don’t love Him—nor other people—as much as I used to. I am plagued with countless addictions, addictions I indulge in order to escape the emptiness in my heart. I have fallen in love—twice—and that love has crashed to the rocks and been beaten and marred by the waves of misfortune and inopportunity. I have watched the girls I love run into the arms of other men and then marry them. I have seen girls I’ve dated have babies. My dream feels so farther away, and sometimes I wonder if this is best—perhaps there was a time when I would be a good husband and a good father, but sometimes I doubt that those times continue. I am a selfish, greedy, and indifferent creature, consumed by my own flesh.
I had been a boy with such dreams and ambitions… and such hope. The dreams, the ambitions—they were nothing but smoke. Emptiness. Nothingness. I tasted them for moments, and then they were gone, and I had the enormous pleasure of watching my dreams given to others on silver platters. The shattering of my dreams scarred my heart, and I became cold and calloused, and I became more selfish and self-centered. I became such a pitiable creature. And, honestly, I still am. This is something I do not wear on my sleeve—until now—but I know there is no reason to hide it. I am a broken creature, and anything positive you think about me is probably an illusion. I put on a good show, but I am no different than the heathen who chases after the wind and reaches for the stars. I knew what I wanted to be like at this time in my life, but I am not that a person. I am a shell of the person I once was, a shadow of what I had, at one time, been. These last four years have scarred me, but I want the scars to be healed, the passion rekindled, the devotion to return. I am tired of this, I am tired of who I am.
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