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Because I usually am in Vino ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** In 2009, I gave up my studies as a medievalist and musician, left my home, my family, my life and moved to Provence in southern France for a guy. In 2012, I moved away from him to study wine. Today, I'm a vagabond sommelier working in Paris at one of the oldest and most famous restaurants in the world, struggling to find some purpose to what I deem the rest of my life. I'm still married and after 8 10 years, I'm still trying to fit-in with French life and culture and to understand why the French are the way they are. Because they're weird in a different way that I think Americans are weird. Perhaps it's me who's weird. |
| I'm writing this in my living room, at my coffee table with a mug of chai tea and a chocolate raspberry mousse cake. My husband has been raving about this bakery for about two years, ever since he discovered it. The patissier is Japanese and took over the bakery after the former owner, his teacher, retired. The husband goes in there every Tuesday for millefeuilles and they see him so often that the patissier actually makes the millefeuilles on Tuesdays for him specifically. It was originally just a Sunday thing, but when my husband started stopping by on Tuesdays they made an exception. Anyway, it's a good cake. I finally caught up with my mom via Skype this afternoon. It was her day to babysit my niece so we talked while my niece made faces at me on the phone. She'll be 6 months on Monday and is SO cute (my niece, not my mom. She'll be 63 on Monday). We made very tentative plans for the husband and I to come visit in another year and a half, but I also suggested that la famille entière take a trip out west while we're there. The husband is dying to see Vegas and no one in my family has visited the Grand Canyon but me. We never get to go because we always spend time visiting my family when we go to the States. Just going to NYC for three days in October was huge. HUGE. He'd never been and I thought he was going to hate it. Instead he though New York was wonderful. WHA? Coming from the guy who can't stand going to the movies at normal times because there are too many other people in the theater. Mom also told me about this site she signed up for called Stitch Fix that sends you clothes once a month or once a season or whatever. It's like a personal shopper where you fill out a form and they send you stuff to try on. You send back the clothes you don't like and buy the stuff you do. Other than the membership fee, it's free. Cool. My mom hates shopping for herself. She NEVER shops for herself and her clothes are literally 20 years old. Go watch something like Friends or Seinfeld and judge for yourself how much fashion has changed. It's subtle but it's there. Plus her clothes LOOK old. So I hope she finds things she likes. I'm no better. Most of my clothes are at least 7 years old and this is because of my job. 85% of my waking hours are spent in my work clothes which come down to a black blazer, white button down, black slacks or a black skirt. I have at least 5 of each item hanging in my closet. And when I do go out and actually put on normal clothes I realize how BORING my clothes are, and how old. Some of the more recent items are still in good condition because they are never worn, but so many were just shoved into my closet and forgotten about and have been there since 2009 when I moved to France. Plus ever since losing so much weight 10 years ago and falling out of love with the hippy look, I've never known how to dress myself. So I found Lookiero which is the French version of Stitch Fix and signed up. Long story short. I gave them carte blanche to style me and even provided a photo. My first package arrives on the 5th of March which is in time for spring and long enough that I'll forget about it and be pleasantly surprised. Now all I need is to fix my skin and hair. Both are in terrible condition and I can't figure out why. My skin is papery, grainy, unpleasant to touch. It actually looks like really fine sandpaper at times. And my hair. My god, my hair. Stringy, brittle, thin, frizzy, flat mess. If you don't know, I have super curly hair. Imagine flat, curly hair. Yeah. I thought all of this would get better when I quit smoking. In fact it was my main motivator to quit smoking. My skin. Money was second. My health came in third. Yes, I am that vain. And my skin did start to improve for a few weeks but now it's done a complete 180 and actually looks worse. What the hell did I quit smoking for? My mom suggested vitamins. She might be on to something there. Many of my colleagues have been convinced I have a vitamin deficiency in my diet, and they are probably right because I eat kind of randomly. Lots of chicken, vegetables, cheese and bread. Nothing bad, but I'm missing out on fruit and red meat completely. I almost never eat either. I'm allergic to all shellfish and rather sensitive when it comes to regular fish. I went out and bought vitamin this afternoon after hanging up with her and hopefully will see an improvement in a month. If not, I'm considering talking to a dermatologist or someone who deals with vain people like me. I don't really want to, because there is nothing wrong with me (except my vanity), but I will if I start to look like I'm 80 when I'm not even 40 (it really is that bad). All the women in my family age well. My 40 year old cousin still looks like she's in her late twenties. Despite my bad habits, I refuse to be "the old one." |
| So.... yeah. The Michelin guide 2018 came out yesterday. Hotel de Castellet got their third star. So did Marc Veyrat. Berne did NOT get it's second and I have to say, I'm not surprised. We weren't ready, at a service or cuisine level, though the chef (who is hardly in the kitchen so how should he know), the chef patissier (who spends ALL his time on his phone) and the maître d'hôtel (who is a drunk) were convinced we were going to get it. Maybe these people should remove those rosé colored glasses. Didn't I say something about taking responsibility once before? Anyway, I am fairly happy to no longer be a part of that world. The move is kinda-sorta-not-really-but-will be-next-week complete. I have the keys to the apartment, I no longer have any obligation to Berne, and my scooter is somewhere between Nice and Lyon. That's not much given France is smaller than Texas. Let me tell you about what a time I had getting access to the cage where the scooter was being kept. a) The ass. general manager of the hotel (see what I did there) yelled at me for calling because "everyone else has been calling and I need to tell my colleagues (aka the HOTEL interns) at the employee housing to stop it." How the fuck was I supposed to know? I don't live there anymore and it's not my fault what your interns do. They're YOUR interns. When I start my new job and have my own apprentice I'll be happy to take responsibility for his stupidity, but until then I take responsibility for nothing. In fact I purposefully avoided positions of responsibility for the past 3 years because I didn't want to deal with it. b) He claimed he doesn't know where the keys are. c) I called the restaurant manager, she told me where the keys are. I went back to the hotel, I can't find the ass general manager and eventually had to track down someone in the office to open the safe to give me the keys. d) I spent 2 hours in the freezing cold waiting for the delivery men to come and pick up the scooter with no word. They called me 90 minutes into this to tell me they'll be late. Really? I hadn't noticed. I tell them they have to get here within 30 minutes max otherwise it's off. Mind you I woke up at 5 to take a 3 hour train ride, a 30 minute taxi ride and spend an hour explaining to the ass. general manager once again why I needed the keys. I'm cold, I'm hungry, I'm stressed, and I'm tired. They showed up in a broken down moving truck with some sob story about how no one likes Arabs in France. Dude. Did you not hear my accent over the phone? It's thicker than yours. So I refused to pay the guy the full amount until I have the scooter in Lyon. If I get the scooter on time when I want it, I will give him a tip. Because I'm that kind of person and I do get the whole "I'm an immigrant just trying to make a living thing." But show up on time next time. Especially after I explained that this had to be done on a limited time schedule. No word on when the scooter will be delivered but I did tell the guy on the 16th or 17th so there is still time. Plus I now have his phone AND address so... In the end, everything is rolling along. The apartment is another story of craziness but other than the electric company going AWOL it was an acceptable level of craziness. I probably came off as a crazy bitch through most of it but honestly... people need to get it together. Sometimes I think my sister is right when she said I'm crazy because I'm the only normal one out there and can't handle other people's craziness. I should get up and feed the cats because they are both standing side by side in the doorway staring at me with very fixed expressions. It's like something out of the Shining with cats. Edited to add: By the way, in case anyone was wondering, I found the teapot. |
| I'm kind of having an anxiety attack. Or an asthma attack. Or a heart attack. One of the three. I spent the past hour rummaging through boxes of stuff. You know, those boxes and drawers of stuff that just pile up. I threw out a lot and organized the rest. I have a ridiculous number of corkscrews. I think I counted at least 10. That's not counting the three I have in my purse and the two in the kitchen. These were extras. Most people don't know this but corkscrews go dull and break. I have a photo somewhere of the screw part broken off in the cork of a bottle. It happened at work. Twice. Wineries and wine sellers are always giving out corkscrews, so it's the hazards of the profession. But seriously, 15 corkscrews? And I'm pretty sure I'll find more when I finish going through my kitchen stuff. I will probably bring them to work. At least my staff will never have the excuse of not having a corkscrew. That pissed me off all the time at Rabanel. I guess this isn't surprising. I have four decanters. For that day that I'll need to decant four different wines during a dinner... Friday I head to Lorgues for the last time to have my scooter transported to Lyon and turn in my key to my room. I will also see if I can find that mysteriously disappearing teapot. Saturday the husband and I are going to Lyon to sign my lease for my apartment and begin the move. It's not that I have SO much stuff I'm moving, but there's wine reference books, my work clothes, bedding, and of course, the 15 corkscrews, that are a pain in the ass to carry on the train. Then I have 12 more days at home and then I head up to Lyon. I could leave later than the 15th, but I want to make sure I have enough time to acclimate myself to the city. I have to pick up my scooter and then find the fastest route to and from work and at some point actually go to work to talk to my maître d'hôtel (who I'll be working alongside as his assistant as well as sommelier) and hopefully drop off the first round of work clothes so that I don't have to wear them while driving. Plus I've really got to get on studying that wine list. Anyway, things are rolling along. I just need confirmation that the keys to the cage where my scooter is, are where I think they are. And then make reservations for the taxi, order the train tickets, finish packing, and and and.... The anxiety was getting better as I was writing. Was being the key word. How I'm ever going to get through this move, I have no idea. I'm pretty sure this is the toughest one yet. Now I remember why I've spent the past week playing computer games and avoiding thinking about all of this crap. |
| Who would steal a teapot? The husband and I went to Lorgues yesterday afternoon to clean out my room. There were some clothes, some hangers, some blankets and pillows, some random stuff that I couldn't fit into my bags. There was also one electric coffee pot and one electric teapot. You know, the kind you fill with water and flip a switch and it boils the water in 3 minutes. That kind. Apparently you can buy fancy ones now that will boil the water to the correct temperature for the type of tea you plan on drinking, but this is a basic 10 euro teapot you can buy at your local grocery store. Nothing fancy. Except the teapot was no where to be found. So I thought that it must be in one of the bags I brought home with me at the beginning of the month and haven't finished unpacking and I just forgot. No big deal. Or it's in one of the bags I had already loaded into the car and I forgot. I figured it was in a bag somewhere and I'd find it when I got back to Arles and started sorting through all my stuff to figure out what to take to Lyon and what to leave behind and what to throw out. You'd think I'd have this down pat by now, but I don't. Plus I'd like to toss, or at least organize, my stuff for the inevitable "move to end all moves" in the summer of 2019. Back to the teapot. The end of this story is that I can't find it. Which means someone went into my room and took it. I'm not really upset about losing it because it was, as I said, a generic 10 euros teapot that I can easily replace when I get to Lyon, but who steals a teapot and nothing else? Why not the teapot AND the coffeepot? Or pillows and blankets to complete the comfort-tea-ensemble? When we arrived at the maison du personnel I noticed that the shutters to my door were open, which I thought was a little odd, but I kind of figured David (the assistant general manager who lives next door) had wandered over when he found out I was leaving to see if I had cleaned out my room and forgotten to close the shutters properly and that it was no big deal. But now I'm not so sure. Someone got into my room - nothing was broken so that means they had a key - and someone took my teapot. Weird? I think so. Although, while typing this entry I have a vague memory of me sticking the teapot on a shelf and then shoving the hotel-issue blanket onto the same shelf thereby hiding the teapot. So I think I know where it might be and I'll just have to check when I go back to Lorgues to give back the key and turn in my uniforms. And if it's not there, then the case of the missing teapot will just belong to that file of very strange unsolved mysteries in my life. |
| In a hotel room in Aix, my husband is out taking his exam, and it's rainy and windy so I don't think I will go running. No sooner did I accept an apartment in Lyon, than I happened upon one for the same size but 150 euros cheaper and closer to work. The husband encouraged me to call the agency "just to see." Now, when I thought the stress was all over, I am waiting for them to call me back and let me know if I can have that apartment or not. And I need them to do it by the end of today so that I can tell the other people that I won't be taking their apartment after all (which despite what the husband says about not having signed and not owing anyone anything, is not exactly a fun call). Even though the apartment I'm waiting on will save me a lot of money, the apartment I accepted or was accepted for (- who knows anymore) is acceptable. It's a tiny box of 18m2 - 193ft2 for those of you not on the metric system, but it's furnished, newly rennovated, and in a nice neighborhood. And when I say it's furnished and new, it's brand new, I'll be the first person living in it. And the owner didn't furnish it with crap. Usually these apartments are furnished with whatever the owner had lying around in his backyard and could dig out of the dumpster. This owner bought really beautiful, quality furniture (granted, there's not much furniture in there). Even all the plates, cups and cooking equipment is new. So despite the price and the location - because it's further from work than I'd like - it's actually a quality apartment. Or box. Quality box. The cons are that it's tiny, it's 20 Euros more than I wanted to spend, it's further from work than I'd like, and the owner is clearly a nutjob. So I can say goodbye to the 1000 Euros I'm about to put down as a security deposit, because these nutjobs never give it back. "You slept on the bed!!!!???? I can't give your money back!" "You mean you actually put FOOD in the FRIDGE?! What were you thinking?" The pros with the apartment I'm waiting on are that it's less expensive, furnished, and closer to work. The cons are that it's furnished with crap (which the husband thinks is fine, but I don't), I don't know if I'll actually get it, if I do get it, I'll be taking it blind b/c I'm not going to Lyon to look at apartments again, and the paperwork I had to fill out was like a test I had to pass in order to get to the next step of being able to rent the apartment. Seriously, this is becoming more and more ridiculous everyday. I almost wanted to call my mom and ask her to give me my inheritance on the house she sold now, so that I can just buy something. Although infact, I don't know if she actually set money aside for me, and I kind of don't care if she did or not. Plus I'm kind of mad at her right now so I don't feel like trying to call her. |
My short story "Invalid Item"  won the December Short Shots contest. It was kind of a wow moment in the whirlwind of apartment hunting. I'd forgotten all about that story. I'd forgotten I entered. And when I entered I didn't think I'd place, let alone win. I never win these things. It was a wake up call. In between stressing over apartments, I've been playing a lot of Skyrim (it's a computer game), to the point that yesterday I didn't even move from the couch. I wanted to write this vacation. I wanted to study wine. I wanted to be better prepared and have appointments lined up for MillésimeBio. I wanted to plan out a novel and redecorate my office (which isn't going to happen because all my money is going to an apartment once I find one) and I haven't done a damn thing but stress and play Skyrim. Last night I deleted the game. Today, I'm writing this blog and then I will either run or pack. The husband and I are going to Aix en Provence for a few days and then unofficially moving me out of Lorgues Friday evening. I don't have much. As I wrote once before, it's the scooter that's the big problem. Currently it's trapped in the cage where we lock up all the water and soft drinks at Berne and I can't get it out. But it's no matter because I still have no place to drive it. My visit to Lyon Monday resulted in nothing except me spending money. At least I found the cool café and the Indian restaurant. But in terms of finding a place to live, I thought I had one, and then the agency told me that they couldn't rent it to me because I was - brace yourself - Married. Seriously. I can't have the apartment because I'm married and have an apartment with my husband. This sent me into a rage. As it very well should. After my rage, we decided to go a different route and look at unfurnished apartments. It will mean I'm living on an air-mattress for a few months but oh well. I found two. Contacted the agency (a different one) and they seem to have no problem renting to me. So I'm currently in negotiations. The agent said she's had some trouble renting the apartment because there is only one sink (so no kitchen sink) and no real bathroom. There's just a shower that kind of gives out onto the main studio room. I said straight up I didn't care because I'm living alone and walk around naked all the time anyway. I said I couldn't come up to Lyon to visit the apartment but if she could send me some more photos that would probably be sufficient. I've seen enough apartments in my life to estimate through photos. She said that wouldn't be a problem. I don't start work until the 20th of February and people seem to think that leaves me with plenty of time. Am I crazy to be stressing that I only have 1 month to move myself out of one place and into another? I don't believe so. People seem to think I have money to burn and time to spare. Which considering I've done nothing but play computer games for two weeks it would appear that way, but is not the case. Anyway, I have received the list of documents and rental application so now I should fill all that out before I go away for the week. |
| Right around the corner from the apartment I want to rent in Lyon is this café where I'm sitting right now. It's called a slowcafé. I have no idea where this concept comes from, but you pay only for the time you are there. 5 euros the first hour and then 2 euros for each half hour after. Drinks are free. All the coffee and cookies I could want. There's even fresh fruit and you can press your own orange juice if you're feeling ambitious. I like the atmosphere. It's people working, a few chatting, but mostly calm and quiet and kind of hipster but I get it. People make fun of the hipster culture but think about it. Would you rather be stuck in a cubicle or in your tiny studio apartment or in an open space with wide picture windows and a view of the Rhône. Point hipster. So this is where I am now. If I take the apartment, or rather if my dossier is accepted, I may spend more Mondays. I visited two other apartments. One that wasn't furnished and didn't really work for me. The other was tiny. Literally tiny. And reeked of cigarette smoke. Even when I was smoking, I never smoked indoors because the odor of stale, old cigarettes is gross. I also found the most amazing Indian restaurant. Also right around the corner. All homemade, a tiny lunch buffet, perfectly spiced, and the owner was awesome. And super cheap. Whether or not I get that apartment, I will go back there every monday. Finally, after eight and a half years of searching for a good Indian restaurant in France, I can eat Indian again! Lyon is looking pretty good right now. We asked my mother in law, who used to be a financial planner for Banque de France, why it was so hard to rent an appartment, even when we earn good salaries and are responsible people with no criminal record. She said it's always been like this and it's to protect the building owner in case the renter gets sick or loses their job. I asked what people do when they retire, and she said by then you are supposed to own your own home. What do people do if they don't want to own a home? Honestly, owning my own space has never been a priority. But all that's about to change because apparently, if one day I manage to retire, I'll find myself homeless. This has always been my general complaint with France. Everyone is supposed to want the same thing. You're supposed to want to live in the coutry, but have access to the city, to have kids, to vacation in the mountains in winter and by the sea in summer, and love the beach, and own your home and your own business. It's the American dream Frenchified. And they don't quite get it when you choose a different path. You WANT to live in the city CENTER? You DONT WANT kids? You DONT like the beach? Hipster culture has not fully made its way to France. Since I can't change the way the French real estate works, I have to change myself. When my husband transfers school districts to come to Lyon, we will buy an apartment. We looked at a few last night. I found a castle for sale. Do you ever get the feeling someone is looking over your shoulder while you type ? I get that feeling all the time. Maybe it's all the free coffee. |
| And now comes that mad rush when I move. This time it's even more exciting. I live in Arles, I'm moving out of Lorgues and I'm moving to Lyon. So I have to co-ordinate between 3 cities in a country that doesn't understand infrastructure. I always say "This is the last time" and yet, here I am again. This is like the 20th time. The hardest is trying to figure out what to do with my scooter. Should I sell? Should I try to ship it? I get the feeling that shipping it isn't going to be worth it, especially because I don't yet have an address to ship it to and most companies don't want to come to Lorgues to pick it up because the village is lost in the buttcrack of Provence. And because it's a tiny scooter that doesn't go faster than 40km/hr driving it for more than 20km is out of the question. It's basically a blender with wheels. But I love it. Although if I can sell it and find an apartment close enough to work, I could use that money for my apartment, because, goddamn, I always forget what a major pain in the ass it is to rent an apartment in France. You have to prove that you have a salary 3X higher than your rent, that you have a long-term contract, that you have enough money in the bank, and if you don't someone has to co-sign. Then there's the caution, which is another 2 months of rent upfront and the frais d'agence - the fee for the realtor. In the end a studio the size of a box that costs 400euros /month is going to cost me 1600 euros. WTF? I'm stressed. Ok, I have a month to figure this out and if worse comes to worse Gaël and Annabelle said I could stay with them a few weeks, but I'd rather not impose b/c their apartment is tiny and their cat hates me. (We were all shocked by that.) WHY do I do this to myself? I'm going to explode. I need a cigarette. I told my husband that if I manage to get through this month without smoking it will be a miracle. It's only been 3 days an I already have non-stop fantasies about buying cigarettes and lighting up. I even dreamed about it last night. The nicorette gum has been non-stop. I have two visits on Monday and I hope the apartment I want works out because it's cute, livable (you'd be surprised how many apartments are so NOT livable), and not far from work. I wouldn't even need my scooter, just a bike. And then I can de-stress. Though they'll want my husband to be a co-signer because my job is new and I have a trial period, which is going to send him into a rage, because it's a lot of extra paperwork and I'm 36 with a salary 5X the rent. I MIGHT BE HOMELESS IN A BIG CITY, PEOPLE. |
| So the interview: was interesting. This isn't one of those times when I chose to use the word because I'm trying to put a polite spin on a crappy situation. It was actually interesting. The chef is a MOF or meilleur ouvrier de France which often gets confused with a Michelin star, but has nothing to do with it. You can be a MOF and not even own a restaurant. A lot of them teach. Anyway, he's a MOF with 3 traditional, upscale bistrots. He's mostly looking for an assistant maître d'hôtel that can do sommelier things. Actually, I think he does in fact want a sommelier, but doesn't know enough about what sommeliers do to understand that he wants one. Which is fine, because despite his status, his experience, his age, he seems to be the type of guy who is open to learning what it is a sommelier does. Gaël and (if I take the post,) I will be the ones to show him. Which means I have a fair amount of liberty in with the cave and the wine list. I have to check in with Gaël and the chef for the final word, but I can propose things without feeling like I'm overstepping my bounds. And the team, which I met yesterday seem like fairly good people. The maître d'hotel is around my age, family man, desperate for an assistant to help him out. He, like me, used to work for Relais Château hotels and Michelin restaurants. One of the servers as well was at a 3-star. I ate at the restaurant and saw him serving and was impressed. He's young, but a lot of potential there. (However I think I got the apprentice sommelier in trouble because the cave was a disaster and I had a very polite, though justified, fit when I saw it. And I didn't see him again for the rest of the lunch service.) There's possibility for evolution. After my two-month trial period I'll have the salary I asked for. Which is over 400 Euros more than I make now. So he's basically throwing money at me, because I asked for a rather high salary. But I did it for good reasons which I explained and he understood. There's a lot of potential. It could look good on my CV. And it's in Lyon. An actual city. A CITY with museums and culture and an opera and ballet and symphony and theater and educated people who like culture. Not just a bunch of sun-dried villagers with broken teeth and crackling voices sitting at the local bar-tabac from 10am til close smoking and drinking until they stumble home. A CITY. Hallelujah. At the same time, it remains a bistrot. That means lots of people, slightly longer hours and not the style of work that I'm used to. And let's face it, my first and only experience with a bistrot was at Rabanel and that went badly. Just all around bad. Catastrophic at times even. To the point where I question my ability to run a restaurant and manage a team. But that was Rabanel where I had no experience and only a crazy, mistrustful chef and an abusive, alcoholic maître d'hôtel to learn from and no actual normal people with any savoir-vivre. In just a few years, a lot has changed and I realize restaurants are not as hard as they seem. So, I'm waiting for my next interview on Saturday, but I am seriously considering this place. I really want to move to a big city and give it a try, I'd like a change from the stuffiness and egos of Michelin star restaurants, and if there is actual potential to do interesting wine-things, I think I could enjoy myself here because this is the type of establishment I'd like to work with and build upon. Only with more of a focus on wine. Also, I can't help but remind myself that the salary he's offering is kind of awesome. I've never been offered that much money before and I feel like I'd actually be paid properly for the amount of work I'd be doing. |
| Some years ago I realized I had a fixation with Catholicism. I still remember the day I learned about the cross and Jesus. I was around 12 or 13 in the bedroom of a friend's parents (I can't remember why, but we weren't doing anything stupid) and saw the crucifix hanging over the bed and asked some question on why someone would have such a gory sculpture of a man dying on a cross in their bedroom. My friend attempted to explain the crucifixion and the Resurrection and the Holy Trinity and while she didn't do a bad job of it, my reaction was "Seriously? Catholics believe in this insanity?" Having been raised Jewish and attended secular schools, I had never known what it was Christians believed until then. I knew that Christmas was to celebrate Jesus's birthday. I knew Easter had something to do with Jesus too, but since it was basically a reappropration of Passover with bunnies, I didn't think much of it. Later on, when I started studying music I started to study theology alongside my history and literature. If you're studying anything cultural it is impossible to not study religion. Impossible. The more involved I became with writing, with music, with history, the more in-depth I went, the more I learned about Catholicism. I've studied the Popes, I've read the Bible (front to back in two different translations including the Apocrypha and lost Gospels) and Saint Augustine and Saint Thomas Aquinas, Saint Hildegard (she was the subject for my master's thesis in music), Saint Bernard de Clairveaux, Saint François d'Assisi, and last, but not least, Thomas Merton. That's more than most Catholics. And not once, never, in my life have I believed a word of it. I've never once been tempted to convert. But I love it. I love the theology, the philosophy, the damning, the praise, the brotherhood, and the history. Why you might ask? Because the Catholic Church and by extension all Christianity has been the driving force of European Civilization since 350 AD. For better or worse, pro or anti, it has shaped everything about our culture and society, and continues to do so today. It is even the origin of our modern day thoughts on Love. Love didn't exist in literature until Catholicism. And yet, it's the most hypocritical, corrupt, convoluted, and tumultuous institution to ever exist. The Church has been a complete disaster. The religious text and philosophy is a mishmash and reappropriation of a bunch of other religions and philosophies. It literally makes no sense. The adaptation is laughable. Even Judaism and Islam had the good sense to just cut out their goddesses and pretend that they never existed. Christianity gave them names like Mary and Sophia and Ecclesia, and just assigned them to other roles in the play. It's why Christianity fascinates me so much. It's so bizarre. Why? HOW? How did this strange cult become such a driving force in our world and society? I continued to be stymied by it today. Sometimes I try to imagine what the world would have been like had we never had Christianity. Would Judaism be the predominant religion? Would Islam have ever developed? Would Europe still be divided into small, barbaric kingdoms raiding and pillaging their hearts content? What of music and literature and art? Anyway, these were mostly thoughts that sprung to mind this afternoon, since I see so much Bible-themed fluff floating around here lately. While I don't necessarily condemn or frown upon people who have such faith and write about it. I wish that most of what I see wasn't such poor writing. The spirit might move you, but maybe common sense could teach people to edit and stay away from clichés. |
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I think it's awesome that you're using that negative experience to get creative. It's hard not to just wallow when those things happen. I use a paper journal for most of my actual coping process too, but I do share bits and pieces on WDC as well.
Might try a short story a day instead. Stay safe. 
