Brainwashing

Okay, one of my friends just ran smack into this, so I should probably explain that it's there.

This does NOT mean that I'm depressed. Actually, I'm fairly happy and well-balanced. That's what makes this kind of scary.

We're inundated with a couple different messages. One is that we're not worth much, we're all grunts, all the same, any one of us can fill in for another at any given time. Another is that anyone on the outside has forgotten us, those relationships aren't real, they have their own lives to move on with and don't remember you. This second one is to make us more cohesive - if the outside relationships don't matter, the ones on the inside matter even more.

There are obvious counters to these. The most obvious one in my life is my family - my parents and sisters - followed by three friends and a sizable chunk of my Camp family. My parents and sisters have been AMAZING about supporting me - I'm able to talk with them every week, they think of me, pray for me (this is big), send me mail (also big), and there's really no way that I could think that they've forgotten me.

The value thing holds out against that. I retain the idea that these people who haven't forgotten me still love me not for anything I have to offer, but in spite of the fact that I DON'T really have anything, and they still take pleasure in me. It's a cool way to love, when that's what's really going on. Pretty much based on the way God loves us.

I was watching Charade on Sunday (why? Because I love Audrey Hepburn. I always end up identifying with her characters. The guys were having a pre-game LAN party, the girls were upstairs watching a movie), and ended up texting a friend over the question of whether a woman's trust was worth $250,000. He answered that you couldn't put price on it. Later that week, I told him that I felt like I was worth about $250, maybe $280 on a good day. Not "woe-is-me," just the fact. The grand total of everything I thought I brought to the table. And the scary bit was that I was content with that. I wasn't sad, or down on myself. I even remember justifying, "Hey, $250 is a lot in some countries! Do you know how many people out there live on less than $2 a day?!"

We're not depressed (well, for the most part. Some people really are, but that's because we're in Great Lakes, which depresses everybody). We believe these teachings as the parameters of our world, and we approach that world with the same attitude that we came to the last one. Mine is one of quirky pluck, random cheer. This is the way the world is, okay, I'm going to be happy in it.

And generally that works FINE. Until a friend randomly messages me with something cool that reminded him of me, and I realize that he HASN'T forgotten me, DOES still love me and see me as having value, and suddenly everything I know is called into question.

So, if you and I someday reunite, and I seem a little weird, it's probably not that I'm not happy to see you; I just had no idea that you'd be happy to see ME.