A dream is a wish your heart makes

As I said before, I don't believe in god. But now that he's gone, sometimes I miss him.

Yeah. I meant that. Sometimes I wish I believed in god. There are times when I could really use a hand, the kind of support you can only get with a living, personal and intimate relationship with an omnipotent being.

There are times, and they are more frequent than I'd care to admit, that I am stressed, and worried, and tired, and frustrated, and depressed, and scared, and all I want more than anything is to turn to someone for help. And there are times when a real person, someone I know, won't cut it. I'm an introvert, and generally keep to myself, so I have few friends. Having god on my side would be nice. The worst parts of me can't come out. I'm ashamed of them, and I don't want them out in the light. First of all, it might kill them, and I'm kind of fond of them, too. Secondly, I don't have a lot of close relationships, and I don't want to queer them. Some of my thoughts, fears, secret desires and actions are shameful, destructive, antisocial, self-destructive and self-indulgent, and dangerous. It's my id at work, and he's a nasty little fucker. Not much worse than anyone else's I imagine, but I find mine pretty damn seductive sometimes.

When it's darkest in my soul (A problematic word, but poetic, so it stays. We can't let religion ruin everything.), I'd like nothing better to turn to an invisible Ward Cleaver in the sky for help. He could scold me gently, because I'm misbehaving (drinking too much, contemplating infidelity, getting angry at my six-month-old daughter because she won't stop crying and go to sleep, smacking my dog on the ass because she was being a dog and therefore, this time, a pain in the ass, reading blogs and newspapers at work... The list goes on.), then smile indulgently, because I am, in fact, only human, and we all make mistakes. He could put down his pipe, and say, "Well, you should really try a little harder, but I know you will next time." Then he could take me out into the backyard and teach me how to throw a curveball.

I understand the appeal. I know why people cling to it so desperately. I wrote a few days ago about my personal experience with prayer. Remember? "No prayer goes unanswered."

One of the reasons I stopped believing was because the answer so often seemed to be, "Fuck you, buddy."

Ward Cleaver never would have said fuck you. Eddie Haskell would have.

Reaching out through the ether is about the only thing I miss. And I know that prayer is more for the prayer than the prayee: there's a soothing, rewarding feeling you get when you feel like you don't have to be in charge anymore. It's intoxicating, I'll bet. And I'm trying to train myself out of that. Every time I find myself about to pray in the dark, I remind myself what the answer was the last time I did it.

That answer came more recently than I'd care to admit to, as well.