In the Clouds

It wasn’t until I was over 40 that I really stopped and listened to “Both Sides Now” by Joni Mitchell. It’s just as well, because I needed to be that old to understand it from experience rather than imagination. I suppose that’s pretty close to the theme of the lyrics: the difference between the fantasies we imagine we’re entering into as we stroll through life versus the realities behind the curtain as life comes crashing down. If you haven’t heard it or haven’t heard it in awhile, here’s a refresher:

I have a whole playlist of what I call “church breakup songs.” I only just realized that this should be on it, because it captures the way the breakup just doesn’t ever feel final, as much as it effectively is. [ALERT: well-meaning Christian lurkers hoping this is that thin thread of hope that I might return to the Church, I promise you that is NOT what I’m saying; please don’t tell me you’re praying for it to happen, thank you and fare-thee-well.]

What I do mean is that to label myself an atheist just doesn’t ring true to how it feels to go through this world. (And agnostic sounds like a food allergy or something, and I’m just not going to think of myself thusly.) It’s so scientific sounding, and I’m just not that. I don’t really want a label, actually. I don’t want to define myself according to what I’m not or what I no longer am in relation to a religious movement that went way too far a long time ago.

But, Adam, this entire doomsletter is you defining yourself as deconstructing from the Holy and Pure Faith of the Church of Our Lord Jesus Christ in Heaven.

Thank you, sarcastic evangelical voice in my head, but that is just one little journey I’m on, one thread of an elaborate braid of journeys I’m on. It’s not how I define myself, it’s how I describe where I’m at.

Speaking of where I’m at, where the hell was I? Oh yeah, “Both Sides Now.”

The gorgeous, poignant song structure of “Both Sides Now” encapsulates my relationship with believing in God. Maybe this is the only way I can put it:

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when publishedLove and doves and virgin birth,Miracles and peace on earth,The sacrifice my soul was worth . . .I looked at God that way.But now his word's a hateful game.They're changing money in his name.The fears and jeers, Amazing Shame.There's nothing left to pray.I've looked at God from both sides now.From hope and hell and still somehowIt's God's illusions I recall.I really don't know God at all.

I guess that says it. I still feel compelled to pray before family meals. I still expect there to be life after death. I can’t shake the feeling that there’s an entire immaterial world around us we cannot see . . . yet.

I really don’t know. Like, at all.