ride 3 (Michael, Salt Lake)

Turned out, Michael and Sue were really good for me. He had a degree in Sociology. I had never heard of that subject before, but he explained to me that it was a subject about how people related to each other. He explained to me, that what had happened to me was normal considering the kind of community I came from. I didn't know what about it should be normal and I never heard of coming from any other kind of community, but there was something about the way he said what he said, that planted the seed in my mind that perhaps there was something natural and expected about what had happened to me. Maybe there is a kind of pressure that is unique to closed communities, like the one I came from, that could make it quite difficult for a person to be their own person and feel their own feelings and solidify their own beliefs. Yes, this realization was probably the first step to a small amount of self acceptance that I craved so badly. Until then, I had been completely consumed with self loathing for having failed at achieving the goal that I had been striving for, for so long. Can you think of anything more despicable? I had been doing all I can do, to achieve God's love and respect amongst my friends and I failed at that. I had done everything wrong and I got everything wrong. Something must be terribly wrong with me. That's all I could think. Now, after Michael explained to me, that it would be natural for people to feel under pressure in a community where everyone was the same, my self loathing loosed, just a bit. I had begun, the extraordinary long process towards realizing that I was not entirely insane. Perhaps, I had just made a mistake. Perhaps, it's not only me, that's the problem here.