The Kids at the Back Table

I went home this weekend and had a chance to speak to my baby sister.

She, in times past, has compared my faith tradition to the kids who sat at the back table during high school. I, in times past, have taken great offense to it.

But now I have begun to wonder whether she is onto something. We convert UUs have felt different and isolated our whole lives. Pun intended. We tend to be a faith of loners, discontents, and melancholics. And that's much to our detriment. We didn't fit in anyway, but we fit in together because we didn't fit in anywhere else.

I certainly was one of the kids who sat at the back tables during lunch.

And, I, for one, am beginning to emerge from my angst and my haze of post-modern existential crisis and realize that I need something more concrete. I don't need creedal requirements or dogma or restrictions, but I need something concrete. UUism is highly abstract and that's fine for discussion, but I can't wrap my arms around it. I can't use any of my five senses to contextualize it.

The closer I get to 30, the more I need something concrete and the less concerned I am with trying to not fit in to the mainstream. It just doesn't matter anymore. Who cares? Who gives a shit?

I'm exploring Buddhism and I hope it brings me what I need.