I do want to clarify that I do indeed know that not every guy who comes in our back door (at our house friends usually use the back door.) is here on some covert operation to "check us out." Now everyone is probably paranoid to visit us. heheh. Actually that thought comes from countless courtship articles that I've read (how amazingly pathetic that I could read so many books/articles and be so lost, huh?) Actually, I don't think anyone has. How sad. We aren't as in demand as I might like to believe.

Anyway, I think a lot of my antagonism comes from just a general feeling that I am moving in a lot of areas and I want to know really what I think and why. I think for a good while my spiritual life was kind of stymied because I kind of came at things from a conservative-good, liberal-bad sort of view point.  When I went into the homeschooling culture I went in whole hog and the only other family we knew who were doing it made Mennonites look wild. That isn't hyperbole. I consumed a lot of homeschooling magazines and books and analyzing every little thing, threw away the TV,  wore jumpers, and really, really tried to fit in with the whole uber-conservative homeschool crowd. We even visited a Mennonite church once. But I could never really feel like it was me, or that it all belonged to me. Some of it did, and still does. I still love reading to my kids, I still homeschool, all that... But I also have to admit things that some of those people I knew then would find shocking. Like that when the Talking Heads come on, I turn it up really loud. I ALWAYS hated how I felt in the dresses. They always made me feel fat..I wore them completely out of trying to do what God wanted... (well, and it was my little protest sign for myself in Portland that I wasn't going along with the whole "question gender" type thing... and in Portland if you have more than 3 kids you either belong to one of two groups-welfare addict or religious freak. Neither is very well looked upon in Portland, but if I was going to have to be one or the other....)

Anyway I think I felt a lot of guilt over things that I didn't need to feel guilty about. Some of the things I took on I did because I was convinced and some things I did because it seemed like that was the thing to do... And I think in a lot of areas I'm just questioning things. I don't want to knee jerk in the other direction and just be liberal for liberal's sake either. I want to be "convinced in my own mind"..

Maybe *I'm* the one looking for an iron clad guarantee that I'm doing everything right and that all the out comes rest with me. Because if I didn't admit that the whole idea of making a mistake terrifies me, I would be a liar. But I suppose all the risks involved are meant to drive us to prayer, and believe me, I do.