Did you know your elementary school library has a wonderful plan for your life?
I've always had this thing about martyrs.
I somehow always knew about Stephen. I'm not Catholic, so I don't know when I found out about St. Joan. Maybe when I was six or seven or eight. But I read a book about her in the school library and it was like someone had given me a tiny encyclopedia to explain everything I would ever need to know about how my life was going to turn out. When I was in the fourth grade, I secretly wanted to grow up to be a martyr. I was a smart kid, though, and I knew I could get into trouble if I told someone about this career choice.
I did not plan to grow very much. Fourteen or fifteen was fine. See a few things, just enough of the world, then I could settle for dying. So I never thought very much about what I wanted to be when I grew up, because... well, when you're a young martyr, these kinds of details sort themselves out on their own.
But like I said, I was young. And being young, I tended to forget the more important parts of being canonized. The suffering, the struggle, and ultimately dying for something, rather than just dying.
One figures these things out over time. Fifteen years or so, and you begin to see that when the dying doesn't work out, you do have to get around to living.
Which is so much more complicated.
I somehow always knew about Stephen. I'm not Catholic, so I don't know when I found out about St. Joan. Maybe when I was six or seven or eight. But I read a book about her in the school library and it was like someone had given me a tiny encyclopedia to explain everything I would ever need to know about how my life was going to turn out. When I was in the fourth grade, I secretly wanted to grow up to be a martyr. I was a smart kid, though, and I knew I could get into trouble if I told someone about this career choice.
I did not plan to grow very much. Fourteen or fifteen was fine. See a few things, just enough of the world, then I could settle for dying. So I never thought very much about what I wanted to be when I grew up, because... well, when you're a young martyr, these kinds of details sort themselves out on their own.
But like I said, I was young. And being young, I tended to forget the more important parts of being canonized. The suffering, the struggle, and ultimately dying for something, rather than just dying.
One figures these things out over time. Fifteen years or so, and you begin to see that when the dying doesn't work out, you do have to get around to living.
Which is so much more complicated.