Editor's Note: In response to the complaint that my blogs are too long, I've decided to make them longer. My job sucks, I do nothing all day but "cell" phones (get it? cell/sell? that's my job in a nutshell), so this blog is all i have left. At least I'm not writing lengthy, detailed reviews of digital cameras and fish lenses like that asian dude with a blog on this site.
One of the most pressing challenges in the months after moving in with a girlfriend is finding the proper time to spend on your internet pornography hobby. When living alone, one can enjoy a romp in the internet bed anytime one cared to. The laptop was always present, inviting you to peak into the bedroom window of Carla or Brittany, or Carla and Brittany, as they enjoyed each other's lovely feminine talents. Now, however, there are certain discretions I must take -- namely, not to visit tight-teens.com while my girlfriend watches the Golden Globes. So, it follows, I took advantage this past Saturday when Jillian was called into the office unexpectedly, leaving me alone in an apartment that just happened to have an internet connection.
A quick note about our new apartment: It faces directly across from a 150 year-old Catholic church, named St. Charles. The two large bay windows are consumed by this church, which hovers over the apartment like an angry priest shaking his sausage-like fingers and berating me for a lifetime of sin. It is certainly not the image I care to have staring upon me as I venture into the ever-present world of sin, populated by lesbians, big tits, and deep throat blow jobs. Something about seeing a woman take a hot load on her face and sun-filled stained glass windows simply doesn't mix.
To combat this problem, I approached the windows and drew our thick, mustard-brown curtains to a close. God may be able to see all, but the clergy of St. Charles certainly didn't have to. I was just getting settled, and had paid a visit to my favorite site (URL available upon request), the beginnings of intercourse playing across my screen, when I heard the thick, skull-rattling sound of heavy bells. I had forgotten that twice a day -- at noon and 6 P.M. -- St. Charles rings their bells for several minutes, apparently to remind everyone within earshot that they are evil sinners. I could block out the site of the church with curtains. But how was I to block out the sound of bells? I quickly realized, just as with images, the sound of a woman moaning "fuck my ass" isn't a nice accompaniment to Catholic church bells. It is was as if God was intentionally trying to make a point to me. Upon reflection, it was the most telling, cumulative religious experience I've had in years. Never at one moment had the polarities of my life played out in such a poetically symbolic sensory experience. One one hand, we had the ultimate sin - sex, pornography, lust, and really, really large tits with even bigger areolas. On the other hand, we had untainted purity - a 150 year-old church, holy bells, the 12 stations of the cross, and a very-prone-to-religious-guilt 31 year-old remedial Catholic.
For better or for worse, there was no chance of me continuing to appreciate the internet porn sites I was desiring to visit. Watching a MILF double-pump her co-workers on hot-secretaries.com was falling short now, as the memories of an innocent youth conflicted with the realities of a corrupted adulthood. I've spent the bulk of my adulthood trying to incorporate the need for pornography with the need for religion. But the time had come to see if I could join them as one. There was only one solution: Put down the laptop and head to my first Catholic mass in over three years.
The simultaneously amazing and disheartening virtue of Catholic church is its total lack of change. Walking through the thick oak doors of St. Charles, I found myself comforted that everything seemed just as I had remembered. The empty pews, the high percentage of elderly people, the high arching ceilings, the organ, the crucifix. Seating myself behind the youngest person I could find, I found myself feeling self-conscious, as if everyone in church knew I hadn't been in years. As if everyone knew I had just been looking at porn. As if Jesus was going to climb off the large cross above the altar, and slap me with his thick wooden hands. I also felt like an amateur, despite the fact I was once an altar-boy (the Catholic version of a cabana-boy), and had attended a Catholic University. Had everything changed? Would I be exposed?
No, nothing has changed. Mass is the same. The smells are the same. Even the words are the same. You have to give it to the Catholic church - they've been able to keep true to what they think works for centuries. It isn't the best policy for attracting young new talent, but at least it's consistent.
As the mass progressed, I recognized an amazing transformation had taken place: I wasn't feeling any guilt. Attending mass in the past was a feeding frenzy for my guilty thoughts. I sat there for an hour, memories of sins shooting throughout my skull like lottery balls. I swore too much, masturbated too much, drank too much, didn't give enough money to charity, didn't pray enough, wasn't thankful enough. Now, however, I was comfortable, enjoying the mass, appreciating the lack of acerbic logic and fanatical devotion to logic that dominates life in the outside world. The feeling of comfort and something higher I have craved since I stopped going to church. I was sold on St. Charles.
As I walked out of mass, and shook hands with the priest with the same hand that would soon be typing in a sinful URL, I finally came to peace with two divergent elements of my past: church and sex. Ultimately, I have realized they can both fit in your life, albeit, I'd recommend not at the same time.