If the bra's too tight, buy a new one.

When I started college, I knew that along with my toothbrush, favorite blow-dryer, trusty bed quilt, and textbooks, I had also packed God with me. In fact, I knew that I needed a sense of spiritual connection at that time more than I’ve ever needed it before. What I didn’t know was how frustrating it would be to keep this connection once classes started and I began to lose my mind in a world of authority telling me I needed to work harder and suck it up already. I still prayed (thanks to my first music theory class). I still thought that I was doing the right thing by continuing to be Christian in college. I still believed that harbored somewhere under all of my insecurities, Christ was still lurking, waiting to guide me in my seemingly obscure life.

In Sunday school at the United Methodist Church I was raised in, I would always try to think up really tricky questions for my Sunday school teachers. I tried desperately, even as I child to find cracks in what they were saying. I would ask why we even needed church. I could pray at home just as easily as I could sitting in our Methodist church (usually while grimacing at the hideous blood red 1960’s carpet that coated the entire sanctuary-and pew covers). To be honest, going to church for fellowship didn’t really make a whole lot of sense to me until I went to college.

Being religious at home was fairly simple. Pray. Think. Love. That was it. I figured that once I moved to a different town to start my education it would be pretty simple. I would still be a Christian and I would just hook up with some Methodist church I found from the Google search. Besides, going to church was just a side note in my spirituality. And somehow, in my naïve little head I still thought it would be simple and painless and easy. Easy like buying a new bra. Hey, that one looks nice and it looks fairly comfortable and I really like that color. Is that lace? I bet its supportive (feeling the straps), ah yes, it is. Is that too much padding? I don’t want to feel too attractive when my fifty year old professor calls on me tomorrow morning (ugh, awkward). I hope it’ll be durable enough to withstand the hell it will be subjected to in the dryer each week, but we’ll figure it out as we go along. Alright, it’s a winner. See? Simple and (almost) painless.

So I went to the first Methodist church I found on Google search. I dressed up, I dusted off my bible, hopped in the car and, thanks to the inaccuracy of my map quest directions, got there with seconds to spare. I sat down (alone, another feeling I had to come to terms with later in the quest) and the service started. Everything felt okay for the first few minutes. Then, while we were singing the first hymn, a very bizarre feeling started to come over me. It came out of nowhere, like when you realize in the middle of the night that you forgot to buy sour cream at the grocery store. I had definitely felt it before though I was unsure where and how and I knew it never had anything to do with religion before this exact moment. Then, I pegged it. I felt like I had been tricked. Dooped. Booby-trapped. This didn’t feel right! In fact, it wasn’t right at all! My bra was the wrong size! Somehow I had picked up the 34A on accident! What a nightmare! I didn’t like this church. I didn’t like it at all. I thought in my panic-stricken mind, it said Methodist on the front door, right? It felt like a Methodist church, but suddenly it wasn’t right anymore. It wasn’t what I wanted in a service anymore. It wasn’t who I wanted to be anymore. I wasn’t sixteen, sitting happily in my adult Sunday School class discussing the contents of Revelation. I didn’t know what I even thought about religion. I sure as hell wasn’t Methodist anymore. What were they even preaching about? I don’t remember. I wasn’t paying attention because I was no longer interested. Where is this coming from, I thought? I knew I was still a Christian but I was not longer Methodist. I was liquid JELLO that was poured pre-maturely out of its Bundt-pan mold. And I wasn’t going back in.

And right then I knew it. This was going to be frustrating and tedious and exhausting. I had to start over. Figure out which JELLO mold I truly belonged in. I felt scared and the most uncertain I’ve ever felt about my faith. The status quo had changed.

And so the quest began.