nincompooprr

[nincompooprr]

I've been going to mass

My eyes do this really weird thing every time I walk inside a cathedral. Like they glaze over or something. I don’t know.

I haven’t thought about church or God or communion or receiving the body of Christ for a long time. ‘Body of Christ,” the priest will say once we bow our heads and approach for a wafer. Every single person. “Body of Christ.”

Nothing’s really dwelled with me since I was a kid and I was forced to go to Sunday school with my brothers. We grew up Catholic. We weren’t actually religious.

Three weeks ago I woke up one morning with the thought of potentially going the night prior. I took out my cracked phone, looked up the bus route, and calculated how much time it would take to get there. Maybe if I’m awake in time, I told myself. Why not.

So I went.

I don’t think I’ve ever sat through an adult service. That was my first thought. I walked to the middle towards the left where I thought I’d be inconspicuous enough to not be judged like hey, that girl obviously doesn’t belong here, but not too much so someone would nod and think wow, she’s got 2/3 of personal notations in The Book of Joshua.

My eyes always glaze over the moment the hymns begin. It’s nothing to do with being tired or bored. If I was bored I don't think I’d be there.

I imagine it like a fogged up camera. Or a mirror after you take a scalding shower. My eyes gloss over and I’m left staring all the way behind the altar where Jesus is hanging with his head slightly turned. He’s always looking away.

I’m comfortable. I remember asking my dad once in grade three why it felt so good to stare into space. He said it’s because you don’t have to worry about anything. You can just… Sit.

The stained glass is the only thing that isn’t sludged up like baby throw up. It’s pretty clear actually with Mary’s outstretched hands reaching for those around her. There’s a lot of people. I wonder if they feel what I’m feeling and if it’s because of her.

The glass becomes a point of clarity. If I stare intensely enough I can decipher what the choir is singing. I can get by what the priests are trying to say. There’s one guy who always reads straight from the scripture. Then another steps up to explain what he actually said.

My eyes aren’t like this the entire time. Today, the third week that I found myself there, I noticed I was squashed between two men, one on each side of me. Not actually but enough for me to notice that I didn’t like it. They breathe too loud, move too much, eyes wander. I hate it. Some of us, I told them in my head, are here for something. Some of us are in such deep shit that we’re praying for it.

The first one that sat down next to me was oddly quick at getting settled, sliding in without a word. The other? I don’t remember. I just know that I heard the most obnoxious way to clear one’s throat in the middle of the Lord’s Prayer.

Other times it’s stuff like a crying infant. Sometimes a phone buzzes or lights up. It’s always some teenager who has their message settings set to LED flash for alerts. It’s obviously for deaf people.

Things like this disrupt the experience. There’s a billion seats so why are you sitting here? Why would you bring your baby here he clearly can’t take the overwhelming incense stuffing his nose like a man coking out in a locked bathroom.

It doesn’t really matter I guess.