The Life of Lou Ruppert

I had a great day today. I slept in until around 8am. I studied Arabic vocab until the noon church service today, and then I hung out with the people who wanted to hang out afterwards. We have an odd cliquishness amongst some of the people I know, which unfortunately played out today when the pastor couldn’t make it out to lunch. I won’t get into my opinions on cliquishness, since I’m trying to keep this positive. But what I will say is that it was a lot of fun, and very liberating to just have people around me who wanted to have fun, who don’t center their lives around a person or subset of persons, who were only interested in sharing the day with others, regardless of who they are, or who they know. We got our food quicker with 1/3 of the people missing. We all mixed with each other and enjoyed our time without being scolded away from empty seats or trying to connect with people who are too busy craning their heads to see what is at the other table.

OK, maybe I will say something about cliquishness and exclusivity: I don’t understand it. I’ve never needed a particular person to be around in order to be happy. Even when I’ve been in serious committed dating relationships, I’ve always been able to find fulfillment in whatever group of people I happened to find myself with. I guess in a way I feel sorry for people who live lives so limited that they never try anything new, who stagnate in the company of only those people who think exactly as they do. I’m thankful I’m a recovering nerd who always hung out with whoever would have me, because now I’m that “whoever” to anyone else who may need me.

So, today I feel kind of connected with Jesus. He was that “whoever” guy to a lot of total freaks. In fact the only “presentable” “important” people we read about in his life were the people who ended up betraying him. So, in that sense, I’d have to say that this was the best Good Friday ever.