Thursday, February 15, 2007

Welcome to the club - Part II

I don't really want to become a member of the club. I'm sure this much is clear by now. At least not in the club's terms. In my mind, I'm already a member. I have been for a long time. What is membership? Is it feeling like you belong? Or is it being told you belong?

You know, there are other clubs that are very similar to the club I have been talking about. Some of the rules of membership are different along with the way the club members express their membership but, ultimately, they're the same. In fact, these clubs are just smaller contingencies of a much larger organization. Ironically, a lot of the time it's easier to belong to the parent organization than it is to belong to one of the various clubs that fall underneath it. There seems to be less hoops to jump through. For some reason, the clubs require commitments and certain behaviors that the parent organization doesn't even require. I'm not convinced that the parent organization even endorses these hoops.

So, I can be part of the larger group but not the smaller club that derives its existence from that larger group. I can represent the parent organization but I can't fully represent the club. Not unless, of course, I agree to lay aside privelages held to be controversial by the club. Privelages that they will tell you are not "wrong" just not what's in the best interest of anyone who would officially represent the club. Why do I feel like I'm less than enough by adhering to the policies of the parent ogranization? How can I belong without actually belonging? Why do I feel like this is some type of polite caste system?

"You belong, just not as much as these people belong. Don't take it the wrong way though. You're fine as you are. Keep up what you've been doing. There's nothing wrong with that. You're just not membership material, but if you......"

Does that make any sense at all? I wasn't going to but I think I need to stop here and pick up in Part III.

3 comments:

Jim said...

erik,

If you want I can create a key, kind of like a glossary of all the hidden meanings to your encoded posts about Easte.. opps I mean the "club". haha

Sandy said...

Well....maybe the only way to hope to invoke any change in the club is to become a member, be a fresh voice. Remember, no blood or first born children are required as payment & its only a lifetime membership if you want it to be. Please, join the club, it needs you. At least then you can say you tried.

c'est la vie said...

Part I -
Before I read this blog and feel guilty for the joke I was going to make before it got all serious...

:)

...I'm going to say this...the whole "W.W.J.D" is not quite as literal as maybe you've read into it. You aren't supposed to try to look like him. Just do like him! (hehe. referencing the awesome facial hair in pic w/ smooching wife).