Things that have been part 1

I think it began in a relatively early age.  I remember not believing into stories of my Sunday-school teacher in the age of five.  I remember sitting by my desk in the first grade, our teacher asking us to draw something that we first think about when someone mentions for example gymnastics or religious studies, things we had began learning just then.  I drew tears and rain for the religion-part, cemeteries and crosses.  It was my vision of Christianity.  

I asked to be placed on a non-religious studygroup instead.  I was seven or eight years old by then.  My parents and the school disagreed and told me, that I could do that after six years, when I got into junior high.  I actually counted the days.

In fourth grade I was best friends with a deeply religious girl.  She and her whole family held Christ really close and I wanted to belong, I was curious.  I read the bible, I listened to gospel, I prayed.  I tried really hard but it just felt so phony- well, it wasn't really my piece of cake.

In the time of junior high I was 13, and still denied the access to non-religious studies of ethics and non-Christian point of view to the world's religions.  On the next year, the excuse was that we were about to attend the world of Church's history and art, and as my teacher put the case, "you'll be left out of so huge part of general knowledge if you don't study these things, that you'll be left stupid".  So I had no choice but to stay.  

Yes, I was sad and pissed off in the beginning.  I was on my teens and I was anxious to move forward and get rid of this whole burden.  My parents never saw the depth of my anxiousness and most likely refused to see the craving I had for learning and I don't blame them.  I can imagine plenty of kids trying to swap boring religious studies to something alternative just for the fun, but I don't think it was the case with me to begin with.