Fic number four: Slander
Sep. 18th, 2007 12:14 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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mash_slashTitle: Slander
Author: Qzeebrella
Fandom: M*A*S*H
Category: slash
Rating: G
Pairing: Hawkeye/Trapper implied, Hawkeye/Sidney
Summary: Sidney reflects on how his beliefs have changed over time.
Disclaimer: The show and its characters belong to Larry Gelbart, 20th Television Fox, CBS and Richard Hooker. No profit is being made from this story and no infringement is intended.
"Part One, Guilt" and "Part two, Betrayed" and “Part three, Robbery”
***
Hawkeye asked me why it is I never speak of personal beliefs. Why it is that I rarely speak of my faith. Well, I rarely speak of it because I’m never quite sure what to say at any particular time in order to convey what it is I believe without slandering myself. For my belief is a growing thing that changes over time.
I was raised to believe in the traditions and taken to temple on occasion. I came to see G_d as just someone we visited on special occasions in much the same way we visited great uncle Herschel. I even thought G_d might look a bit like him when I was a young child.
Then my parents enrolled me in Hebrew school and I began to learn the history associated with the holidays we observed. I began to be taught the Talmud and Torah, began to be expected to know the reason behind the traditions we kept as a family and I began to see G_d as an invisible teacher and a guiding hand. Someone I could turn to when I needed help. Someone whose influence could be as subtle as a gentle breeze.
However, that slowly changed as I approached adolescence. Hebrew school began to be the time I could get to know the cute boy a little bit better. A time to visit my friends and scoff at all the old-fashioned ways of our parents. Holidays began to be the time I was dragged to see annoying relatives who would pinch my cheeks and treat me as a child. Traditions became things I HAD to do to please my parents as opposed to something I wanted to observe. G_d became a stern, far off figure that was increasingly becoming meaningless to me.
College was a time of new-found independence and I used it to push at the boundaries. For the most part holidays and traditions were ignored in favour of spending time with friends. The only exceptions being Yom Kippur and Passover. The first I observed because I still believed that there was a small chance that G_d existed and knew that I had sins I needed to atone for. The other because it was the one time a year I was sure I would see my extended family as I grew up and family was, and still is, important to me.
I was learning all sorts of new things, some of them even through my classes. Many of these new things forced me to examine my inner self. Forced me to learn who exactly I was and what it is I would do with myself for the rest of my life. At this time in my life, G_d was an afterthought. Someone I only recalled a few times a year. Someone who was as unknown and unimportant to me as any stranger.
Once out of college, my beliefs changed again. Partly because I had different responsibilities and partly because things happened that forced me to do a lot of self-examination. Things such as great uncle Herschel passing away, followed by my father and one cousin. Things like my sister marrying a goy. Things like losing patients through suicide or worse. G_d became someone I thought of frequently. Someone whose intentions I questioned even as I reached out for comfort and reassurance. He became real to me again, as real as great uncle Herschel had been. But he was a stranger and I didn’t really understand who he was.
However it became important to me to see if I could find out what he thought through examining the teachings and meditating on what I learned. It became important to me to follow the traditions because they had helped to form the man I had become. It became important to me to honour G_d because G_d had honoured me by providing me with life.
This war has brought about new changes to my beliefs. It has caused me to ask questions that have no easy answers. It has forced me to face the darkest parts of my psyche and then left me to see if I could learn to live with them. It has shaken up all my foundations and I’m still not sure what it is I will become once the dust has settled. It has left me unsure of what it is I believe now, if anything.
There are days when I believe G_d is as real as I am and infinitely more complex. There are days in which I’m certain that man’s inhumanity to man demonstrates that He does not exist and never has. There are moments in which I’m convinced that G_d is wrathful, petty and cruel. Then in the next moment I believe He is glorious, compassionate and forgiving. I have gone from believing that the traditions are meaningless to being convinced they are vital, in the same day. I have gone from seeing the holidays as a sacred time to praise G_d to seeing them as just another day in the year and back again. Though I do admit that I have added Hanukah as one of the holidays I celebrate due to Hawkeye believing it is important to do so and the fact that I don’t mind getting eight gifts from him, and giving him eight in return.
If you asked me today what it is I believe in, I would tell you that I believe faith is a living thing that changes over time. I would say that one’s faith is incredibly personal and sometimes impossible to put into words. I’d tell you that I believe god exists and that he is someone you can turn to for help. I’d explain how important the holidays and traditions are to me as a Jew and then, tomorrow, I would have to accuse myself of slander for all I said today. For my beliefs may very well change by then or will change shortly and all because of what I may have seen in connection to this war. Or maybe just because I re-examined my beliefs by explaining how they’ve changed over time. Or maybe just because I was bored.
Author: Qzeebrella
Fandom: M*A*S*H
Category: slash
Rating: G
Pairing: Hawkeye/Trapper implied, Hawkeye/Sidney
Summary: Sidney reflects on how his beliefs have changed over time.
Disclaimer: The show and its characters belong to Larry Gelbart, 20th Television Fox, CBS and Richard Hooker. No profit is being made from this story and no infringement is intended.
"Part One, Guilt" and "Part two, Betrayed" and “Part three, Robbery”
***
Hawkeye asked me why it is I never speak of personal beliefs. Why it is that I rarely speak of my faith. Well, I rarely speak of it because I’m never quite sure what to say at any particular time in order to convey what it is I believe without slandering myself. For my belief is a growing thing that changes over time.
I was raised to believe in the traditions and taken to temple on occasion. I came to see G_d as just someone we visited on special occasions in much the same way we visited great uncle Herschel. I even thought G_d might look a bit like him when I was a young child.
Then my parents enrolled me in Hebrew school and I began to learn the history associated with the holidays we observed. I began to be taught the Talmud and Torah, began to be expected to know the reason behind the traditions we kept as a family and I began to see G_d as an invisible teacher and a guiding hand. Someone I could turn to when I needed help. Someone whose influence could be as subtle as a gentle breeze.
However, that slowly changed as I approached adolescence. Hebrew school began to be the time I could get to know the cute boy a little bit better. A time to visit my friends and scoff at all the old-fashioned ways of our parents. Holidays began to be the time I was dragged to see annoying relatives who would pinch my cheeks and treat me as a child. Traditions became things I HAD to do to please my parents as opposed to something I wanted to observe. G_d became a stern, far off figure that was increasingly becoming meaningless to me.
College was a time of new-found independence and I used it to push at the boundaries. For the most part holidays and traditions were ignored in favour of spending time with friends. The only exceptions being Yom Kippur and Passover. The first I observed because I still believed that there was a small chance that G_d existed and knew that I had sins I needed to atone for. The other because it was the one time a year I was sure I would see my extended family as I grew up and family was, and still is, important to me.
I was learning all sorts of new things, some of them even through my classes. Many of these new things forced me to examine my inner self. Forced me to learn who exactly I was and what it is I would do with myself for the rest of my life. At this time in my life, G_d was an afterthought. Someone I only recalled a few times a year. Someone who was as unknown and unimportant to me as any stranger.
Once out of college, my beliefs changed again. Partly because I had different responsibilities and partly because things happened that forced me to do a lot of self-examination. Things such as great uncle Herschel passing away, followed by my father and one cousin. Things like my sister marrying a goy. Things like losing patients through suicide or worse. G_d became someone I thought of frequently. Someone whose intentions I questioned even as I reached out for comfort and reassurance. He became real to me again, as real as great uncle Herschel had been. But he was a stranger and I didn’t really understand who he was.
However it became important to me to see if I could find out what he thought through examining the teachings and meditating on what I learned. It became important to me to follow the traditions because they had helped to form the man I had become. It became important to me to honour G_d because G_d had honoured me by providing me with life.
This war has brought about new changes to my beliefs. It has caused me to ask questions that have no easy answers. It has forced me to face the darkest parts of my psyche and then left me to see if I could learn to live with them. It has shaken up all my foundations and I’m still not sure what it is I will become once the dust has settled. It has left me unsure of what it is I believe now, if anything.
There are days when I believe G_d is as real as I am and infinitely more complex. There are days in which I’m certain that man’s inhumanity to man demonstrates that He does not exist and never has. There are moments in which I’m convinced that G_d is wrathful, petty and cruel. Then in the next moment I believe He is glorious, compassionate and forgiving. I have gone from believing that the traditions are meaningless to being convinced they are vital, in the same day. I have gone from seeing the holidays as a sacred time to praise G_d to seeing them as just another day in the year and back again. Though I do admit that I have added Hanukah as one of the holidays I celebrate due to Hawkeye believing it is important to do so and the fact that I don’t mind getting eight gifts from him, and giving him eight in return.
If you asked me today what it is I believe in, I would tell you that I believe faith is a living thing that changes over time. I would say that one’s faith is incredibly personal and sometimes impossible to put into words. I’d tell you that I believe god exists and that he is someone you can turn to for help. I’d explain how important the holidays and traditions are to me as a Jew and then, tomorrow, I would have to accuse myself of slander for all I said today. For my beliefs may very well change by then or will change shortly and all because of what I may have seen in connection to this war. Or maybe just because I re-examined my beliefs by explaining how they’ve changed over time. Or maybe just because I was bored.
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