Jim Stitzel
Jack-of-All-Trades, Master of WordsExcerpts from Life
That Time I Tried to Reclaim My Faith
Right after my first hospitalization and subsequent separation from my ex-wife in 2016, I made an attempt to reclaim my former faith. Up to this point, I had been a reluctant atheist, and I was still struggling through the ramifications of my lost faith, my lost sense...
I Am a Changeling
So, in publishing that thing to my blog yesterday, I kinda suddenly realized shortly after that I don’t really consider myself an atheist anymore. I’ve started to come to think of myself as some kind of spiritual changeling who’s trying to figure out its final form,...
I Never Wanted To Be an Atheist
Trigger warning: discussion of suicidal ideation and mental health inpatient treatment I never wanted to be an atheist. It was never something that I chose. It was something that happened to me, over the course of more than a decade. The irony of this is that it was...
Fiction
Critter
I have a sinking sensation in the pit of my stomach. That's where it lives. The critter, if you can call it that. It burrowed into my torso, and it took up residence there. All I can see of it is its mouth, sticking out of my abdomen, and it is insatiably hungry. I...
Crow
The crow talks to me. It sits on the road sign, with its black eyes, its black beak, and its black feathers, and it speaks to me. I don’t understand the words — they’re in bird, of course. But the words come, all the same. They take up space inside my mind,...
Pain
The lingering pain. It's all I can think about. It dwells in my consciousness like an open wound, even though there is no injury to be found. It's like fire in my flesh, a deep, crippling fury that makes me lose my sanity at times. I never should have made a deal with...