Innocence Lost

Note: This is part 1 of a long term journey of sharing my testimony. My testimony is graphic, and I would recommend not reading it if you do not want to hear plain truth. Mom and Dad don't need to read this stuff.

Young.

Far too young.

Just a few short months before were defined by innocence. Dirt on my hands, life in my eyes, playful innocence. Baseball in the "big leagues," catching frogs, and climbing trees innocence.

It left too soon.

I can't say whether I was 10 or 12, I was ageless, alive.

The first time changed all that. My eyes floated somewhere new, and it was art. Art at its most beautiful, most breathtaking.

Fixated.

Then curiosity bloomed, opening slowly in the quiet, but growing more bold and vibrant always. This soul thirsted for something unknown.

And in the search for beauty I would not be stopped. I went to that new invention, that Al Gore created Web of the Whole Wide World. Long before parents heard of filters, before password protection and "You Must Be 18 to Enter", I found beauty.

I did not yet know that I had also lost that most precious art already alive within me.

Innocence Lost.

Next Tuesday will be part 2.