Do you feel rage that never feels random, but never serves a purpose?

What wrath is, and isn't.

If my writings are for you, know this:
* You aren't crazy, the world is.
* You aren't bad, you're deeply wounded.
* You're not stuck or lazy, you're injured so severely you can't move.
* Much of the shame and guilt you feel is grief.
* You may have never felt real, healthy, love.
* You are not alone, God cannot be taken from you.

I once lived in an apartment complex. While walking back from getting my mail, I saw wet ground near one of the transformers for the complex. These were pad-mount transformers, 250kv. As I approached, the smell of diesel fuel was strong. I saw a pool of oil on the ground behind the transformer. For those who don't know, transformers like these are filled with oil in order to do two jobs: 1) cool the transfomer (by transferring heat from the coils inside to the heatsinks on the exterior) 2) Prevent fires.

So, walking around a transformer and seeing the 'safety oil' on the outside is real bad. It'd be like walking out to your car and finding all the engine oil on the ground. Or walking up to your wife and finding all their blood on the ground. It serves a VERY important purpose. As important as blood. I called the power company's emergency line and submitted a ticket with the complex (it was after hours, so nobody handled the ticket until the next day). 3 hours later, some linemen came out to look at the transformers. They agreed it was bad, and promised that 'they had it'. They told me a hazmat team would be out to clean up the oil. I moved on with my life.

Two weeks later, I go to get my mail again, and half the complex has no power. I walk by the transformers I saw leaking oil (there was more than one) and the soil near both transformers had not been disturbed at all. And the oil stains on the ground were still present.

I used to get angry. So terribly angry. Never without a reason. I always knew why I was angry. There was always a cause. But my anger felt so much more intense than it 'should have'. You read a story about a cop beating up some old woman and most people say 'man, that's wrong' but for me, that was a wound on a spiritual level. Because those cops are, clearly, not effectively punished. Let me ask you, before you dismiss me as a cop hater, if your child is effectively punished for being a bully, why do you get a report from the school every year that they beat someone up? Why does that keep happening? Effective punishment discourages misbehavior BEFORE it happens, by instilling a cost in the individual so great that they dare not incur a punishment. It does what we now call 'self-censorship' on platforms like Youtube. Where people will say 'sewerslide' or 'brushing their teeth with a shotgun' instead of the actual word. Because the actual word would get their video demonetized. That's what effective punishment does.

Do I agree with Youtube's restrictions? No. But that's a different story. What filled me, in that moment, seeing that oil still on the ground, was wrath. The sort of wrath you read about in Exodus 33. "you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live". "But God is love!" God is many things, and you cannot have love without justice. It is not love to let your child do whatever they want. You must punish their bad behavior. It is not love to pretend everything is fine when it isn't, sometimes it is love to exile, or show them reduced love, for a time. And that love, taken to its extreme, is a bit like Judge Dredd. It cannot look upon evil and allow it to exist. It must destroy it.

That is the sort of wrath I feel. But I am keenly aware that I am not God. I do not have the mandate to flip the tables in the temple. What I can do, however, is stand and refuse to lie about what I see, and what I feel. I can explain to everyone who listens, as they wander around wondering why the lights are out, that this outage was completely preventable, and show them the proof of my words. I can make sure they are not lied to.

Learning to live with this sort of wrath is not easy. In school, I had a boy come up behind me in the bathroom and start punching me in the back as hard as he could. I knew the boy, but we never spoke. It was not some snooty thing, we literally just saw each other in the halls, but had no reason to talk. Like everyone else you saw in school and never spoke to. To this day I have no idea why he punched me that day. Nothing happened, there was no instigation I am aware of. I did not seem him earlier that day, or even that week, so far as I remember.

I am wearing a backpack, however, and the only place he can punch me is in the shoulder blades. He's a short, fat, kid. He can't punch very hard. Even if he could, shoulder blades are nearly 1" of solid bone. Your fist would break before they would. I knew I was not in any danger, unless he tried to punch the base of my skull, and he wasn't smart enough to do that. So I waited. When he was done, I finished peeing (I was at a urinal), shook, zipped up, turned around, and looked down at him. The other kids in the bathroom were waiting for a fight with anticipation. I looked at him with a mix of pity and wrath. "You done?" as he huffed and puffed, and I just walked away. He was no threat, he caused no harm. Why attack? What purpose would it have served?

Years later we saw each other in high school and he acted like we were best friends to his best friends. To this day, I do not understand that kid. Had he tried to knock my legs out, or punch the base of my skull, I would have spun around and shown him why fighting in a bathroom is a bad idea. Because in that moment he would have escalated from ineffective combat to effective. In that moment, wrath would have been set free. But I tell this story because you need to understand that wrath isn't violence. It isn't rage. It isn't mindless, without compassion, or waiting for an excuse to unload. Wrath is intentional, contemplative, and considers the factors at play.

But I didn't. And he was able to heal and improve because of it. If you read this and think "oh, look at you, so virtuous" understand that the ONLY reason I share these stories is so that others might find someone like them. People like me are incredibly rare. We are often alone, and miserable because of it. These stories are a flag, waving in the wind, trying to signal to others like us.

I thought I was crazy for a long time, but the world is the one that's crazy, not me.