I Ran

I made good on my fruity drink promise of Friday, as we went away for the weekend to Clearwater/St. Petersburg to see a playoff-clinching Red Sox/Devil Rays game and stay at a comfy fancypants resort on the beach. It was lovely, our seats were ridiculously awesome (the players could hear me if I yelled loud enough, I swear. It was wicked, wicked cool) and the game was actually exciting, except for the fact that Tito hasn’t figured out that Dice-K is a six-inning pitcher, period, so please pull him after the sixth inning. It will come back to haunt us in the playoffs, mark my words. We will have another Grady Little/Pedro situation, oh my God, WE WILL.

But I digress!

Do you know what’s in Clearwater, other than beaches and fancypants resorts? Scientology headquarters. As in, L. Ron Hubbard’s Scientology — the religion that arguably transformed Tom Cruise into a man who uses the word “glib” on national television and made John Travolta agree to star in Battlefield: Earth. And um, oh my God, y’all.

The headquarters themselves are entirely unassuming, and part of me thinks we might have missed them if not for the sudden sight of this:

Oh hi, Scientologists! That’s the first of three bus loads of Scientologists in uniform — I’m told they were students. And oh my God, the whole uniform thing was extraordinarily disconcerting and y’all, they were all wearing the same navy pants/short sleeve shirt combo and this crazy regulation belt! They were all wearing THE SAME BELT. And special pagers! They need pagers?

I don’t even know how to explain the bizarre details of the rest of our encounter, but it involved an unhappy Scientology guard who left us with a veiled threat to confiscate our camera if we took any more photos by simply saying “the others” wouldn’t like it. “The others” also wouldn’t like us being there, so maybe we should move along, unless we’d like a sanctioned tour for a hefty fee? I might also add that he indicated that he’d been watching us take pictures from as far as two blocks away, which is even … well, it’s even creepier.

Um, seriously.

I might add, too, that when we left the vicinity, we kept seeing belted Scientology students lurking around every corner, and we got the distinct, if paranoid, sense that we were being watched and/or followed by aspiring operating thetans. Or maybe it’s just that they were everywhere, because they really were, though I’m told that’s just downtown Clearwater. They were all belted and pagered and navy panted, except for a few people in khakis, who had clearly been promoted to a different enlightenment level and granted permission to wear khakis with their regulation belts.

I’m not one to make any sort of judgments on anyone’s religious beliefs — in fact, I don’t think I ever have. It’s just that honestly, the whole experience was just … well, it was a little creepy. And admittedly, I am very skeptical of L. Ron Hubbard and his purported comments about religion-as-business, not to mention the enormous costs involved in being a Scientologist — it’s my understanding that even the most rudimentary levels of enlightenment can cost tens of thousands of dollars. And the belt! THE REGULATION BELT!

And it sort of grates my cheese that the guard was so weird about the whole thing, because honestly, I can’t imagine any religious headquarters that *isn’t* seen as some sort of tourist attraction, so why the secrecy? And further, why the regulation belt?

And even further, I’m fairly certain that the guard wasn’t so stoked about us after he got wind that we took this photo, which is, um, me doing a rather bad version of the Vulcan salute (the thumb! I messed up the thumb!) in front of the church, but come on, man, it’s kind of hard to resist, because again: BATTLEFIELD EARTH.

I just … I don’t know. I just know that I can’t get over the belt. I don’t think I would wear the belt.

Other than that, we had a fantastic weekend. I hope you had a great one as well. Happy Monday!

*Flock of Seagulls … or Scientologists, if you prefer.

25 comments September 23rd, 2007