what's on your mind, sammy?
can i say something here? sammy asked me to come and talk to you, because it's her opinion that you're not gonna find what you're looking for the way you're looking for it --
but i'm really not here to try to get you to do anything, or to believe anything. and i'll tell you the same thing i told her, which is that as far as i'm concerned the only way she can help you is by her example -- by trying to be a model for you, by the way she lives her life.
and that doesn't mean she's supposed to be a saint, either, if that's what you're smiling about.
you know, terry, a lot of people come to see me with all kinds of problems. drugs, alcohol, marital problems, sexual problems, health problems --
well.  i like it. because even in this little town, i feel like what i do is very connected with the real center of people's lives. i'm not saying i'm always mr. effective, but i don't feel like my life is off to the side of what's important. you know? i don't feel my happiness and comfort are based on closing my eyes to trouble within myself or trouble in other people. i don't feel like a negligible little scrap, floating around in some kind of empty void, with no sense of connectedness to anything around me except by virtue of whatever little philosophies i can scrape together on my own.
can i ask you, terry: do you think your life is important?
yeah.
but do you think it's important?
do you think it's important in the scheme of things? not just because it's yours, or because you're somebody's brother. because i don't really get the impression that you do.
well, isn't there any way for you to believe that without calling it god, or religion, or whatever term it is you object to?
well.  it's a sin.
but we don't tend to focus on that aspect of it, right off the bat --
well --
well --
um.  no.
well.  why do you think you're in this situation?
all of them.