let's play dress-up, so we can pretend

I went to mass today. I always want to go, but then when I get there I feel like I am pretending. I put on church clothes and say the words and pretend to be a good Catholic girl. What's worse is I think everyone around me is pretending, too. No one is happy like they pretend to be in church. If they were, they wouldn't be there. Maybe people go to church because it offers them different things, whether it be a sense of belonging, or purpose, or whatever. Lately for me it's been a way for me to focus my attention on something besides the break-up, a fill for the space that I have in my life. Do I go because I think it brings me closer to God? Not really. After I get out of mass, I'm still doing the same things I've been doing, partying and cussing. I don't think you need an institution to worship. If I wanted God in my life, I think I could do it on my own. I think the act of going to church is a reassuring tradition to me that I've been doing since birth. If nothing else, it calms me. I don't know what it is for the rest of the congregation that sit in the pews. Does anyone listen to the words anymore, or is it merely tradition that still brings people to Catholic mass? It can't be the cantors, the music, the spirit of a Catholic mass, nor the boring priest in croc's. I can't take anyone seriously that wears crocs.