It was about 10pm when I stopped at a gas station on my way home from work. I was immediately greeted by two women, one noticeably older than the other who I presumed to be mother and daughter, but that's just a guess. They were by their car at a pump in the next row from me and called me over. You never hear good stories about meeting strangers at gas stations, so I already had a sense of what was about to transpire.
At first, I tried merely to ignore them and go about filling up my car. Since my tank was nearly empty, I knew I had a whole lot of ignoring to do. Unfortunately for me, ignoring things is difficult to do, so I gave in and decided to acknowledge these people. The older one started telling me that they were trying to get home to Riverside and needed gas money with a sad, desperate look on her face. I stood looking at them in silence while they both repeated their story adding extra "please"'s at the end each time. I've become quite a cynic over the years, but a big part of me is still a sucker for the sad and desperate so it only took a moment when I knew I was going to give them something. The matter of what and how much would come later.
As my cynical and empathetic sides battled in my head, I hesitantly walked towards them. They must have sensed my reluctance so they added that they had three young children in the car who they needed to get home and feed. All the while I was trying to calculate in my head how much money one would need to get from Temple City to Riverside in a compact American-made car. My cynical side wasn't going to let me give them too much, but my empathetic side wasn't going to let me walk away. I came to a close, yet comfortable, distance away from them where I was able to see into their car and saw that in fact they did have three children with them. A part of me felt even sadder for the situation and for these kids, while the other part thought that these women were exploiting kids in whatever scam this was.
They continued begging. A part of me knew that I shouldn't give a fuck, while the sucker in me felt really sorry for them. I find it in my nature, unfortunately, difficult to simply be mean. Sometimes I feel like I care too much with no good reason. So I reached for my wallet, pulled out a twenty and gave it to the older one. I figured that should be more than enough to get back to Riverside from there. She began to thank me, but was quickly interrupted by the younger one who said something to the effect of, 'c'mon sir, how about another five, so we can feed the kids.' This kind of annoyed me. It came off as ingrateful, and to add to that, she adds something like, 'come on, do the math, 15 for gas, and with 10 we can feed the kids, look at them, they're so young.' A part of me was thinking, "excuse me, bitch?! you're telling me how to do math? Shit, if you did the math earlier you wouldn't be stuck..." but another part of me thought that any self-respecting person would have to be pretty desperate to say shit like that, or you'd have to be stupid. Either way, it was pathetic enough for me to cough up another five bucks.
As I started walking back to my car, they both repeatedly shouted a phrase that made me re-think the whole encounter; that phrase was "God bless you." I was instantly infuriated and just kept on walking. I got back into my car and drove off without acknowledging them again. Because, if I had to continue listening to them I would have caused a scene. I understand that it's a common way to thank people for their generosity by saying "God bless you," but to me, that's an insult and it bothers the shit out of me. My first reaction is, "shiiiit, it looks like God needs to be blessing your sorry ass a little more, not mine." If I weren't so tired at the time, I would have gone back and gave them a lecture in how their God failed them.
See, this whole situation only reinforces my disbelief in God. If those people were genuine that means God purposely created the situation of suffering. And if he created suffering, then he can't really be a "good" God, and therefore one I couldn't honestly worship--why would you worship something that created suffering? Now, if God didn't create suffering, then it had to come from somewhere. And that means God isn't much of god at all if some other entity can affect his realm so negatively like that. In the same vein, if those people weren't genuine, then God either must have created deceit, or some other force did. So if God is battling some other being like the Devil, that means God isn't the single most almighty being and we have choices in who we worship. Who's to say God is "good." If we have to suffer anyway then why must we go to lengths to praise God?
So to you people at the gas station who seem to believe in God, you can send him this message from me: take your blessing and shove it.
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