Thursday, February 28, 2008

Itinerant Mendicant

I had a wonderfully written post that the wondrous magic of cookies and internet security basically removed from existence.

The gist of it was that I had to refuse a young lady's request for the last of my money. She wanted to use it to get wherever she needed to go: home, presumably. Shutters slammed down on whatever it was that showed her humanity and allowed her to acknowledge mine. I remember feeling hurt by this, as I did want to help.

Of course there were valid arguments against it. I'd had enough money to only get me partially home. I'd still have to walk the rest of the way. And considering everything I'm juggling these days, I was going to need every calorie I was bound to lose by walking.

I wrote -- before the website hiccuped and removed everything-- that I felt the odious feeling of being... tested.

I wrote before that I didn't like character tests, because you walked into them blindly, not knowing the rules that someone (a woman, an authority figure, God) has often arbitrarily [and cruelly] set. These tests are usually stacked against you: they are engineered so that you'd have to defy your own nature to beat them. Ultimately you almost invariably fail.

Of course, I also thought about how God must likely be feeling: being presented with our needs day in and day out with each request being a pass-fail test of His character.

I'm surprised he hasn't tired of the lot of us.

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