Got my hair cut today.
Nice, you might think, but what has that got to do with this group?
It's because the best hairdresser in town (as well as the only one who will take this alleged heretic's business) is that rare bird, a super-fundie with at least a somewhat good heart. She's the busiest in town, so she doesn't need my $ but she cuts my hair anyway so I don't go around looking raggedy and embarrassing the whole town. I walked into one place several years ago where both seats were empty and I could almost swear had cobwebs in the corners. But no, they were 'booked up, sorry.'
So this lady cuts my hair, and btw she does it better than anybody I ever went to anywhere, whether on the coasts or in between. Now with her theology, I'm pretty sure she thinks I have one foot on the edge and the other on a banana peel, that somehow I can't possibly be thoroughly 'saved', so she does 'share' an awful lot of unrequested thoughts with me. Because I like her more than a little and appreciate her tremendously, I just add the occasional, polite "Oh?" and let her ramble on. On rare occasions I've 'shared' back with her my basic doctrine that I know God loves me and I trust my soul to his care but am happy to leave the details up to him. God's gonna do what God's gonna do, and whatever that is, is fine with me.
Not only does this approach drive most people who want an argument up the wall, which entertains me more than it should, it also saves me a lot of wear and tear in this hysterically xenophobic spot on the road in the remote MidWest. When I'm determined not to argue, there's no way they can make me do it. I almost feel bad about it with her, though, because she gets a sort of sad look in her eyes, not that murderous gleam that so many do. She won't ever come out and say she's worried about my future, but I'm pretty sure she prays a lot for me and that can't hurt even when she is off target.
Hey, that's as good as it gets here. I celebrate whatever and whenever I can.
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Believe me, I don't start these subjects, not even politics; they're forced on me to one degree or another. That's why I usually just give my hairdresser very polite and extremely vague murmurs in reply. But I don't mind, because there I sit getting the best haircut in the world for $13, and I know she won't press me for specific agreement. She just wants to 'save' me, even though that's somebody else's job and already an accomplished fact a couple thousand years ago. She'd have a heart attack if I told her Jesus died for everyone, past, present, and future.
And yes, there are those scissors in her hand!
What I can't seem to do - and don't care to try - is to stop writing the occasional LTTE of our local paper, which incidentally has a wide regional circulation. Sometimes it's strictly politics, less often a note on religion. But every bit of it seems to make a lot of people apoplectic, and they just lovvvve to let me know to my face. They don't care for the slightly acerbic brushoff they get either.
They're not going to like the next one any better than the last. Although I must say, the nastiest respondent - the one who print-screeched LYING HYENAS OF SOCIALISM! one time, began his latest personal attack in the paper by noting that the publisher/editor had asked him to keep in mind how he hurt people's feelings with his hubris and mean spirited words. Then he went right on doing the same if not worse, referring to me as "little My Name" The last time I had pinned his ears back a bit by pointing out the immature cruelty of ridiculing his wife at length in print and maligning the Mennonites en masse in a manner few publications would allow. (He complained that they all sounded like they just got off the boat!)
Don't worry, I shall never address him directly in print again. I think he's done enough to show people his true colors. Maybe just for fun, I'll reprint his latest LTTE in GD sometime soon.
Have a Happy Easter, Irish!
