Midnight Rantings 11:50am 7.18.10

Current song being listened to: "Dumpster Divers" ---the Psalters, and "Family" --- Aaron Strumpel

I forgot how exhausting it can be to be perpetually stared at everywhere you go, to be aware of how different you are at all times, and to be subtley reminded everywhere you go that you do not belong. I somehow feel that I can now be empathetic with people in my own country who are made to feel like they don't belong, maybe with signs and bumper stickers that say "God hates fags" or maybe even being required to submit to unlawful search and seizer just because they look like they might have been born just a little south of the border.

But really it doesn't compare. People stare at me maybe because they know that I am rich, or maybe because I remind them of the empire from which they found Independence from (maybe because they can't tell i am a girl with a beard or a boy with a ponytail ["it's pat!"]).

It's also tiring knowing that because you are different looking, people assume it's ok to rip you off. Every time I ask the price of something, the person pauses, gives an ominous grin, and asks for 4 or 5 times the fair amount. But in a way, the blatancy and even the honesty of their dishonesty can be a little refreshing. The only difference between this extortion and my own explotations is the white collars and contracts that buffer my morals and conscience from my theft and extortion. Kind of reminds me of a Woody Guthrie song about Prettyboy Floyd : "And as through this world, I've wandered, I've seen lots of funny men: Some will rob you with a six gun, and some with with a fountain pen".

Is it ok that people here are trying to take advantage of me? no. Is it ok that I bought shoes two weeks ago that were made in a sweatshop (possible an Indian one) by people who's financial circumstances left them no other option but to work there and be taken advantage of? definitely not. Not to "Bible" you in the face or anything.... but this reminds me of the parable in 2 Samuel 12

" There were two men in a certain town, one rich and the other poor. The rich man had a very large number of sheep and cattle, but the poor man had nothing except one little ewe lamb he had bought. He raised it, and it grew up with him and his children. It shared his food, drank from his cup and even slept in his arms. It was like a daughter to him.

Now a traveler came to the rich man, but the rich man refrained from taking one of his own sheep or cattle to prepare a meal for the traveler who had come to him. Instead, he took the ewe lamb that belonged to the poor man and prepared it for the one who had come to him."
David burned with anger against the man and said to Nathan, "As surely as the LORD lives, the man who did this must die! He must pay for that lamb four times over, because he did such a thing and had no pity."

Then Nathan said to David, "You are that man!"

I know I know..... strong words. But something to think about