Things That Annoy Me.

Okay, It's Sunday and on most Sundays I walk to a diner and have breakfast. If it's a real nice day, I'll walk as far as Millburn to eat and follow that with a walk on South Mountain Reservation. But most days the weather and /or my will only allows me to go a mile to either the Mark Train or the Huck Finn diner on Morris Avenue. I walked over to the Mark Twain and had myself a decent French toast meal. Afterward I walked back to my place.

Big deal, right? Anyhow, I like taking a circulus route home avoiding the main drags to instead take a less familiar street for scenic variance. So I'm walking on a sidewalk when a woman dressed to the nines comes out of a house and walks towards the church next door. She's walking at a slower pace than I am and even slows down a little down this narrow sidewalk. Since I wasn't in the mood and thought it rude to pass her and thought it would be intimidating to walk too close to her until she turned away, I walked around her via the church parking lot.

So what's the big deal? Well, after a few calls of "sir", "sir", "Sir" in my direction I turned around to find out what the heck she wanted.

Now, I'm a "mind my own business" kind of person. I don't like being interrupted when I AM minding my own business unless it's to be helped or to help someone. So, I'm like sighing when I turn to face her and say "yeah?"

"Did you park in that parking lot?"


"What, NO!" was my incredulous reply.

"Okay, Thank you, Have a Nice Day" was her sarcastic response.

Yeah, I was rude to her. I felt I was violated by being held in suspicion of doing something "wrong". And what evidence could she have? Did she see me come out of a car? Of course not. Did she see me put anything in a car or take anything out of a car? again, that would be a "no" because my car is in my OWN driveway ten blocks away. All I wanted to do was avoid interfering with her walking in what I thought was the most polite and least intrusive way, By walking AROUND her.

And what was this "crime" she accused me of in the first place? Having a vehicle occupy a space DESIGNED to occupy a vehicle? Ahhh, But there are rules and possible needs of payment who can park and where you can park. And again I ask "What is the crime?"

Think about it, I'm accused of parking my car in a parking lot of a church I don't belong to. Now, Even if I did do that and I walked away, flipping them the bird along the way, They can get my car towed at MY expense. Well within the rules of law but hardly a Christian thing to do. Think About it for a second, I don't think Jesus would be leading the charge to remove my vehicle if it wasn't interfering with anyone's safety or blocking anyone's progress. My fictional car did neither. Property and parking lot rights out of control in my estimation.

But it does point out my problem with many Christians. I grew up Christian and have kept many of the values I grew up learning from the church other than the belief in God and the belief that a man who lived 2000 years ago was the son of that God. Now a Christian is supposed to turn the other cheek, Supposed to embrace the Prodigal son.

In other words, Even if I were to go into the church, Grab a batch of holy water, Guzzle it down my throat, swish it in my mouth and spit it on the church floor. A Christian is supposed to observe this and say "God bless him!"

Otherwise you don't prove much in my eyes.