Oh Emily, sweetie, don't be silly. And definitely don't feel bad.
But you do get the prize for kindly whipping everyone back "On Topic". We may need you down the line.
Lordy, lordy here's one for you. And it is true.
Most of all of you people have heard of the Bible Belt, Southern Baptists, etc. And Louisiana is smack dab in the middle of all of that.
Well every summer growing up, until 13 or so, my mother would book me into Vacation Bible School. (A traumatic thing for a shy, introverted young lad who just wanted to go to the woods and catch snakes. Note, we lived in Kentucky, near the Ohio River bottoms until 1975.)
Well after those two mortifying weeks, she'd (at my insistence) send me down to spend the rest of the summer to stay with my dear kind precious grandparents, who I look up to as saints to this day. The loss of my grandmother in 2001 was, and is, a difficult thing for me, and my grandfather turned 93 in July. But I digress.
Well low and behold, I arrived every summer to find my grandmother had booked me into yet a second two week stint in
their church's Vacation Bible School. Two more weeks of organized regimented mind control among mostly strangers. But I survived. And lived to make lemons into lemonade. I learned scripture. And went on to read the whole bible. Several times, and 4 to 5 versions. I learned that much in the Bible is metaphorical and figurative, (not so simple as literal). A clever and brilliant way to teach higher thoughts and ideas and principles. Jesus was a brilliant teacher, but his audience just wasn't that bright. But he did his best. I wax philosophical about all of the subjects
he himself never touched upon. Like anything about sex. I even went on to study philosophy. But again, I digress.
Well, before, between, and after all the Vacation Bible school confinement and torture, I caught many and varied snakes. Brought them home. Showed them around. My grandmother told me snakes were supposed to be killed, their heads to be bruised under the heals of men (and women). Sat me down and showed me the thousands of years old scriptural (and metaphorical and figurative
) proof that snakes were the descendants of Satan.
Still not feeling satanic, I continued to read about, catch, identify, and bring home snakes. At her wit's end, my grandmother being a practical women, she decided (like no doubt many missionaries and spreaders of the gospel in the past) to bribe me into conforming to the scriptures. She said she would pay me not to catch snakes, and if I agreed, that an especially big bonus would come when I graduated high school.
Well I was ethically torn. I wanted to please my grandmother. I wanted to accept her "pay to pray" offer. But moreover, I wanted her to know that my belief in her God did not conflict in my mind with garter snakes and blue racers.
So I went to my grandfather, a very wise man, who also knew my grandmother much better than me. He was even more practical, and I don't think he had much against snakes. He told me to take the money, keep my mouth shut, keep catching all the snakes I wanted, but quit waving them around, and for God's sake stop bringing them around my grandmother. Needless to say, I was awakened to a new way of looking at things by my grandfather.
Anywaayyy,....true to my own values, I refused the money...AND...stopped bringing snakes around my grandmother.
Now, you have my story.