Gimmie candy

I swear, #2 knows when we have a day off.  He revved his lawnmowers for a while before 6 AM, then played loud Mexican love songs for another 5 minutes just after 6 AM.  In the morning.  On a Tuesday. 

I wasn't as angry as I would have been because I had woken with a headache.  I "had" to get up and take something anyway. 

I was thinking about a couple of different issues.  You may remember, if you are a long time reader, I used to hand out bags of candy with scripture booklets.  The booklet had 48 pages and about 300 Bible verses, along with "the road to salvation" or somesuch.   I used to carry them in a bag everywhere I went. 

At the time, I felt it was an important and relevant way to share the gospel.  I handed them out mainly to service providers, i.e., drivers.  But then some of the other customers started to complain so I started handing them out to the passengers, too. 

I was bagging up 20 bags a day sometime, no one was mentioning the scripture booklets, or, rarely, I was getting people saying "Give me 100 Booklets to hand out".  I would refer them to the publisher.  "No, I want your booklets.  Give me your booklets, I don't want to contact the publisher."  I didn't feel bad saying no to that, although they certainly tried to make me feel bad about it. 

Why would you be unwilling to contact the publisher on your own?  It's (World Missionary Press in my sidebar link) not like they are going to run a criminal background check before they send the booklets.  They just want name, address, and how you are going to use them.  "I plan to hand them out on the street" or whatever. 

Besides, they ask you not to waste the booklets and I really didn't know how they were using them, if they were using them at all.  Some people like to hoard stuff like that.  More than once I have been given dozens of Bibles at a time, that someone had hoarded and finally decided to "let go".  They were always kept in a dirty garage, too. 

My house may look like a warehouse, but I keep "my" Bibles in the front room.  I was very proud when it looked as if we might flood because I knew my Bibles would be OK on their rack. 

Anyway, I got sick of handing it out, the entitlement, the demands.  "Gimme candy", "Where's my candy?"    I tried just handing out the booklets and they handed them back.  Fine, I thought, and I stopped it all together. 

Boy, I got a lot of screaming on that.  "Gimme candy!  I want my candy".  First of all, I never agreed to give you candy every time I saw you.  Secondly, you aren't entitled to it; you don't get a bag of candy just because you ride paratransit.  Third, it isn't your candy, I'm the one who bought it.  Fourth, if all you recall is the candy then I shouldn't waste any more on you, because you are clearly just throwing away the booklet, which is the whole purpose of the exercise to begin with.   Fifth, most of the clients are diabetic anyway and shouldn't be eating candy unless they are having a hypoglycemic episode. 

Sunday we had another woman like that.  She bitched and moaned, yelling for her candy.  "You used to give me candy, where's my candy?" for a good 20 minutes.  After she got out I told Ron "This is why I stopped" and he agreed.  It was exhausting. 

I finally asked her "Where do you think it is?"  I got in without any bags, purses, or packages at all, just me in a pair of capris and a t-shirt.  Even if I was "hiding' it, I had no place to put it.  She kept complaining. 

It's sad.  It seemed like that would have been a really good way to spread the gospel but it just turned into a demanding maw of entitlement and tantrums for candy. 

I have better things to do, and I hate to say, I'm sorry I ever started that.  Maybe God will show me a few got saved, later, but I am very skeptical.