I Hate Being Dragged Into Stuff!!
Ok this is gonna be a rant… So bear with me…
Every once in a while, people get dragged into places they didn’t want to be. It could be a silly thing like attending the birthday party of the one year old kid of a neighbor who you hardly know or it could be something annoying like being stuck with a relative who wont let you go to the movie you bought tickets for till you give him a full review of your activities for the last month. People get stuck in lots of awkward situations…
To me it happened last weekend. As some of you know, I am a married guy who currently lives in a joint family, joint with my folks that is. I know, it’s probably not very macho for some of you guys out there, but I don’t have a choice at the moment. Anyways that’s a discussion for another day.
So every once in a while my dad goes mad and forgets I am not a kid anymore. Almost always, it’s about attending religious activities like prayer meetings and church etc. And if there is one thing I hate, its forcing religion on to others.
This weekend, after me and my wife made plans of hanging around in Avenues, my dad got the sudden urge to drag us to a church prayer meeting. My attempts to avoid suffering the boredom of having to sit in the basement of a school singing stupid songs with uncles who are unimaginative about ways to spend a weekend were thwarted by him because he felt that everything in life should not be about entertainment. Apparently, by his own logic, prayer meetings exist to provide a balance to our lives by providing adequate amounts of boredom and bullshit.
So we accept our fate and take solace in the assumption that we at least get to go on our own. But that too is thwarted when my dad demands that we tag along with him! If you know my dad, you would know that anything you say against a demand will get you a lot of hot air and incoherent yelling that will leave yours ears ringing.
So I bit it down and climbed into his car to go for the GODDAMN prayer meeting. And man! Was that place full of jobless uncles or what! I had one of the worst evenings of my life! Second only to the yearly ritual of going to Good Friday services! I don’t know why every single idiot, even the once who never set foot in a church on any other day, just HAS to come for the Good Friday Service! Anyways, back to the prayer meeting, after suffering 3 hours of singing boring songs, listening to a lady screech – ‘bla bla bla… kathaave’ a gazillion times and the priest go on about something about Job and lent and what not, everyone settles in to have food. Since I was too pissed for that, I spent my time outside counting the number of things I could have done and the number of missions I could have completed on Assassin’s Creed 2. And then my dad comes out and we all get into the car. That’s when it happened. The very first thing he said after all that ‘spiritual enlightenment’ is “The food was really good.”! And I am thinking – W T F!!!
It’s never about God or Jesus. It’s always about looking good and keeping ones ego sharp. ‘You have to socialize’ my dad constantly says. The problem is – I don’t want to socialize with people with a hollow sense of prestige. People seem to think that being close to the priest is a big deal. Its not! It’s just a bearded guy in a weird costume and funny hat you want to hang out with! Not to mention he talks weird too.
I always had a problem with the concept of prayer. Why does an omniscient god want us to beg for things he already knows we will want? He already knows everything even before we are born anyways. Besides, what do you do when whatever you pray for does not happen? God’s will? Well won’t god do his will even without you begging? I just don’t understand the logic of praying!
And have any of you have heard how the average Orthodox Christian or the Marthoma or even some of the Catholics pray? It’s a whole lot of mumbling and repeating lines from prayer books over and over again. Most of em don’t even know what they say during service or during prayer! They just mindlessly repeat stuff!
I mean… Really, if a god is actually listening to this, I am actually surprised he has not swatted us like flies!
Floating Thoughts 
Eagerly awaiting to be ‘swatted’ 🙂
Socialising works when you socialise with like minded people. Or at least people with a working mind. NOT with mindless freaks who won’t even listen to your view, let alone agree with it.
Ask your dad if he would consider sitting with YOUR FRIENDS as an attempt to socialise?
If he does actually say ‘yes’, Do let us know. Will make time to sit with your father and give him a small peek of what’s in our mind.
You are most likely to get yelled at – at the end of the SOCIALISING exercise. But hopefully – your dear father would realise that you do have a point – at least against the socialising argument associated with attending prayer meets.
Now that is what people would classify as suicidal 😛
He would probably tell me not to hang out with friends who have a ‘screwed up’ way of thinking and give me gyaan about the virtues of socialising with the ‘good’ church going people.
So his argument will still stand and I get gyaan. Double jeopardy!
you know something? as a kid I would dream that when I grow up to be an adult I can finally tell people I dont want to be dragged into these things and have my way… but years later I still find myself being dragged there coz I have to be ‘diplomatic’ with certain people.
😦
Yea I understand. When I was a kid my folks used to tell me that I should study for me and that once I grow up and get a job noone will bother me. After I got a job, he was like once you marry you live your own life.
AND HE STILL DRAGS ME INTO STUFF!