Karma

Karma karma karma karma, karma chameleon
You come and go, you come and go
Loving would be easy if your colors were like my dream
Red gold and green, red gold and green

~Culture Club 

 Instant Karma's gonna get you
Gonna knock you right on the head
You better get yourself together
Pretty soon you're gonna be dead
What in the world you thinking of
Laughing in the face of love
What on earth you tryin' to do
It's up to you, yeah you
~John Lennon

Last week I was riding back from a vacation in Idaho when we came across a large traffic jam. This was by Malad Pass, for those familiar with the area. Malad Pass is pretty much where you go if you want to get in a car accident. We got in an accident there about 15 years ago. You also go to this area if you desire to get into hot water while driving an unmarked Chevy van with dealer plates and a man in the passenger seat who has not aged in 20 years. (This reference will tie in later, for those who, for a variety of reasons, know what this is referring to).

The Ultimate Associate Wagon

However, we luckily managed to dodge that ill-fated Chevy van trip (for a variety of reasons) and our our encounter with Malad Pass was merely someone who got into a traffic accident.

As we were working our way through the traffic jam, a big black truck ripped past us on the shoulder. Highly illegal. This is the type of person that deserves a personal visit from karma. I would give my vote for the black truck to get stuck in quicksand. Maybe as a bonus karma could also allow one of the local cows to give the driver a good wallop. However, as far as I could tell, karma never served the black truck its due justice. Although about 20 minutes later we did catch back up to him. And we had taken a 10 minute break at a rest stop (Also by Malad Pass). So maybe karma was manifest by the black truck just being slowed down. But honestly that is a pretty lame use of karma.

Now there are many times in life where, if I was at the controls of karma, people would get there just due. Sometimes we speak of "good karma." Really good karma to me is when karma strikes people down. Other people being struck down by karma is good. (Or is it "well?" No, it is good. Please believe I when me say me was taught well grammar good by my peers). But anyway, we should all enjoy a good karma induced strike down. Good karma is when that girl who dumped you three years ago on May 7th is now languishing in Granville, ND. She's not married, and I'm not bitter. So there.

In keeping with this theme of rambling about karma, I have compile a list of times I have seen karma manifest. Many of these deal with someone gaining copious amounts of adipose tissue, going bald, or some combination of the these. I think this is because karma likes to go to the head, the belly and the hips. Karma has waaaay too much to do to become inventive. This does not mean that people who are bald have been stricken with bad karma, nor should it infer that....."adipose tissue"......indicates wickedness. This is why karma is good at what it does. You never know who to blame.

Let me also place a fast public service announcement: If you are 23 years old and have pronounced male-pattern baldness, the comb-over does not go over well. (Well, it doesn't matter WHO you are, comb-overs will usually not go over well). But in a very literal sense, a comb-over does not go over well. They comb over poorly and blow off even worse.

 Without further ado, I present the short list.I came up with a much longer list, but most of them were too wild. Not that avoiding the wild and weird has stopped me in the past, but today I have somewhat refrained.

• One type of karma that I personally did not witness, but have read about in the Bible, deals with Herod the Great. Herod commanded that all males under the age of two should be slain. Herod then was killed by a form of gangrene of the genitals. At least according to Wikipedia and the famous Roman historian Josephus.  

•  On my mission I had a companion who got the bad end of karma. In this case, I actually think karma came down way too hard. The stun gun must have been set on the wrong setting, because this guy got a pretty harsh punishment. To make it worse, it was served by a lady that had to be 115 years old. Picture Yoda, sans green skin. Well, on good days, sans green skin. One day this old lady gave him some 떡 (Ddeok). This pretty much amounts to eating an entire rice cooker's worth of rice, shoved into a small, dense, unflavored brick. A so called "rice cake." My companion decided to throw most of it away in the dumpster behind the church. Bad idea. The old lady found it (Fact: Old women in Korea are champion dumpster divers, even past the century mark it appears). After I was out of the area the ancient lady invited my companion to come to her house for dinner. She then proceeded to hold the missionaries captive for the next three hours and force fed them enough food for six head of bovine.

• I also had personal encounters with food while on my mission. I flirted with karma as it pertains to food on a regular basis. (I also had a companion who flirted with his former girlfriend on a regular basis. This was how I learned the word 시시덕거리다. This, however, is a story for a different day).  But back to my original story of karma and food. As a preface, it is important that you understand that, as a missionary, you are forced to eat many things you would rather not consume. This is especially true when you cannot speak the language and you are at a dinner appointment. The only way the host can interact with you is to command you to eat more. On one such occasion, after only having been in the country for about a month, I came up against an especially tough dinner appointment. I swear that all this lady ate was rice and undercooked fried eggs--the runnier the better. Desiring to avoid salmonella, I tried to avoid the runny eggs as much as I could when we went to her house each week.  This time though she wised up to me and took one of her special fried eggs off of the plate and put it into my bowl. However, I still outwitted her. I just let the egg sit in my bowl and ate the rice around it. After she got distracted talking (she was a gabber), I threw the egg back on the serving plate. About two minutes later, she snatched up my cold, coagulated yet runny (former) egg, rolled it up, and ate it like a Twinkie. After the dinner was over, she congratulated me for eating so much. Karma served. Karma served good and well. I guess I can just be grateful that instead of being matched against an ancient granny, I was only competing with a less wise middle-aged woman.

• I will close with the following piece of karma. There once was a man who brought a hat with the logo of his "favorite" sports team to church. He then placed said hat on pulpit while giving a talk. This man later was hit with a horrible aging bug. As in, 36 to 66 in ten years. Having high maintenance daughters can do that to you. But putting a U of Fruits hat on the pulpit is ten times the hammer. And this guy got pile driven.

In closing, let me add that I still have several karma petitions currently pending. I do not know when karma will get around to answering them, but some people are due......I am sure that doesn't sound sinister. Right, Mr. Ginobli?