Your Personal Screwtape

"What in one instance might be a vice, in another may possibly become a virtue. A thousand imperceptible, evanescent shadings modify every thought, every motive, every action of our lives - no one can estimate the sensations or, can form an exact judgment for another."

I avoid the inside of gas stations. I'm always appalled when I go into these places because invariably there’s at least one caricature from society to be dealt with. In this part of the country it’s generally the “Birthed Five but Mother to None.” She has disheveled hair, a dirty shirt, the very epitome of slatternly squalor from head to foot. Her child is similarly attired (if in fact attired at all) and wandering off in any available direction without so much as a nod from its “parent.” Typically she’s walked there from some nearby apartment to spend $50 on the staples or her life: lottery tickets and cigarettes. The stertorous, tortured rasping that passes for her breath echoes through the store proving that this isn’t her first encounter with Raleigh’s “gift” to humanity.

It is only with the utmost willpower that I manage to put aside my decidedly procrustean prejudices and dream that it’s just POSSIBLE that there’s some perfectly legitimate reason that this woman is in the state she’s in. From my decidedly affluent position in society, it’s difficult to imagine a circumstance in which I would allow myself to appear to the world in such an unflattering light. How can this woman respect herself at all in such a state? Doesn’t she realize that the reason she’s in this position in the first place may have to do with her day-to-day choices?

The answer is that of course she knows. She knows she’s not going to win the lottery but to her it’s the only hope. The only chance she has to extract herself from the mire of her own ignorance and poverty is to be that one lucky person in a million. To her, the choice is simple. She HAS to buy the lottery tickets because without those, there’s nothing. That’s ALL there is. The State certainly doesn’t help the situation as it speaks from both sides of its mouth. On one hand, the ads say “Buy Lottery Tickets! You’ll win a LOT of money!!” with big flashing lights but in small print encourage you to “Play Responsibly.” When you live in filth on minimum wage playing at all is automatically irresponsible. Yet the State continues to tax the hopes and dreams of those who can least afford it. It is an irresponsible society that taunts its lowest earners into giving up what little they have for an evanescent hope of wealth.

But does she not realize that by smoking she’s not only throwing away her money but her health? Again, of course she does. The tocsins of death have been ringing in her head for years as she wakes up coughing and breathless in the middle of the night. No smoker is unaware of the quag into which they wander when they continue to smoke. There is no paucity of warnings; any pretence to ignorance is obvious affectation. They knowingly and willingly throw their resources and health into the abyss because the twin demons of habit and dependence force them to. Smokers are slaves to their habit; what is once picked up is not so easily put aside.

While we do not all share the same vices, we each have our own that stand in stead of this woman’s. She dreams to be rich and does what she thinks needs be done to make it so. My hopeless dreams are no less lunacy than hers. I service them in my own way and feed them as much if not more than she. I too have my bottomless abyss to feed.

Dare I ask, lest your demons become my own, what masters you serve, dear reader?