Day 32: Don’t Tread On Me

It took a lot of effort to send out chain letters back in the hoary days before email. You had to actually go somewhere and pay to have copies made – there were no scanners or personal printers (yes, I’m that old). Then, real envelopes had to be hand-addressed and stuffed and stamped. Finally, you had to trudge to the post office to physically mail them off to the ten closest friends you’d chosen to persecute.

Even I have succumbed to the pressure to keep a chain from breaking, either through guilt or some pathetic hope that the deal du jour would actually come true. Even I have tucked a dollar bill into those envelopes so that I would in my turn find $12,000 cash in my mailbox.

I never followed through out of fear or superstition, though, despite the veiled threats those letters always contained. My Catholic upbringing provided more than enough of that, thank you.

Then, REPOST OR ALL WILL GO WRONG appeared on my Facebook page.

I hope for crissakes that God has better things to do than police social media. It may seem to us that He’s an obsessive-compulsive type afflicted with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, narcissism, and paranoia – but God is a very busy man. If He can’t take the time to end war and hunger and pestilence and cruelty and ignorance, we certainly can’t expect him to monitor the vanity internet.

And whosoever dareth to make promises on God’s behalf? He’s now obliged to send a miracle my way, just because it said so on Facebook?

Here’s the thing: Perhaps it’s a test. Perhaps God Himself posted that on my page. My eternal soul hangs in the balance even as we speak.

To that end, tag! You’re it!

You know what to do.

3 thoughts on “Day 32: Don’t Tread On Me

  1. I’ll bet you had no idea, O cynical one, that the results of the 2016 election were solely the fault of unforwarded chain letters and FB posts….thanks much!

    • You know what Lily Tomlin says: No matter how cynical you get, you can never keep up :-) And while I’m always quick to assume general guilt and responsibility, there is NO WAY I accept any blame for #45. Apart from belonging to the family of man that made him possible, of course. Apart from the weight of original sin, which probably contributed. Apart from my failure to knock on doors and collect signatures during political campaigns. Apart from my inability to change the voting minds of those in my personal circle. Apart from my general incompetence as a human. Except for all that, I am not complicit! No, Sirree.

  2. Diane

    Ha, memories. I once did this with chain letter recipes–obviously it didn’t work!

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