Why couldn't you have been a Jew?

Last night Husband and I went to get a new package of canning jars, because I am a nerd who likes to can and I have a bumper crop of bush pickles and tomatoes. And of course I ran out of jars in the middle of a canning sessions. ANNOYING. So we went to the store and as we were checking out, the cashier said "It's not often I see young people come through here with canning supplies!" I love talking about canning and stuff because once again, nerd, so I started to talk with her when the woman in front of us turned around and exclaimed in a too-loud, too-cheery voice "WELL, GOOD FOR YOU! WHAT DO YOU LIKE TO CAN??" 

I wish I had just kept talking with the cashier, because she was really sweet and I think I might bring her a jam sometime. Or at least let Husband handle the chatty-mouth customer woman. But Chatty Mouth was kind of insistent and being nice to Office Loony has me being nice to pretty much everyone, and she was so enthusiastic about my pickles and it was impossible to talk to them both at the same time and so somehow we ended up walking out of the store with Chatty Mouth and talking with her in the parking lot for like 30 friggin minutes.

At first it was canning tips and make-sure-you-only-freeze-asparagus and did-you-know-you-could-can-meat, BUT THEN it turned into her interrogating me with beady eyes on how exactly I wash my vegetables, why I use that particular ratio of vinegar to water instead of buying vegetable wash, AND THEN she was telling us about her business that is 12 or 17 or 27 fruits and vegetables in a single capsule or something and I was like "oh neat, an entrepreneur, I'll listen to her invention, whatever. She told me not to can asparagus, I owe her one." So I listened patiently, totally believing that she had invented this product.....until I realized she wasn't very familiar with her bottom line, and that she was randomly spewing "facts" about this capsule that sounded scripted and choppy and she wasn't really sure how many nutrients were in the capsule but it did only cost $1.38 per day. At which point I figured out that she was one of those fucking pyramid schemers and was trying to sell us her product.  I should note that Husband (who was carrying my heavy canning jars, by the way) had all this figured out way before me because his head is on earth instead of floating around the stratosphere thinking about what lychee sangria might taste like, and had been shifting uncomfortably from foot to foot in an attempt to get a subtle message to me.

Chatty Mouth was also one of those lonely people who talks and talks and talks because their cats and walls don't talk back so when they're in public and ensnare you, you are one fucking ensnared dumbass and find it nearly impossible to get away. So while Husband is shifting around with my heavy jars, she and I have exchanged business cards and she's chitty chat chatting about how I'm so smart to grill bok choy and could she have that Filipino recipe from me because a Filipino exchange student lived with her family when she was in high school and then she went on a mission trip to the Philippines much later in life and one time when she called Qwest or Cox or whoever about her service she recognized the distinctive accent of her Filipino client service person and got to talking about her mission trip to the Philippines, and then the Filipino lady was like "Oh! What church was it??" and Chatty Mouth said "The born-again church!" and the Filipino lady said "Me too!!!!" and I was screaming in my head BORN-AGAIN???? FAAAACCKKK!! WHY COULDN'T YOU HAVE BEEN ONE OF THE BAZILLION JEWISH PEOPLE WHO GO TO THIS STORE?!?! BACK AWAY GINI, BACK AWAY!!

Because I? am a MAGNET for the people who live to convert others. And I've been a sucker more than once. In junior high, an extremely strange girl name Rose convinced me I was a chosen child to help save the world before the apocalypse came on the eve of the year 2000 (I spent that eve drinking Two Dogs and champagne and calling my brand-new boyfriend by his friend's name), and we used to "speak with the wind" together and use our magical stones to help us find answers and do weird shit. (I still have that rose quartz-- omg, ROSE quartz??-- and it actually did help me find a shit ton of lost things so go figure? And one time I was completely unprepared for a French test but I was sitting near the window and had my stone, so I asked the wind for answers and got a 100%.) 

Throughout my twenties I've unhappily fielded many unsuccessful attempts by my super-religious uncle to talk about the deep spiritual meanings behind the Bible (ironically, he was never interested in the actual historical, political or sociological meanings), not to mention the door-to-door Mormons and Jehovah's Witnesses who hate to leave you alone and who apparently like to walk around the Old Market and accost people on the weekends. Another time, I was training a guy at work who asked me about my religious preferences and against my better judgment I answered him, and he was like "I'd like to talk to you some more about that, I'm born-again and I really think you're headed in the wrong direction with this 'live and let live' ideal you got goin on..." and then I was like "Hey, we are totally working right now and being born once was just fine for me and SURPRISE, I'm pressing the button so you get another call." And in between calls he would try to engage me again, insisting that I needed to go to his church and see the Lord, and you know, he didn't really make it in my department. Or at my workplace. I should google that fool and see where he ended up.

Obviously none of these proselytizers are bad people-- they are trying so, so hard to be great people and great citizens and great for their Lord. That's lovely. I simply do not care for it and do not care to be roped into even talking about such silliness, and the easiest way to avoid it is to avoid those people. Call me closeminded, I really don't care, but I think organized religion in general is a bunch of hooha and believing the Rapture is really going to take place is tantamount to believing in magic. I believe in science and proof and that religion simply fulfills a psychological need for direction and structure in many people, and you know, maybe there is an omniscient deity who turns his glaring eye on this blog post and is like "GINI'S GONNA FUCKIN BURN FOR THIS ONE" (or is that every day?), but maybe there isn't. Maybe I really don't care. Because I don't believe in magic, no matter how many times I insist on having a serious discussion with Husband about what we need to do to prepare for the Zombie Apocalypse.

Maybe the answer for me lies in combining Jesus-magic with the Zombie Apocalypse? Then the born-agains AND I would all be happy in Heaven (which is like a Resident Evil game, yessss) together! Oh, except Husband. He thinks all of it is silly. Crap.