Once upon a hoopty...

Okay, so...getting stuff stolen from you isn't very fun. It feels like such a disrespect of personal space. I want to equate it to rape, but it's really not quite so personal. And at least this time, it was only a chain hanging on a tree (although, the second time it has happened) and not my computer stolen out of the next room while I was sleeping. The more I think about it, though, it isn't that I was robbed that bothers me. It isn't the amount it will cost me, because money is only good if you use it. It isn't even, really, the hassle of having to replace it (or live without it). And it's barely the fact that I was stupid enough to leave it in a place where it would get stolen (for the second time). It's the fact that it didn't cost the theif anything to steal from me. It's the fact that he is bragging to his friends how he got away with it. And when I finally see what it is that is really bothering me, that someone is laughing at getting the best of me, it makes me realize that I am just as much a jerk as that low-down, son of a gun who stole my hammock-hanging chain. Because he thought, likely, before he stole it, "This gringo can afford a new one. It will barely even bother his wallet." And he's right. That doesn't give him right to take it, but it makes it hard for me to be mad at him. So, brother...wherever you are, you are made from the same deprived slime that I am, and I forgive you. You can keep the chain. Think of it as a gift. May God bless you and have mercy on your soul.