The Rebound – 2/4/2005 - Revised.

 The Rebound – 2/4/2005

There is only so much testing a man can take, I told my friend Rafi yesterday. And God—it seems—is testing me to the max. So much so that I flipped during my evening prayer. I had just finished praying and was in the act of besieging—or to put it plainly, asking God to lend me a hand like I always do at the end of every prayer—when suddenly, out of nowhere, a part of me just shouted out:

"AAHH! Enough of this!"

"I’m begging... and it seems to get worse by the day!"

I was stunned by the outburst—it came from somewhere deep within me, raw and unfiltered. I had no control over it. Beneath my quiet exterior, I harbor so much anger and frustration at life that, had I been utterly alone in this world today, I might have joined Osama Bin Laden or just blown myself up for good measure. I mean it—life sucks at the moment.

The former Prime Minister of Malaysia once asked, "What makes a terrorist?"
Well, he’s looking at one.
Except I’m a little too late in age for suicide bombings...
So I take my jihad to the blog.

I’ve said before that this blog is my catharsis—a place to vent my anger and frustration, while also sharing the best of my creative work. After all, it's called Ramblings of the Cheeseburger Buddha, and ramblings they are.

Take yesterday: Telekom called and warned me that my phone would be disconnected unless I paid up. This, after I had already paid half of what I owed a week ago! I should’ve kept that money and let them sweat it out of me, but I thought I was doing the right thing.

It took them three months to install my phone line when I moved into this house. When I finally confronted their servicemen at the local office, their excuse was: "We couldn’t locate your house."
Imagine that—a national telecom company boasting about profits and service efficiency, telling me they couldn’t find a house in a residential neighborhood!

Now I can’t pay for two months, and their bounty hunters keep ringing me up with threats of disconnection. So, to all of you who call me from time to time just to see if I’m still alive—please forgive me if I don’t return your calls. This is just another temporary setback... until the next tsunami hits.

Yes, God is testing me.

And as the Buddha would say, it’s my karmic consequences playing themselves out. At my age, I’m still haggling with life, still exposing my flaws, still trying to explain away every mess I’ve made—as if doing so would justify my existence.

Yet I fully acknowledge the wisdom of Lao Tzu:

"A man who justifies himself does not convince, not even himself."

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