y-talks

At the vegetable (i had to look up how to spell that) today I was approached by a lovely group of people. Four twenty-something year olds. It was impressive how friendly they were. They made sure to ask me everything about myself it felt like. They did it with no judgement and what it seemed like, no ulterior motive. Simply asking me about who I am, my name and the normal backstory that usually comes with explaining what the origin of my name is, and other random questions.

After they asked me to do an impression of my improv classmate, j, I finally had a chance to ask them about who they are. thats when I learned they were christian missionaries. they were going to school here and would be here till their ship-date to Africa, in May.

They are Christian missionaries, going to Africa in May. That is pretty legit. If that is not Christian I dont know what is. That was the most Christian thing I have heard. Is that why they were so charming? J at work made me think about it afterwards. Were they nice, or were they Christian missionaries?

I thought back to one of my dear friends that I made a couple years ago, B. B was a wonderful friend, he was someone I could truly rely on and was one of the nicest people I knew. Was it because he was Christian? B did not have any ulterior motives, he never once tried to do his missionary thing on me. Is there a chance that this group of 4 was doing the same thing? Or are they genuinely just really nice people.

It’s funny now that I think about it. What about them I found so nice– it all had to do with the way they talked and interacted with me. They knew exactly what to target: my ego. They made me feel special and visible. I was the center of their attention. The showed it to me multiple ways: maintained eye contact with me, asked me about my job, asked about my “secret passions,” they were curious just about everything about me. It happened organically too. One of them, C, just came up to say how awesome our vegetable store is, one question led to another and boom, next thing you know theres 3 others standing there looking at me as if they had never seen anything like me before. That felt really good. Feeling like they’d never seen anything like me before. I felt like a performer and an entertainer. Making sure that I kept that persona going for them. Trying to prove that they in fact have not seen anything like me before. In a way that is true for anything right? Anyone we lay our eyes on is unlike anything we have seen before. I do wonder now if this was real. if they wanted to know everything about me just to get in a good word, maybe convince them that its worth becoming christian. im totally assuming now. assuming that just because people have this belief it MUST mean everything else is motivated by that belief. that thought needs to be challenged. Where does assuming really go? If we look at the evidence, which is what i recommend we always do, they were just being nice. and we are all influenced by who we are, it doesnt necessarily dictate who i am. if we were to use that logic than everything would have an ulterior motive based on our beliefs and morals. as a missionary maybe you get taught those things, I DONT KNOW I AM NOT A MISSIONARY!!!! but im assuming you get taught some tactics to convey the word(s) of someone who you have beliefs in and to spread them because they are, as you believe, to be superior or more valid, than someone elses belief. imagine writing one million run-on sentences and not knowing how to use punctuation?? ANYWAYS. They were christian missionaries AND they were really nice.