I’m a good person (arguably, a biased opinion), yet every now and then I get excited at the idea of ruining someone’s day. Ever have that? I don’t mean like slowing down because you don’t like how aggressive the person behind you is driving. That’s just a regular day. I also don’t mean ruining someone’s day in a mean way. I’m a good person, so I need to ruin it in a nice way. What I mean is more like holding a door for someone who’s just a little too far from the door, so they now feel obligated to do a little jog to get to the door quicker and not look rude themselves. See how this makes me a jerk? I cause unnecessary anxiety and sweating to someone by being “nice”. It’s a win-win because I look good while being jerk. I think part of me enjoys this because I used to be so obsessed with rules and being perfect (aka annoying), so now my rebellious nature is kicking in, and it helps me feel “wild and crazy”. Yes, I know this is far from wild and crazy, but as I claimed earlier, I’m a good person (aka someone who hides their jerk side well).
I have recently come up with the ultimate way to be a nice person, but the biggest jerk in the world, and I’m really excited about it. It’s so simple, yet mind blowingly awesommme with three ‘m’s to emphasize how awesommme it is. My idea… are you ready?… my idea is to put my neighbor’s recycling bins back. Sounds nice doesn’t it? But not when the garbage trucks haven’t been by yet. I won’t put back an empty recycling container like a normal good person; I’ll put back the very same container full of stuff my neighbor put out. Do you see the brilliance of this? It’s going to blow my neighbor’s mind, and not in a good way. Sometime after he goes to work and before the truck shows up, I’ll go out and return his recycling bins to the exact spot he always leaves them. Later that day he’ll get home and be like, “Huhn, the recycling bins are gone. Someone nice must have put the bins back.” And someone nice did put the bins back, me, but at the wrong time. My neighbor will feel good about life because someone did something nice for him… that is until he sees that the bins are still full. What? He’ll be like “Did I not put the bins out today? I could’ve sworn I did, but then how could they still be full and put back? It is Thursday… isn’t it?” So he’ll check with his wife, but she’ll think he forgot because he’s a guy and therefore must be incompetent… you know, what most wives of many years think about their husband. The next week my neighbor will be very careful to put the recycling out because he’ll have two week’s worth, so he’ll double check and triple check, and he’ll go to work feeling good. But after he leaves for work and before the garbage trucks come… yeah, I’ll go out and put his recycling bins back again. My neighbor will come home and again he’ll be like, “Someone nice must have put the bins away.” Of course, after last week he won’t be as confident about this idea, but he triple checked so it’ll fine… won’t it? He’ll start to feel better just as he goes to the side of the house where he’ll see the bins right where they were before he supposedly put them out. No! What’s going on? He’ll be like “I know I put them out. I triple checked!!! Didn’t I?” He’ll go in and ask his wife about it and she’ll be super annoyed because how incompetent is her husband? He now has 2 week’s worth of recycling and he’s getting testy. Meanwhile his wife is losing her mind… and I’m laughing hysterically. Third week, I need to change it up. He’ll know he put the bins out and his wife will check on him because she doesn’t trust him and three week’s worth of recycling is getting ridiculous. So this time I let the truck come and remove the recycling, which will be fun to watch because so much recycling at one stop will ruin the worker’s day – that’s the bonus moment of being good but a jerk at the same time – and as soon as he’s done, I go out and bring the bins in… to my house. My neighbor will come home and have a little panic attack because the bins aren’t out, but he couldn’t have forgotten because his wife checked. Afraid to be happy that someone was nice, he’ll quickly run to the house to see the recycling is, in fact, gone, which is good… but so are all the bins. Where are the bins? My neighbor will go back to the curb; nothing there. They’re not at the curb or the house? Confused, he’ll go in the house and ask his wife: “Where are the bins?” And as soon as he goes in the house, I’ll put one bin out at the house and one at the curb. How could he miss both? Unless he’s starting to go senile… Now he’ll go outside with his wife to show her how the bins are gone and that’s when they’ll see there’s a bin at the house and at the curb where he didn’t think there was anything at all. He’ll protest: “But they weren’t here a minute ago!” His wife will now call the doctor because her husband is clearly insane and I’ve ruined his life… but that’s what you get when you flick your cigarette butts on my lawn, and refuse to stop. Payback is mine, sucka!
So will I ever do this plan? Of course not, but it’s fun to think about. Sometimes we need to let ourselves think of crazy things like this in order to not feel so bottled up and a slave to rules. Thus, being creative can actually help fight symptoms of depression. I once read that Stephen King claimed if he wasn’t a writer like he is, he’d be a criminal. I think he made the right choice. Our creative minds are a wonderful thing, and we need to take the time to let this creativity come out, especially if it gives us joy and a sense of purpose. Being creative is part of being human; we just need to use it appropriately and know when to follow through with an idea and when to just think about it and smile.
This week may you get to do something creative that’s fulfilling.
Rev Chad David, ChadDavid.ca, learning to love dumb people