Chapter 2
The door to door salesman
So back in the nineteen fifties people bought all kind of things from door to door salesmen. It was a time when milkmen would still deliver milk right to your back door. I remember the Helms bakery truck on our street and of course the Good Humor ice cream truck. My mother, Norma bought stainless steel cookware from a door to door salesman. She also bought us the 1956 World Book encyclopedia. Something every kid needed at the time. Just a few years later of course the information was out dated and not of much value. Just like life, valuable information one minute of little use the next. The pictures were fun to look at. Of course we bought many items from the famous Fuller Brush salesman. She almost bought me an accordion once from a fast talking salesman. I’m glad she passed on that one.
She never got permission from my father for anything she ever bought. And boy, was he pissed when he got the bill for $319 for the stainless steel cook ware. A lot of money for my poor old dad to cough up back in 1955. I bet the encyclopedias wasn’t cheap either.
The thing about my father was, he probably was the most pussy whipped man on the planet. In fact if you look up the word “pussy whipped” in the dictionary, it has a picture of my father’s face there.
In 1952 my mother bought something really strange from a door to door sells person. No one was expecting it, for sure. It was a religion. This turn out to be very expensive. The cost of which turned out to be hundreds of thousands of dollars. Even though she has been dead for over thirty years it’s a bill that her children, grandchildren and her great grandchildren are still paying for till this day. Yep, the gift that keeps on giving.
The first Jehovah’s Witnesses my mother ever met looked pretty innocent. They were two sweet little old ladies knocking on our door on a warm Saturday morning in Azusa, California. They had quite a story to tell my mother. A story that made my mother quake with fear. A story that confirmed my mother’s worst fears. The ladies pulled out their bibles and showed her scripture after scripture that showed her that Satan the devil was in charge of everything here on Earth. He was in control of all the governments, churches and businesses. They showed her how bad people are, by reading to her second Timothy, third chapter, were it said “But know this, that in the last days grievous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, haughty, revilers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, implacable, slanderers, without self-control, fierce, no lovers of good, traitors, headstrong, puffed up, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God; holding a form of godliness, but having denied the power therefore. From these also turn away.”
My poor mom, she looked like someone had just shot her dog. She knew in her heart they were right about how bad people really are. She felt this way for many years. Yes, the world was a terrible place. She knew this ever since she was eight years old. She knew this right after her mother died trying to give herself an abortion with a coat hanger in Kansas farm house in the winter of 1934. After which her father shipped her and her brothers off to live with different relatives. She knew this ever since her drunken seventy year old grandfather came into her bedroom late one night and sexually abused her after her mother was dead for just one month.
The old ladies could see it in her face. They had found one of “god’s sheep.” They got a gleam in their eye. It was time for the close. It was time give her the good news. What was the good news after scaring the shit out of my poor mom? The good news they told her is god was really pissed too. So much so that very soon he would be coming down here with his son and kicking some serious ass. How much ass would be kicked? Billions of people would soon be dead. However, more good news, she and just a few others could be saved. Yes, she could save herself and her family if she joined god’s people. She needed to join god’s people and spread the word about the coming destruction of the vast majority of mankind. Time was running out back in 1952. It was time to spread the good news! They sold my mother two magazines for 10 cents and left. They would be coming back to study the bible with her every week at no charge. This home bible study was a course completely free. That just shows you how nice they are. There was a bill of course but it came much later.
Anyway they started off studying the bible with the help of numerous bible study aids. The most popular one at that time was the “Let God Be True” book. Bible study aids are needed because the bible needs help to really understand it. It really needs some aids. The little old ladies informed my mother “That the bible can be very vague in places so the aids can help you and point you in the right direction.”
I found out years later that there are over 20,000 different Christian sects in the world. I wonder if they all have “bible study aids” too. Aids to point you in the 20,000 different directions you can go in trying to figure out the mind of god and what the Bible is really trying to say. Wow! 20,000 different concepts of what the Bible really means. What’s interesting is the vast majority of these churches feel they have the only true way to god.
The aids explained to my mother what got god so pissed off in the first place. It seemed that in the beginning of in creation with Adam and Eve, Satan challenged god to a contest. He said that given enough time he could turn everyone on the planet against him. Satan had already won this contest with Jehovah when he turned the two perfect people created away from him, Adam and Eve. So god wanted a rematch, so he said sure bring it on. So for about six thousand years Jehovah and Satan have been fighting over who could get the most followers. Now the time is almost up. Very soon the ladies said the “very great day of god the almighty was coming. The great war of Armageddon.” The war between god and man. The funny thing about this war, was god was going to kill billions of men, women and children because they chose Satan instead of him. It turns out that there is only about one Jehovah’s Witness to every thousand people on the planet. So most of the people are not going to make it, just like in the time of Noah. God’s answer to this huge loss in the popular vote is to kill off all those who are not for him. If you read the bible this has been going on since the beginning of time. One of the biggest causes of death on the planet is god.
However, Armageddon will be the granddaddy of all massacres on the planet. I say massacres because no one can fight against god. It will just be god wiping out mankind. So what happens to Satan then? He gets death too or even torture? Nope, god has a better idea, he going to put him prison for a thousand years. Most of mankind dies and Satan lives? Yep, it seems god has another plan for him. God likes to test people. So after a thousand years god is going to let him out of jail. He needs to test all his perfect people again. If you choose correctly you get everlasting life with the rest of god’s people. If you choose incorrectly you get squashed like a cockroach. This seems like a no brainer. But according to the Bible a big percentage of people would really die then live with god’s people for eternity. I wonder why?
It was six months of hard studying for my mother to get this all straight. Getting inside the mind of god is not easy stuff.
Anyway after a few weeks of studying the bible with her new friends, it was time to meet the rest of the congregation. I didn’t remember the first meeting we went to. I was too young but I heard about it years later. Yes, everyone “Love bombed” my mother. What is love bombing? It goes like this. You go to their Kingdom Hall. That is what the Jehovah’s Witnesses call their meeting place. You are introduced to many different people with smiling faces.
“Norma this is Sister Jones.”
“Norma we are so happy you are here.”
“I love your baby Norma, just call be Brother White.”
You get the idea. Everyone loves you. We are all brothers and sisters in god’s big happy family.
My mother finally found a home. A real home with people who really liked her. After years of being an outsider and with no real family around at least ones she liked, she got her adapted family finally.
She never asked my baby sister and me if we wanted to join Mom’s new family. She of course didn’t consult my pussy wiped father either.
They say everything in life is timing. It’s so true. Timing is everything! Ask any salesmen.
There is a story about a man in New York City who is of average age and build, nothing special to look at. He spends all day walking up and down Madison Ave. He walks up to 150 to 200 women a day. He looks them straight in the eye and asks them. “Do you want to fuck?” And yes, his face gets slapped. He gets cursed at. There is a lot of upset women after that rude question. He also has sex with two or three of these women a day who like his question. He said in an interview “some of these women were gorgeous.” He also said. “It’s all about timing and persistence.”
What is the purpose of this story? I guess to illustrate the concept that no matter how wacky or strange an idea can be, if you talk to enough people there is always a few whack jobs out there that think it’s a great idea. Yes, it’s the good old spaghetti principle, you throw spaghetti against the wall some sticks but most of it doesn’t.
My mom needed a family besides ours and she finally got it. The two little old ladies timing was perfect.
The timing is everything. My good old Mom and Dad proved that when they met.
[KC1]