I looted, took advantage of a friendship, and put my wife in danger.Â
I don’t remember what happened that caused us all to start looting a gas station, but I remember jumping in and taking anything I could. At first, I was just grabbing the stuff I was already going to buy, but then I thought I might be able to resell some of the stuff I took. I looked for anything expensive — but its a gas station right. I grabbed oil. I went to the car to unload what I had taken, thinking I would just run back in and take even more. While I was doing that, people all around me were grabbing stuff off the shelves, just like I was. I remember thinking, “what’s wrong with these people?” Stephanie asked what was going on when I dropped the stuff I had stolen off in the car. “Nothing, just start packing this stuff up” I told her. When I got back to the gas station, the door was locked. A friend of mine (I have no idea who it was, just that I knew the guy) was inside, wearing a gas station uniform. He asked what I was doing, I asked him for a two liter of soda pop. “I can’t, I could lose my job” he said, but I was convincing. “I just need a drink, man. I won’t be long and look, so much is already gone, what would anyone notice?” There was someone else in the store with him that I didn’t recognize. He let me in.
Once inside I grabbed two bottles of Mt Dew and started making small talk. I was looking for opportunity. If I could get him to let me take more stuff, I could… take more stuff. We talked about the looting. “These people are crazy, right.” We were in the back of the store. Something was happening up front and he ran to see what. I took my opening – I grabbed a bottle of something near the oil. I also saw jelly and thought of taking it: we didn’t have anything jelly at the house. I decided not too, but when I saw a few boxes of Life cereal, I grabbed. I stuffed them in the platic bags my friend had given me to carry the soda.
I headed for the front door. My friend looked and saw that I had taken more than soda. He looked disappointed, but didn’t say anything about the excess loot. Then I noticed several bikes being sold in the middle of the station. “Wow! I can’t believe no one took these!” I said. “Yeah, we got lucky on that” he replied. I was thinking, if I had seen those, I know I would have taken them first. They are worth more than a bottle of oil. But I couldn’t think of a way to get one now. I headed back to the car.
Everything after that starts to fade as I was waking up. Why was I looting? Why didn’t I see that my looting was the same as everyone else that I had looked at like they were crazy? The bikes weren’t there the first time, so why were they there when I couldn’t get them? Why did my friend let me in, even though the obviously disapproved of my stealling? And why didn’t my wife ask more questions about the stolen stuff?
I have little doubt this dream is anything more than the two woppers I had from Burger King last night before I went to bed, however there are a few things I see that I find interesting:
- My hyporisy – I looked down on people because of the very sins I was committing.
- My poor leadership – I lead my wife into sin, and she followed me without question.
- My friendships destoried – I took advantage of my friendship regardless of the consequences to him or our relationship.
- My greed – No matter how much I took, there was always more better things I couldn’t get that made everthing I already had worthless.