A Minor Crisis of Conscience

For better or worse, these apparently really are the times that try my soul. I suppose that I should be getting used to it by now, but, somehow, I keep getting surprised every time the rug is yanked out from under my feet. And the bitch of it is, it happens with such regularity that I have no excuse for being so surprised when it happens.

I have a friend who, if I were going to be most charitable in my description of her, I would say never met a ponzi scheme she didn't like. In other words, living proof of the axiom that a fool and your money will soon be partners. Although absolutely none of the schemes she's gotten involved in have, to date, paid off - a fact that is hardly surprising - she continues to fork out thousands of dollars and fervently believes that is she only works the internet hard enough, all of her something for nothing dreams will come true. Boundless riches wait just around the corner, ripe for the taking.

Of course, if that were indeed true, everybody in the country would be a millionaire, living it up in Beverly Hills with a cee-ment pond out back. On the other hand, there is a kernel of truth behind her something for nothing dreams: she is, indeed, giving up something for nothing.

Now, being a good shrink, I know this already: addictive personalities will always find something to be addicted to. In her case, having given up both smoking and drinking, she has replaced them with oyramid schemes. In point of fact, there isn't really any difference between that and being addicted to gambling. And, like any other addiction, the fallout isn't just limited to the individual engaged in the activity, but to everyone around them as well.

Heartless as it may sound, if it were just her involved, the best prescription would be to just leave the whole thing alone until she hit rock bottom. You can't reason with an addict - I know, I've tried - nor will an addict change their behaviour until circumstances force them to, and even then it's an iffy proposition. After all, addicts revert to their previous behaviours with frightening regularity, despite what Betty Ford and the other fine people at Trembling Hills would have you believe.

Which brings us to my current crisis of conscience.

My friend approached me this evening with a truly heart-breaking story. She and her husband are currently $8,000 dollars in arrears on their property taxes and, if those taxes are not paid by December 2nd, their home will be seized and auctioned off in a Sheriff's sale. Of course, if we connect the dots, it's kind of easy to see that they're $8k behind in their property tax because that money was forked over to someone else in one of the many get-rich-quick schemes my friend has gotten herself involved in. And now, her problem has become my problem because she has asked me to loan her the money to pay off their tax.

You know, not to put too fine a point on it, but I am poorer than a churchmouse. I am on Disability, which totals a whopping twelve hundred a month, and almost all of the money that I did manage to salt away while I was still working is almost all gone. Do I have enough money to loan her to make up her tax arrears? Yeah, I do. But in doing that, I will become almost completely broke, and my savings account not so much that as just a collection of spare change.

The thing is, I've been down this road before. Almost a year ago, my friend had approached me because they were almost $15,000 dollars in arrears in their Federal income tax. Why? You guessed it, because she had been handing money out hand over fist to internet assholes who promised her fantastic returns on her "investments" for little or no effort on her part. At the time, I gave her $10,000 dollars to help pay that particular debt off.

I say "gave" because I do not loan people money. Loaning implies that the money will actually be paid back, something that, frankly, is unlikely to happen. If you don't expect to be paid back, then you can't be disappointed and there won't be any hard feelings involved. Right?

Which again brings us back to my crisis of conscience. No matter how much I may want to deny this fact, it is very unlikely that I will ever be able to go back to work. Physically, there are just too many things going wrong all at the same time. I can go through mental gymnastics with the best of them, but the reality of it is that I am most likely going to be consigned to living off Disability for the rest of my life. Until it all started getting siphoned off into the black hole of my friend's current addiction, what I had in my savings account was a hedge against that future, a small cushion that I could have used as leverage against a future of abject poverty.

Which is now gone, because I already know what I'm going to do in regard to her current request. Rather than see them go homeless - and myself, too, since I live with them - I'll give her the money, and try to ignore the fact that my savings have gone from $20,000 dollars to almost nothing in just about a year. But it does beg the question of just how far the bonds of friendship extend. The fact that I will never see that money again doesn't bother me nearly as much as the fact that, knowing the circumstances I am in, I was asked for it in the first place. And now that this tap is dry, just what happens the next time? See my earlier point about fools, money and partners.

So, perhaps this isn't really a crisis of conscience, but a crisis of faith. Which, these days, is decidedly lacking. And I have no one to blame, really, but myself.