Dear Karma Cleanser:
I need an escape. I’ve been in the same go-nowhere job for three years now. It hasn’t been a bad run here, but I am bored with it and ready to try something new. I started thinking this thought on a daily basis about two months ago, pleading with my higher power to open a door for me.
My old girlfriend “Marta” always used to say to me, “Ask and you’ll receive.” Well, I asked, and I’ve received. Except, I’m not sure this is what I asked for. I have been virtually offered a job in Boston. (It’s not a final thing yet, but almost.) All I have to do is say yes. It’s not my top choice of places to live because I don’t like the climate there. I worry that if I don’t take this job, though, another chance might not come along. And how can I ask the powers-that-be for a second chance when I blew the first one?
Would I risk bad karma by saying no to this opportunity? How do you know when to leap and when to relax?— Nothing in Common with Boston
You know the answer already. You say from the get-go that you’re ready for a new challenge in your life. Yet when an opportunity comes along, you don’t jump at it? Sure, maybe Boston isn’t Aruba. Maybe you’ll have to deal with a group of pasty, preppy New Englanders who say things like “yad” and “cah,” and name their cats after sports teams. But isn’t this exactly what you’ve been waiting for? What you asked for is a new challenge, a way to defeat your obvious inertia. It’s an adventure! Don’t argue with the universe. Seems to us this is one case where Marta really is smarta.
Dear Karma Cleanser:
Your use of the term “karma” as your columns [sic.] description shows your complete understanding of the concept, and also displays your arrogance/ego in believing yourself qualified to dispense advice regarding same. Get a job lazy, arrogant, egotistical, thieving (what you get paid is unearned), Christian BUM!— Michael THE BUDDHA
Um, thanks, Mr. Buddha. We had no idea you were reading our column. Or that you were reading at all. Or that you’d have such pitiful grammar. But we digress. It seems crazy that an Enlightened One should show such anger, or use the term “Christian” as a slur. (Not that we’re claiming any specific dogma here — the Karma Cleanser tends to go for the all-you-can-eat religious buffet approach, which you’d know if you really did read the column.) As for your demand that we get a job, so long as we receive letters like yours, we’ll never want for work. Be good.
Been bad? karma@creativeloafing.com.
This article appears in Aug 27 – Sep 2, 2003.
