Kudzu Queen

By Tamara Ducote

When the drugs and alcohol quit working, a person is in truly dire straits. Or so I’ve heard. Such a desperate person will try any drastic measure for a little peace of mind. I think I read that somewhere. It is rumored some folks have even been driven to try spirituality.

In the spiritual fellowship I joined, prayer is a big thing. I have been learning a lot about prayer, lately.

I was spawned and raised Southern Baptist, so I am no stranger to pious supplication. I managed to escape Dry Ridge, Kentucky at a fairly young age, so at least one of my prayers was answered. Or, more likely, the prayers of the devout citizens of Dry Ridge, Kentucky were answered.

My prayers used to consist of wish lists, and they were generally ineffective. This is because when you pray wish list prayers, you are treating God like Santa Claus, and God doesn’t like this. He considers it a demotion. Likening God to Santa Claus is like calling your new boyfriend by your ex-boyfriend’s name. It’s just not good policy.

One of the things I learned is that we are supposed to pray for our enemies. I had no problem with this. I’d been doing it for years (“Dear God, please send a huge, stinking garbage truck to run over that ugly, skanky bitch. Soon would be good. Thanks. Amen.”). To my dismay, I learned that I’d been doing it all wrong. We are supposed to ask God to give our enemies the things we wish for ourselves. Things that make us happy. This was a bitter pill to swallow, indeed, until I found the loophole. I learned it from my friend Jane, who has an advanced degree in Deviousness.

Jane’s own personal curse was a needy, demanding stepmother who insisted Jane drive her all over the county on an endless series of errands. Being a dutiful daughter and also codependent as all get-out, Jane couldn’t refuse. Then one day, Jane’s car air-conditioning died. Jane discovered, to her delight, that this development immediately relieved her of having to tote Stepmomma hither and yon.

The stepmom couldn’t tolerate the heat. Jane elected to not get her A/C fixed, and now she tools around in happy solitude, without the burden of an annoying relative OR a guilt trip. Having her A/C die was a boon to Jane. Therefore, she can in good conscience pray for this to happen to her enemies.

I love snakes. Although I’ve gotten out of the snake-keeping business, I retain a passion for the creatures. My favorite was Pandora, a friendly eastern hognose snake that would sleep coiled up on my stomach in the wintertime. There are very few things that would make me as happy as waking to find a fine, fat, sassy eastern hognose snake coiled up on the pillow next to me. This, I decided, was something I could pray to happen to adversaries, and I would still be following the prayer rules.

I used to drive around town sometimes with my six-foot-long corn snake, Fancy, coiled around my steering wheel. This, too, could be a prayer request (“Dear God, please let a snake spontaneously appear coiled around __’s steering column while he is driving in heavy traffic. Thanks. Amen.”). As I am a generous soul, I would unselfishly pray that the snake be really, really big.

How does it feel to pray for somebody’s horrible untimely death, and then the person actually croaks? I’ve only had this happen once, but I’ll be honest, it feels pretty damned good. If I’ve got God validating my low opinion of the person, I really don’t need anybody else’s.

I imagined God’s Charleton Heston voice booming through the clouds: “Y’know, Tam, you were right. The world really WOULD be a better place without this asshole. Stand by. ZAP!”

A word of advice: Should somebody you hate die, it is advisable to keep your glee to yourself. For example, you should not say, upon learning of the death, “Cool! I’ve been praying for that for six months!” It is perfectly OK to make up a happy little song about the event. But keep it to yourself. By no means should you skip through the house singing the song. Even if the song is really, really clever and funny. Because your teenaged daughter will get completely creeped-out and move out of the house for two days. It is also considered poor form to try to finagle an invitation to the funeral just because you’d get a kick out of seeing the bastard dead.

Nobody I know needs to worry about being ZAPPED nowadays, because my fellowship’s prayer rules prohibit me from asking for stuff like this. But if you wake up one morning to find a gigantic, puffed-up, hissing snake three inches from your face, you’ll know that I’ve been praying for you.

If your car air-conditioning dies, you’ll know you’ve been in Jane’s prayers. If you’re merging into heavy traffic and simultaneously, an enormous, writhing serpent appears on your dashboard AND your climate control system fails, you’ll know you’ve found your way onto BOTH of our prayer lists. God help you.

Contact Tamara Ducote at TDDucote6@aol.com.

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