The Seven Deadly Sins Read Online Free PDF Page B

her, leaving all the kids by themselves. I sat up and waited with the younger ones. The cops showed up, hands on their guns. My sister started screaming, which set off the other kids. I told the police they had fled into the night and a few of them ran in the approximate direction. Sometime later, Tom was led back in handcuffs. Christine was screaming from the cop car. An officer was asking me for my phone number.
    My mom’s roommate’s boyfriend came and picked us up and took us home. The sun was coming up. My sister was quiet for several days. We never saw those people again.
    Rage is not a sin, but it can be the trigger that makes us commit sins. The real problem comes when we bottle up emotion and ignore the fact that we need to let ourselves be angry. Bad things happen when good people pretend nothing is wrong. I am sure Tom was a fairly decent person, just as I am certain that Christine cared about her kids. My judgments are based on the vague memories from an eleven-year-old’s point of view. I remember the emotion more than the circumstances. But these
things stuck with me because shit like that happened all the time. My sister and I were not protected from raw hate and powerful anger. It showed me that, with the right push, and the right pressure, anyone could be hurt at any time. That in turn made me angry, made me hate the world, made me distrust everyone. It was not fair; I should not have had to grow up like that. I turned it into music. Most people turn it into crime.
    But then again, I still maintain that rage is not a sin. When properly expressed, anger can be beneficial. Some of the best art in the world is angry, jolting, and abrasive. Moderation—always practice moderation. You cannot place blame on the sin for one simple reason: If you blame one, you must blame all. If that is the case, then we are all guilty. The people who watched and did nothing are guilty. The ones who laughed and thought it was funny are guilty. The ones who suffered instead of saying something are guilty. Imagine a family tree of nothing more than the names of the people involved and you will get the idea.
    The flip side to this rusty coin is that rage can make us do funny things. Have you ever been so mad you could not say anything? Have you ever been so mad that you just blurt out the most ludicrous shit known to man? It is a base idiocy that can be as infectious as the very anger itself. Try talking to someone when you are pissed off—words escape you and everything just gets louder and louder, to the point when you are using monosyllabic words and belting at the top of your lungs. You sound like an auctioneer with Tourette’s syndrome.
    To an outside observer, the telltale signs of someone getting angry can be hilarious as well. Their face might get red, then purple. They might start smiling or laughing while they shake their heads. Their lips might purse and their eyes will get all squinty like they are channeling Clint Eastwood or Steven Seagal. Watch
their hands—they could either start squeezing or sweating, depending on their mentality. Teeth might actually grind if their mouths don’t go slack from incredulous shock. All of these things are incredibly fucking funny to me, and I find myself giggling when people are incensed. That, in turn, exacerbates the situation. I cannot help it. It is awesome. Then again, it drives me nuts when people do it to me, and I become uncontrollable. I have to walk away to keep from firing off.
    Sins are the unwashed marks on your spiritual record. So how is it something we all feel almost every day is counted against you? I get it—rage can send someone down a disturbing path that can contribute to actions of questionable purity. But getting pissed shouldn’t mean getting burned. To be mad is to react to a moment beyond your control. Reacting to something you cannot control is life in a nutshell. How the fuck is that a sin?
    Let me clue you in on a real