BY REX C. MUZONES
IN THESE trying and difficult times, borrowing and lending has metamorphosed into a national past time; an art form; even a way of life, to those who do not pay.
My misguided studies and sorrowful experience show that the good and the kind lender is more prone to stress and depression than the bad and notorious borrower. The goodness that you do and the kindness that you show gali in lending money causes stress disorders and deep suicidal depression, more so if the debt is unpaid. Gali is Hiligaynon for it seems.
On the other hand, once the money has changed resting place to the borrower’s pocket, he is happy and elated because he has money and paying it is the least of his worries. Which is why the lender is stressed and suicidal, especially if it is his wife’s money he lent out.
But it is not as awful as it seems. It’s only money and what’s money if you don’t have any?
The eternal joust between lender and borrower can be taken as a learning aid; an exercise of brain power which is good for both parties.
The borrower thinks up of schemes and sad stories to tenderize the heart of the lender, thus, making the loan inevitable and undeniable. But the lender, in self-defense, also has to exercise the corresponding mental agility double-time to concoct plausible and acceptable excuses why he cannot extend the loan. Like his house was burned down or his mother-in-law has mouth cancer and he has to brush her teeth and similar analogous disasters.
The lender, too, is constrained to maintain himself in top fit condition with good eye sight so that he can immediately cross the street to avoid meeting the borrower. So, the ritual improves the physical and mental health of both participants. The borrower implicitly wants to meet the lender; the lender doesn’t want to see his face. And the battle of greeting and avoidance rages. Because in the over all, the most difficult thing to do, is how to avoid lending money to a non-paying friend who is in need.
What makes it doubly difficult is because this friend is always in need and afflicted with Alzheimer, forgetting that he has not yet paid his past five loans and now comes another.
When these travails become an unavoidable tragedy on the part of the lender, just, consider it as an indulgence to God. Your adherence to his teaching that: When you help your brethren, you are helping Me.
You see? Be god-like and kiss your Aquino goodbye.
And remember the words of Pastor Quibug-oy: When you give to Me, the Appointed Son, you shall be rewarded three-fold. Hey, this sounds good, though a bit usurious and worse, you don’t know when.
Your consolation, though, in giving to Pastor Quibug-oy is that he will buy Rolex watch or a jet plane because it is the Will of the Father. Ayleluyah.
This underground financial industry outside the regulation of the Central Bank continues and persists as long as there are the poor and needy…for God loves them because he made so many of them. While there are so few of us.
Find solace in the words of the Great Bard, pare William: In life, neither a lender nor a borrower be; For if the debt is unpaid, you lose your credit and what is more, you lose a friend./PN
