What Is This Midnight Fuel Which We Often Find Ourselves Burning?

What is this feeling we call life? Do we control it? Or by it are we controlled?

As often happens in one's life, I became deathly hungry, starved, one might say. And due in part to convenience, I drove my vehicle, my artificial mode of transportation, to the Taco Bell drive-thru.

"Welcome to Taco Bell," the voice said from inside the menu box, like a ghostly apparition, representing human life in the form of food choices. "What can I get for you?"

"I left my house with a craving, a desire for chicken quesadillas. However, it seems now that my stomach has changed its mind. Is that not the way of life itself? We head out into the world to obtain, to achieve. Yet when we find ourselves faced with success and accomplishment, it comes lacking. Mankind strives for more. More land. More food. More wealth. Even more life so that more time can exist for which to grasp more. And like so many humans, I too find myself wanting more. I see the picture of the grilled stuft burrito and it appears rather fulfilling. Yet quesadillas are the motive for my spurring to action, for my being here this very second. They were the catalyst bringing me to my destiny, but only to change my course and choose a grilled stuft burrito."

"I have one grilled stuft burrito, will there be anything else?"

"Indeed! I am certain there will always be more. We will never cease with the abundance of plenty in this world. No matter what happens, there is always something to want and to pursue. Be it food, romance or even paper towels after spilling one's red wine on white carpet. It seems our true destiny is to adhere to the sin of gluttony. Yet is it our fault? We did not ask for the cravings. Nor did we ask to live in a world so ripe with objects suited to fulfill our every whim."

"Okay, that'll be $2.19 at the second window."

I accelerated the vehicle. Slowly I made my way to the penultimate window, also the first window. And then to the second where my Holy Grail, the ultimate boon of hunger, was awaiting me. Like Excalibur to King Arthur, this burrito would be the object that allows me to continue on my quest. Without it, I could not go forth into the night and continue my father's research.

"Here you go. That's $2.19, sir."

I handed him three dollar bills, each with the face of George Washington, the first President of America. How do I know this? Is it not common for Indians to know of American history? Perhaps. Yet I knew this trivial fact. Why me? Out of the billions of Indians in the world, is it mere chance that I, one of the few with this knowledge of American history, would arrive in America and exchange currency containing the very essence of my American history lessons on its cloth-like paper? Or is it fate?

You may say that God has a hand in destiny. That He creates destiny and it is His will being carried out. If that is the case, then I would submit to you that God is a grilled stuft burrito. Afterall, it is this very burrito that is sustaining me now, as I write this post. It is this burrito that fulfills my needs, my cravings. And it is this burrito that is leading me along my path of destiny. And if so, I am prepared to do God's will and eat Him.