Matthew Mudge. Who was this man? No, not a man; a phlebotomotic nightmare. The most handy nightmare around. The most helpful of beings. Too helpful. Annoyingly so. He helped and you wanted to boot him in that smiling face. Why did he help? No one knew. Why did he smile? Because he liked to help. This was the vicious circle.
Matthew Mudge. We all knew that the name was absurd. It couldn’t be real. We all knew that his acts of kindness were performative. But for whom? The almighty God of course. That great celestial being who slept with innumerable women on the seventh day. It was unconscionable. An abuse of power – the dawn of time. And now, here we are; Godless, starved of faith, addicted to sugar, and doomed to look bad next to the helping hand of Matthew Mudge. When he spoke, he seemed too nice. When he spoke, children beamed. When he laughed, you wanted to take him out with an anvil to the jaw.
“Please let me help you with that bag of canned fruit, sir. Please, let me alleviate the strain from your back and your legs and maybe you can start to appreciate the real joys of life again: Swimming. Dining naked,” said Matthew Mudge. The good fucking samaritan was at it again. Helluva clip.
The old man smiled, relieved. His teeth were weak. His face was weathered, as if it had succumbed to too many years of long shore drift. But smile he did, and those big, old teeth bared the wisdom of the world. Was it plaque? No, it was life stained on the teeth of a man who had truly lived. And now, the helping hand of Matthew Mudge was reaching out to take some strain off those size nines. But, Christ, was he annoying. Clearly, he had failed to learn life’s important lesson: never be too helpful, for people will wonder if you are really just trying to bring glory to your name.
Self-interest: that inescapable human curse. Damned if we do, damned if we don’t. And that’s why I smiled as a deranged, roving band of Jehovah Witnesses bludgeoned the helping hand of Matthew Mudge to a pulp while singing praise be to Jesus. Finally, it was starting to feel Christmassy.
