I Want It

Today I felt like Esau.

I took the girls to downtown Austin this morning on the metro rail. Which was fun and exciting but a serious commitment since the train drops off at 9:00 a.m. and doesn’t start running again until 3:45p.m. We spent most of the day at the Austin Children’s Museum milking cows, building houses, being silly. The fun lasted all day—no naps.

After that VERY long day, driving home from the train station, I was suddenly overwhelmed by a fearsome cocktail of exhaustion and hunger. I NEEDED food. So I pulled into a McDonald’s thinking I could buy a $1 diet coke to hold me over until dinner. But I knew even as I pulled into the line that my self-control was in no shape to withstand the chocolate chop cookies sitting on the dollar menu.

I knew I didn’t need them. I really didn’t need them. I’d had a cupcake and a chai tea already, that on top of a reasonable lunch. And I’d be eating dinner in less than an hour. But I was so in-the-moment hungry. And they were just a dollar and I was already in line.

Sitting there in the drive-thru, completely ignoring my common sense and disciplined conscience, I imagined what must have been going through Esau’s mind when he sold his birthright for a hot bowl of porridge. I figure it was something like: “I don’t care. I want it.”