Chapter 10: Business as usual
“A six hundred dollar economic stimulus package, wonder how many happy endings that will buy me over at the Asian massage parlor.” Robert says as he eyes his ATM receipt. “Six hundred dollars of my money the gov’ment was nice enough to let me have back. You know, they think they own us!”
“They do own us,” I reply “I thought you knew that. They own the land, the roads, the sky, the airwaves, you name it and the feds will have their fingers in the pie. They are the new mafia.”
“I know, I know, but how many other people realize that? I bet if they had to write a check to the IRS once a month for their portion of the income taxes we would have a revolution in a matter of weeks.” He paused to suck down another gulp of beer. We were back at the Stratford drinking away another afternoon. It was too cold to do anything outside, too early to go to bed, so we decided to drink the evening away in the beauty of someone else’s heating bill. “The state takes a slice of my base pay, taxes everything I buy, consume, use… I wonder if it will ever end. We once had a revolution in this country to throw off unfair taxation. In a matter of 150 years they had completely reassembled the entire monstrosity and even added to it.”
The same usual drunks were at one end of the bar, the old retirees drinking away their pension checks. One of them had a gin blossom that was taking over his face. Strangely there was a woman near their end, very skinny, about 60 and sporting a black eye. Nothing says classy like a grandma with a black eye, I figure she was barflying, getting free drinks from these old codgers, while these old codgers were hoping she would get loaded enough to lose her inhibitions and go home with one of them.
“Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. During the revolutionary war a third were for it, a third were loyal to the crown and a third figured that no matter the outcome they would be boned.” I said “Now who was right? I figure for a few years the revolutionaries had it pretty good, but in the end the boned cynical third turned out to be the ones who saw the handwriting on the wall.”
“You have been measured and found wanting” Robert said looking at his half full pint glass. I wasn’t sure if he was talking to me, about the revolution , talking to his beer or all three. If I remembered correctly that was the translation of the handwriting on the wall from the Old Testament, I think David translated it for Darius, but I could be wrong.
“Will there ever be a revolution? Will we ever get tired of living in this so called free country?” Robert asks. “Will the peasants with pitchforks storm the castle, wrestle back the wealth that the czar and his ministers have squeezed from the populace?”
“There will never be a revolt as long as the populace remains fat dumb and happy. Think about it, the American revolution was a bunch of rich W.A.S.P’s who didn’t want to pay taxes anymore. They were the wealthy, and they managed to convince enough people to go along with them. They won, set up a government that they wanted and that benefitted them. Now the ruling elite and fortunate sons have the power, will do anything to maintain their dynasties and any revolution will be quickly squashed. It will take a huge uprising of the masses to change anything and as long as people have plenty of fatty foods and mindless shows on TV to watch, there will never be a change.” For some reason I don’t want to mention Walker off in his cave. The Water Man who has found a way to beat the system. I know if the Forest service found him they would run him off, they have a bunch of rules about how many days you can spend in one spot, and they really hate it when people sleep in their caves.
“Well then we are screwed.” Robert laments, “Sad thing is I really don’t want much. Just a few acres that I can live on and raise some chickens, maybe a few goats for milk. But land costs more than I can ever afford, then the damn state comes through and taxes you for owning it, for every head of livestock you have, for every piece of equipment you have, for your house, it just never ends.”
We pause to drink and think. Looking at the patrons of the Stratford I realize they would all be for the revolution, these are the people left behind by society. Although we don’t have an official caste system here we are mostly grouped by our income, the ones of us who can pull out of the cycle and make it to middle class do, the ones who can’t end up at the Stratford or a place like it.
“Ever thought about doing it underground? Just heading off into the wilds and trying to be self sufficient?” Robert thinks about his answer for a while. I add “You know how to fish, trap, ever wonder how hard it could be? Plus there is the whole underground economy. Mowing grass, doing odd jobs, just not reporting it”
“Dude, I can’t live like that. You are a cheap bastard, can eat fish every day, scrounge food from dumpsters. Besides I like society. I like sitting here drinking beer, I like television, going to the library, people watching. Hell I get the occasional shot of leg, I am not the one that is fed up. I am not happy, but not ready to walk off into the woods yet. Besides what would I do for beer? I am addicted to this stuff and my job, as worthless as it is, does provide me with the means to get drunk whenever I want.”
“I don’t know what I will do for beer if I make the break.” I reply. “but I don’t think either of us would need it or want it so bad if we could get away. At least, I think if I was free, living off the land, I could live without beer. Besides mother nature provides all sorts of intoxicants, weed, mushrooms, toads. I think I could get by.”
“So what are you going to do, take some seeds and head off into the woods. Spend your days smoking and fishing?” Robert asks.
“Sounds like heaven doesn’t it? I don’t know what I will do. I just keep thinking that I was not put on this earth to sit in a cube, write software and fret over my retirement. Most people are content with this, 99.99 percent of society thinks this is the way to live. Hell without them we wouldn’t even have a society. If it was people like me we would be off in the woods sleeping in survival shelters.”
“You know you are right.” Robert twirls his beer thinking about it. “I read somewhere that one of the major reasons, perhaps the only reason man settled down was that he learned to grow crops. Now why would any fool want to settle down and grow stuff when he can roam the earth and hunt. You are thinking to yourself that must have been some pretty damn fine corn for him to settle down and earn his keep from the sweat of his brow. Nope, when he started farming, he learned to brew beer. Wonder how life would be different if mans first crop had been weed.”
“I know you are sick of hearing about Africa, but over there people had nothing and were happy. It was a terrible place, starvation, disease, abject poverty. You name the affliction it was there. But they were happy. Any why were they happy you might ask? Because they lived a real life. They had families, friends, a village to share their life with. Most people in this country are miserable. Look at how many people are on anti-depressants. How many people think that a big house, big new car, all this material crap will make them happy and it never does. We could learn something from them.”
I looked around at the patrons of the Stratford, not a smile to be seen on any face. They were just killing time and easing pain till they took their last breath.