That Reminds Me of a Story

By James E. Collins

I probably watch too much news, read too many newspapers, magazines, and blogs, and have too many conversations with people about politics. Often in my mind, I consider myself better than politicians. I may be better than some but not all of them. What I notice is that I make similar mistakes to those in charge. Because of this, I'm willing to say I'm not perfect. And I have the experiences to prove it. Join me in a journey to tell people why I should not run for public office, nor should I receive any write-in votes in the next election. If you do opt for writing my name in on your ballot and are uncertain how, ask for assistance from the helpful people at your voting location and write in my full name, James E. Collins. You may not change an election, but maybe it will change your outlook, knowing that you can vote for whom you want to, not someone you are being told to vote for. As an afterthought, please don't tell me about ending a sentence with a preposition. I tend to do that.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Nov 14, 2023
• ISBN: 9798889600879

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That Reminds Me of a Story

James E. Collins

Copyright © 2023 James E. Collins

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING

Conneaut Lake, PA

First originally published by Page Publishing 2023

ISBN 979-8-88960-086-2 (pbk)

ISBN 979-8-88960-087-9 (digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

To my mom, who knew I would write a book thirty years before I knew.

Introduction

Onset

Overture

Beginning

Starting Point

Inception

Maybe I Should Begin

Conclusion

About the Author

To my mom, who knew I would write a book thirty years before I knew.

Introduction

My book began as a political commentary. Imagine Mark Russell of PBS fame from back in the day without the piano. I looked in the mirror and discovered two things: (1) I'm no Mark Russell, and (2) I really should clean my bathroom mirror. Maybe it would be cheaper to buy a new mirror. How much can a mirror cost? There is the issue of removing the old mirror. I think it's fastened to the wall. What if I should break this reflective surface while dislodging it from its formerly happy home? Does the idea of seven years' bad luck come into play? And what if I also break the new mirror? Does that add up to fourteen years of unfortunateness? Or is it possibly exponential? If it is 7², seven times seven, would that be forty-nine years of bad luck? Or far worse, to possible generations of members of the Collins family, would it be 7⁷, which is the equivalent of seven times seven times seven times seven times seven times seven times seven or a total of 823,543 years, if I've performed my calculations correctly? That seems to be an awful long time for me being a klutz. Imagine instead if I were a ballerina. Let's just say I wouldn't be in a tutu. It would be more like a four-four, not to be confused with a 4 4 truck, although possibly the same size. Is it body-shaming if I shame myself? If it is, do I apologize to myself? Would I need a mirror to do that? Maybe I can just talk to one of my many photos I have amassed through the years. I just realized that I'm not in many photos any longer. I would hate to use my current driver's license photo. Imagine if baby Yoda met the Pillsbury Dough spokesperson, they somehow had a child, dressed it in orange, and flashed a bright light into the child's eyes. Now imagine you aren't going to see that photo.

I'll learn how to take selfies on my phone yet. Here's one of me looking surprised. Here's one of me looking constipated. Here's one of me looking at one of my photos looking constipated. Maybe I should be a hand model. My toes are a mess. I used to wear shoes that no longer fit because I liked the look of the shoe. Let's just say I went through a lot of socks as a child. On a slightly unrelated note, my grandmother, my mom's mom, used to darn my socks after they wore out. She had the philosophy that a sock never wore out. When you couldn't darn it anymore, you used it for patches. I had a pair of jeans where I ripped a large hole in them, front to back. A former sock comes to the rescue. I wish I could make this next part up. My grandmother lived through the Great Depression. My mom was born seven years into the Great Depression. Needless to say, things were saved to be mended, repurposed, or stuffed into a bag for future use. I think this is how Mom became a pack rat. I was cleaning my parents' house the other day and came across several bags of former socks and the elastic bands to underwear from a former era. I'm not sure if it was the Big Band Era or not. I can say with certainty it wasn't the Disco Era, not knowing if it was an actual era or merely a footnote in musical history. I'm going to regret saying this, but clearly the waistbands were Stayin' Alive.

But this isn't about my distaste for a lot of disco music with a pronounced dislike for almost everything associated with the Bee Gees. I know. I know. What about the songs Words or How Can You Mend a Broken Heart or I Started a Joke? Not exactly disco music and, therefore, in my mind, acceptable. This is really about buying a new mirror. Since at this point in time, President Biden is proposing government incentives of $7,000 to new electric car buyers and $4,000 for used, don't you think the government could afford to buy me a new mirror and have it installed so I can stop worrying about 823,543 years' bad luck? While I'm waiting for an answer from his administration, I did buy a pair of mirrored sunglasses on eBay for $8.00, only a mere 2 ½ times a loaf of sliced bread. I could use those to determine I'm not Mark Russell. The local library has mirrors. I'll just look at my reflection there, while someone tries to figure out much government money I should receive for buying an electric car rearview mirror.

Onset

The idea of a political commentary was something I think I wanted to do. I was going to leave space on each page for people to respond, react, or regurgitate to things I might have said. I tried this concept out with friends on Facebook, looking for their comments, thoughts, and observations to help better understand the world around me. What I often found, however, was that people didn't want to put themselves out there, voicing their own opinions, telling their stores, sharing their experiences. Often it ended up either them calling me names, stupid being the kindest, or reposting a story they read on an online newspaper, magazine, or blog with the headline supposedly making their point. I often found that while I would read the story they sent, the person responding, reacting, or regurgitating on what I had written never bothered to read beyond the headline. More than a few times I would ask if they had read the story they had just posted as a reply to my words. To date, I have yet had anyone tell me, in words such as these, if not stronger, Of course I read the story. And here's what I think about it. I have had people tell me, I agree with everything the article says. They also agreed with everything the writer, what the magazine or newspaper had to say, and what the blog had to say, past, present, and future.

I've never met someone I agreed with completely or followed someone's writings to the letter, time after time. I even have difficulties with a lot of the Old Testament. If I have issues with what has been called the Good Book or the Holy Bible, I probably would have concerns with something that says the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN, Fox News, the Wall Street Journal, or Cambodian Cuisine Made Easy Monthly.

There are other ways to reach me; face-to-face would possibly be the best. I would like to know what your thoughts are, what you bring to the table, what experiences you have had. I might even agree with you every now and again. For an interesting book on reaching out, might I recommend Conversations with People Who Hate Me by Dylan Marron. But I won't learn anything if you only throw headlines at me even if the Chicago Daily Tribune, later just the Chicago Tribune, did tell you that Dewey did defeat Truman.

I look forward to hearing from you. Each person has a story to tell. But not everyone is blessed enough to have a person to tell a story to. Find that person. It may be a friend, a colleague, another student, a patron who looks lonely at a diner, or someone who shares your same genetic material, not to be confused with jeans material, which is most often denim. I wasn't as fortunate as some when growing up. Seldom did I have Levi's jeans. Instead, I was clad in Toughskins, bought by my mother at the local Sears store. The pants were nearly indestructible. My knees underneath the armor were not. More than once I took off my pants to discover I needed soap, water, and antiseptic, Bactine, my mom's favorite. The school's choice was iodine. Hiding injuries from their caring hands, it's a wonder I lasted as long as I have. And I hope to keep on lasting, God willing, for several more years. I just hope I'm not buried in a pair of reconditioned Toughskins pair of pants. There was a rumor that whatever you died in is what you would be wearing in the afterlife. One, I have never met anyone who came back from the afterlife and telling stories of people's clothing. And two, I have never met anyone who will admit to wearing that Sears brand of clothing.

Having said, if I had one wish for you, that instead of reposting a headline, you can become worthy of being a headline.

Overture

What inspired me to write a book is this: Why not? I wrote a lot of things in the past. There were personal ads, cost improvement ideas, letters to girlfriends, shopping lists, social media posts, accident reports, and reminders of things I wanted to do last week. I think those were more of a to-don't list over a to-do list. If the same thing keeps appearing on a to-do list and it isn't something that needs to be done on a regular basis, maybe it belongs on the to-don't list. You don't just change a baby once. You don't only take out the trash once. You don't buy milk once. You don't greet your neighbor once. You don't root for the Chicago Cubs after they won the World Series once in the last century plus a few years. And you don't eat healthy just once. I tried to eat healthy once. There was this candy bar that offered 1 percent of the daily requirement of protein. Not wanting to be a protein denier, I started on my way to better health. Hearing the Count on Sesame Street in my head, I made my way to ten, ten candy bars, hahaha. I wasn't feeling very good. Who knew eating healthy could cause this feeling? But then I remembered No pain, no gain and continued my way to better health.

I was somewhere in the midteens in candy wrappers at my feet when I realized I couldn't get out my chair. It wasn't actually my chair. It was actually a park bench. I thought if I ate the chocolate outside, I could take two things off my bucket list at once. One was eating 100 percent of the necessary protein, while two was enjoying nature. There was a tree nearby. I didn't need to be lost in the woods to be one with nature. Why would anyone put being lost in the woods on their bucket list? I've been lost at a shopping mall, an amusement park, an airport, and a city with a population over 16,000. In case you're wondering, Glenbrook Mall in Fort Wayne, Indiana, Disney World, Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport, and Frankfort, Indiana. Why get lost in a place where there aren't places to eat, roller coasters to ride, uncomfortable seats to sit in silence while waiting for my boarding time, or visiting with friends? Another negative thing about the woods, I can acquire poison ivy in my backyard. Take that, naturists. I've been told I should have used the name nature lover instead of naturist. While I'm on that, why is someone who exorcises people an exorcist and someone who spends a lot of time at the local gym, in my case more than five minutes, called a gym rat over being called an exercist?

It was at this moment in time I realized something I had learned in a creative writing class years ago. My style can be seen as more of a stream-of-consciousness style over the often more preferred Jim, will you please stick to the point? method used by most of the civilized world. I can't speak of the uncivilized world. I don't even know how to determine if somewhere is uncivilized or not. To some, I may be from an uncivilized part of the world. But I have to wonder, why is this word—in this case, uncivilized—a place that may be more civil than someone from a civilized place? After all, you can't spell civilized without c-i-v-i-l. You also can't spell civilized without l-i-e-s, z-e-n, or d-e-v-i-l. Using that last sentence as an example, I can gather that one-third of the people you should hang with and two-thirds you shouldn't. Hopefully that isn't true. I'm also hopeful I won't have to use any more math for at least a few pages.

Here's the thing about stream of consciousness. You never know where you'll end up. You may end up lost, perhaps in a verbal woods, or you may find yourself on a written roller coaster. Whee! I'm not sure if I ever said Whee! while on a roller coaster. I have screamed nonsensible things. I have held my breath. I have even said This isn't so bad before taking that first drop toward the usually unforgiving planet where height and gravity are concerned. If given the chance, I would like to talk to the professor who taught me to write creatively. Sadly, Dr. Robert McCarron passed away before I could ask him an important question, which is, Did you lose sleep after you read some of my writings? This might lead me to another question. In the people in your life, how many keep you up at night and how many give you a good night's sleep? Not every instance is bad, nor is every instance good. Tell your stories. Write about your experiences. I hope you can find the good in both situations. And maybe Dr. McCarron can smile, knowing that he made a difference in my life and maybe someone else's as well even by accident.

To repeat, this is about me and my stream-of-consciousness method of writing. And maybe it should be yours as well. I look forward to hearing your stories.

Beginning

I took a quiz somewhere, probably online, about what my top trait might be. Granted, it was online, so take the results with the proverbial grain of salt, but I found my chief quality was curiosity. I wonder how the designers of the quiz came up with that. And I wonder if I truly believed it. I took an online quiz or two before and found myself to MENSA worthy. I think MENSA stood for master of education, nerdiness, smartness, and adaptability. I should look up what the acronym MENSA really stands for. I would be perplexed if the original idea was MENSAY. Intelligence and misogyny should never be synonyms. When I looked that word up, I found it meant table. Little did I know I might have a MENSA table in my living room. It's been in the family for generations, and it's always been known as a coffee table. Not really being a coffee drinker, although I do know how to make instantish coffee, I often felt somewhat ill at ease when I set a soft drink on this four-legged piece of furniture. Likewise, a bottle of water, a glass of milk, or the drink of choice when I was growing up, Kool-Aid. I hate to admit it, but the advertising got to me. Who doesn't like a giant pitcher pitching drinks? I wonder if Kool-Aid man became a gateway sponsor to Duffman on The Simpsons.

When someone turns a certain age, it's time to manufacture a fake ID and go shopping at your local carryout for something sudsy, not necessarily the sudsy stuff found at Bed Bath & Beyond. I once interned at a local substance abuse clinic while in college. I was told one of the characteristics of an alcoholic was finding alcohol in normally nonalcoholic forms. It might have been mouthwash, and who doesn't want fresh breath while getting a buzz on, bananas, a good source of potassium as well as another reason to have a banana daiquiri, and rye bread. If you put enough of these ingredients together, you could make a somewhat interesting smoothie. If your significant other suddenly wants to do the shopping and comes back with a fifty-five-gallon drum of Listerine, a bunch of bananas, and a Rueben sandwich, you may be concerned. One, where do you store a fifty-five-gallon container of anything? Two, did the person think adopting a monkey would disguise someone's banana dependency? And three, what brought on the conversion to Judaism? As of today, I only eat that yellow fruit a few times a week. I don't like the taste of Listerine. Being isolated in northeastern Indiana, I've had very few Jewish friends or acquaintances, so the likelihood of conversion is remote. I've never shopped at Bed Bath & Beyond, and I only have Rueben sandwiches on special occasions, like weekends after a tough week at work. And yes, I can quit eating Rueben sandwiches anytime, so get off my case.

Yes, you're right. This was about an online quiz I took. And my major character trait is, drum roll, please, curiosity. I wonder why this should even be included. Isn't everyone curious? I've always wondered why the word curious didn't become curiousity. Late didn't become latly. Instant didn't become instatly, or normal suddenly become nomally. There's a joke in there somewhere. I just don't know what it is. I should point out home did become homily, but that's a different topic. Back to everyone being curious. Doesn't everyone want to know more, learn more, become more? When I see or hear something on the news, whether it be in print form, visual form, or someone saying something, I don't just say, Well, that's the final word on the discussion. I want to know more. I want to know other viewpoints. I want to see the things the TV camera or cell phone photo doesn't always show or hear from people who are at the scene or have experienced an event. I want to be open to be surprised. I don't want to be closed to surprise. I don't want to be open to what I expect. I truly want to be surprised. And I expect that you're like me in that regard, although I may be surprised. Some people are good at being recorders of things but not very good at comprehending things. I've been told by someone—maybe it was someone MENSAier than me, maybe it was an author, or it might have been a philosopher of sorts—that when robots start to comprehend things, they will become sentient. I wonder if a person is unable to perceive or feel things that a person becomes more robotic. Who should be offended? The robot or the person? Will a sentient robot be open to be surprised? Will a nonsentient human be open to be surprised? Will I ever learn to use the acronym MENSA properly? Will I ever learn that MENSA isn't actually an acronym, that it only pretends to be one?

A secondary trait in the previously mentioned quiz was creativity, not necessarily in the written form. But you're probably not surprised by that, are you?

Starting Point

I will probably make mention of my working in a music store in the past. I wonder if anything I did there will leave a lasting impression on anyone. Will anyone remember my words being compared to King David, Dr. Martin Luther King, President Ronald Reagan, or Emperor Julius Caesar? Or have they not left an impression on anyone these many years later? Maybe I should share some of my memorable sayings so they can live on. As they say in the original Latin, Egoinsonuit emptio usque, ego bagged, ego vendidit, or put another way, I rang the purchase up, I bagged, I sold.

Here are a few gems I remember from years ago. Feel free to use them yourself in everyday conversation.

Will that be cash or charge?

Would you like that in a bag?

That reminds me of a story.

I used each of those on an almost daily manner. I'd sell someone a 45—the record, not the gun. Or maybe it was a piece of sheet music. I also sold guitar strings, band instrument accessories, and kazoos. When in the guitar department, a place of wonder, fantasy, and humor, I collected stories from musicians, musician wannabes, musician groupies, and nonmusicians. And every now and again, someone would say something that sounded familiar, similar, or relatable. And within a blink of the eye, That reminds me of a story would leave my mouth, unimpeded by any brain activity telling me not to.

So this is what I'm attempting to write about. So much of what is said, heard, seen, or smelled will remind everyone of a story. And in this collection of writings, I get to tell the stories I am reminded of. You can do the same, either with my stories, your stories, or those stories you encounter at coffee shoppes, grocery stores, or license branches, whether it be fishing, hunting, or driving. Wouldn't we all be better off if we could find stories that are familiar, similar, or relatable instead of stories that are condescending, hypothetical, or distancing? I could be wrong. What does someone who once sold guitars to the not so rich or famous know?

That reminds me of a story.

Inception

I've written a lot in the last few months. Some of the work I'm proud of. Other parts remind me of something from my past. Spending a few moments in silence, I realized what it was my words sometimes reminded me of.

I wasn't always the best student in the classroom. Some classrooms I was Rudolph's red nose, brightening the darkest corner, filling others with a sense of wonder, maybe even making people wondering why a song wasn't written about me. Gordon Lightfoot sang about a boat. The Beatles sang about a submarine. Kenny Chesney sang about a tractor. Ernie sang about a bath toy. Run DMC sang about a laptop. And George Harrison sang about a yellow dwarf star. You would think one of my former classmates could have written something about me and then sang my praises. I might just have to find some new friends.

Or I might have to realize I wasn't always the wonderkid I thought I was. There were times I heard George Harrison in my head, singing, Here comes the F, doh, doh, doh, or Kenny Chesney singing, No one thinks Fs are sexy. Part of my problem, which if I were to guess, would have to be my lack of studying. At Manchester College, I was even denied admittance to an introductory class called study skills because of my unwillingness to study for certain classes, while the teacher was doing an Oprah impersonation, telling the students, You get an A, and you get an A, and you get an A. Everybody gets an A, and, Jim, I need to see you after class. That just doesn't have the same ring to it. If only there were a way to keep Jim out of that class. There must have been a way. My college transcript doesn't include anything called study skills or very many classes that have the letter grade A attached to class titles.

I should have studied more, asked more teachers for assistance, and had my parents help me with my homework. But I watched TV, played sports in the backyard, rode my bike, and acted like a kid, such that those were my majors, minors, and requirements over science, math, English, and many other classes I have so few memories.

Many of those classes required essays. What can you say about what you don't know? Surprisingly enough, you can say an awful lot. You can write and write and then write some more. I've heard the saying about a method to one's madness. I'm pretty sure there wasn't a method in my case. And so what you're seeing now and perhaps later if you turn the pages, read my words, and consider my writings is just my continuation of junior high school, high school, and college. Some of it would make a teacher proud. Other parts would leave a confused look on the hardiest of educators. But mostly what you'll find is things that would make a teacher give me a letter grade of C because I may have made a point, but it had nothing to do with the topic.

Maybe as you read my words, you'll consider grading on a curve.

Maybe I Should Begin

I don't know if I've ever met someone from Delaware. If I did, they didn't act like it. They acted like normal people. You know the kind. They put their pants on one leg at a time, go to work several days a week, and eat at McDonald's. Maybe I should have been curious in my interactions with people at airports. Everyone at an airport likes to talk. I could have easily gone up to someone and said, Hi. My name's Jim, and I'm not from Delaware. Instantly we have a connection. Either that neither of us are from the first state or one of us is. Since I've never been there, much less lived there, it must be the other person. I just don't see anyone saying they're from Delaware when they're not unless they're a telemarketer or a credit card collection agent or part of a Johnny Cash cover band. Yes, this is a reference to the song I've Been Everywhere from 1966 and later used in commercials selling something. It might have been potato chips as far as I can remember.

The difference between success and failure might be something others would consider insignificant.

I was once on a flight from Orlando to Detroit. Someone didn't enjoy my view of the world from the back of the plane and asked if I was willing to move up to the emergency row. The excuse was families should be with families. As I was flying alone, not as I was the only passenger but rather without other family members, I thought it would be okay. In case of a crash, I would want family members to be with one another. I also didn't want small children roaming around the airplane, much like it was The Rocky Horror Picture Show. I was only offered a choice of peanuts or a cookie with the Delta logo on it. I didn't know there was toast. Why wasn't I offered toast? Was this exclusive to first-class passengers? Not only do they get bigger seats, but they also receive better snacks. I wonder if the toast had the Delta logo burned into it. I wonder if I was on Delta or American Airlines. We'll say it was Delta. Maybe I'm thinking of another flight. My point is this: some toasters will brown your bread with a logo showing up in the final product. Just like Delta on their elitist toast, I once bought my brother-in-law a toaster that put the UK, University of Kentucky, logo on a slice of bread. Being from Indiana, the known nemesis of UK fans tristate wide, I looked with anticipation as he plugged in the kitchen appliance, inserted a piece of white Wonder Bread, watched the wires turn orange for a certain length of time, return to fire extinguisher mode, and spring the toast upward toward the heavens. In my defense of saying Toward the heavens, I have heard people say heaven is on earth, so when the toast only popped up a fraction of an inch, I'm not exaggerating by their standards. Let's just say the UK logo did not appear. It was a good piece of toast, perhaps one of the finest I've ever witnessed. When you say you've seen the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, you don't say, I've seen other ceilings that were better. Same here.

So I moved up to the emergency exit row. I was asked if I was willing to assist others out of the plane if necessary. In the history of emergency exits, has anyone ever moved up to that row and said, Let them die! That is clearly reserved for boarding and deplaning this oversized sardine can under normal circumstances. Why is it boarding and deplaning? Why isn't it planing and unplaning? Or boarding and unboarding? Or possibly boarding and disboarding? There's banding and disbanding. Who do I ask about this? And how can I, one of the few to rise up against this tyranny, get this changed? For now, my ascension to sainthood will have to wait. I have a seat to get to. This is nice, plenty of legroom. A nice view of the door. Getting served my logo-bearing cookie with several ounces of Sprite twenty some minutes sooner than the family in the back row. First-class passengers have nothing on me, or at least I tell myself that. What made it better was the row I was in had three seats and two passengers, myself and a young woman engrossed in a book; whether it dealt with plane crashes or not I don't know. I knew not to use my Hi, my name's Jim, and I'm not from Delaware because who flies from Orlando to Detroit to Philadelphia and then takes a puddle jumper to Wilmington? If I had more time, I might have, but that's just me. I wonder if they have any great gift shops in Wilmington. That's for another time. So not only did I have legroom, but I also had more arm room as the middle seat remained empty. Apparently, no one other than the young woman and I could pass the lie detector test about whether we would help other passengers off the plane in case something unusual happened.

I wanted to ask the flight attendant what I should do if the plane was tractor-beamed up to an alien ship. Do I still help people out? Or do I scream in terror like the rest of the passengers? Do pilots have to keep their poise when announcing, Thank you for flying Delta. We are currently being taken into a large UFO. Arrival in Detroit may be delayed? So the emergency row consisted of myself, an empty seat, and the previously mentioned young woman. She read her book. I read mine. When it came time to receive our snacks, I showed her how to work the tray table. She nodded her appreciation, and we went back to reading our books, awaiting that little extra that makes passengers feel special. When we landed, she went her way. I went mine. While waiting in the Detroit airport for my connecting flight, that same young woman sat beside me. She was eating some kind of sub. I should have made small talk. We could have talked about sandwiches and not being from Delaware. This might have been my future wife. I'll talk to her on the flight to Fort Wayne. But then something terrible happened. She boarded the flight to Saginaw, Michigan. Our eyes met one last time as she went up the ramp that led to her flight. I thought about seeing if I could change my flight to Saginaw. I didn't. And now there's a story with no happy ending. I hope she's happy. I've been for the most part happy. We just will never be happy together.

I seem to have meandered away from the point. This was supposed to be about Delaware. Here's what I want to know. How does someone like Joe Biden get elected so many times to government positions? It couldn't be because of the hair. Charles Manson had better hair. He also had a better forehead tattoo. Not everyone can wear a swastika these days. Mr. Manson also had a way to unify people. I've never heard it called Charles Manson and the Mansonettes, the Mansonteers or the Fighting Mansons. His followers were always called the Manson family or as I understand it, to those on the inside, the family. Doesn't that sound more unifying than calling your political opponents names? I'm not very fond of either Mr. Manson's or Mr. Biden's policies through the years. What enabled Joe to win and his opponents to fall short? I wonder if it had anything to do with the gift shop in the Wilmington Airport.

*****

Here's my opinion on the raid on Mar-a-Lago on August 8, 2022. I believe in the First Amendment and each person in this country having the freedom of speech regardless of whether people agree with my opinions or not. I have no reason to think that the FBI, Federal Bureau of Investigation, would have any reason to deny my First Amendment rights and redact anything I might say.

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In conclusion, ▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉ ▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉ the ▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉ ▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉.▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉ truth ▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉ ▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉ is ▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉ out ▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉ ▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉.▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉ there ▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉ ▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉▉.

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I think this is an amazing idea, right up there with air, fire, minitrampolines, and microwaveable burritos. Since people like to identify as their own genders with their own pronouns, let me take this a step further. With President Biden wanting to pay off $10,000 of student loan debt for each current and future borrower, I submit to our current commander in chief that my credit card balances identify as student loan debt with pronouns of it and they.

How would Louis Armstrong's song What a Wonderful World appear today? Would it start with, I see deep-rooted beings of self-described color, self-described, colored, perennial Americans too. I see them bloom for me and for you, and I think to myself, what a wonderful world.

I hate to admit this, but I may be addicted to politically based news. I watch too many hours on TV. I read too many newspaper articles. I talk about this subject with too many of my friends and family members. And sometimes I engage in two of these activities at the same time. My brain is trying to tell me stop this nonsense. But my eyes and ears and my mouth want more. More information. Better information. Bigger information. And I have to have it now. Don't I sound like a Jimmie JJ Walker commercial? Here's the problem I have. More information isn't always bigger or better. Gathering more than one kind of information at once often leads to synthesizing these two ideas into one idea. This is often a good thing in many parts of life. Remember the old Reese's Peanut Butter Cup commercial? Since you probably don't, let me summarize. One person is walking alone eating a chocolate bar. Someone from the opposite direction is also walking while eating from a jar of peanut butter. They violently, violently, as in a TV-G rated commercial would allow, run into each other. One exclaims, You got chocolate in my peanut butter! while the other exclaims, You got peanut butter in my chocolate! And this is how the candied goodness came about. Another example might be in your hands right now. When the first cell phone came out, who expected it to take pictures, videos, reach out to people across the globe, or tell me what time it is?

When it becomes a bad thing is when I combine a news story that is repeated over and over to hypnotize me into believing what I hear or see is true with a dissimilar topic. Hypnotize becomes hype-no-tize. And to make matters worse, I start to blend things together. I now believe Elizabeth Warren is Native American. Rachel Dolezal is African American. Bill Clinton was a new kind of Democrat. Joe Biden is a moderate. A male athlete can identify as a female. And then I thought how else this might work.

President Biden is proposing a measure where all previous, current, and future students who have or will have outstanding debt from going to college would have their student loan debts reduced by $10,000. Simultaneously I hear of someone who identifies as gender fluid with pronouns of they and them. This leads me to wonder if student loan debt can identify as whatever it chooses. And then I came upon this idea. My credit card balances identify as student loan debt with pronouns of it and they. Since my liabilities identify as student loan debt, they should be eligible for a $10,000 reduction under the Joe Biden's plan as well.

This is crazy! you may think. I might quote from episode 22 from season one of the former NBC sitcom Cheers, Crazy like a doorknob. This country was built on crazy. Seceding from Great Britain? Crazy. Settling in Montana? Crazy. Playing the lottery? Crazy. Landing on the moon? Crazy. Quoting from Cheers? Crazy. And each of these has happened, maybe not in our lifetimes but previously. So me identifying my monthly statements, which by the way drive me crazy, as student loans might not be crazy after all. Time will tell. And I have my phone charged up just for such an occasion.

President Biden, you know where to send the check. I'm sure I'm on a list waiting to be turned over to one of the new 87,000 Internal Revenue Service agents.

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I'm not sure I understand New Yorkers. Maybe if I lived there, it would make sense. But I don't. I may have several misperceptions about the residents of that state and specifically New York City from what I've seen on TV. I haven't walked a mile in their collective shoes. I haven't even tried on a pair of their shoes: size 11, medium width, very low arch, please. It is more like I saw a pair of their shoes in a catalog and decided whether to buy them or not based on color, manufacturer, and price. I should be better than that. Likewise, I would hope native New Yorkers could do likewise with me. Without meeting me, getting to know me, having a conversation with me, paying for a meal for me, they are only basing their judgments of me on a picture they saw in a catalog. I hope the makers of the catalog airbrushed me with more hair. I want to make a good first impression even from a distance. Now about the idea of your paying for my lunch. I've never been to a Thai restaurant. Know any good places?

I may not be memorable, but I am unique. Maybe I'm looking for a candidate who is memorable and unique.

Strangely, the catalog scenario happened in the Democratic presidential primaries in 2020. There were the tall guys, the short women, the progressive old guys, the progressive old women. There was a billionaire, someone from the state of Hawaii, not spelled K-E-N-Y-A. There was the inexperienced, an author, people I've never heard of, I think it might have been either Harpo Marx or Raymond Joseph Teller, an African American, a non–African American, a few people who don't get to say much but possibly knowing more than a little, and someone accused of breaking wind at inappropriate times.

I know what you're saying. When is it an appropriate time to break wind? Being a connoisseur of many fine documentary shows, such as Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern, Parts Unknown with the late Anthony Bourdain, and Carnival Eats with Noah Cappe and guest appearances by acclaimed foodie Les Cookie Monster on Sesame Street, I have heard it appropriate in some countries to belch after a good meal as a sign of respect to the preparer of the meal, whether it be the cook, the caterer, the chef, or the DoorDash driver. How shall I say this nicely? Passing gas has never been shown to be culinary civility. I wonder if those episodes were edited for content. If only I were able to ask Andrew, Anthony, and Les. No, I don't mean Cuomo, Fauci, or Nessman. Having lost Mr. Bourdain too soon, perhaps I could interview family members. Maybe it would be interesting to do a few moments interviewing them about manners, cuisine, and living in big cities. I think this might be a paraphrase, but the four corners of the world include New York City; Washington, DC; Huntington, Indiana; and Cincinnati. I'm sure the answers would come out hopefully not in an impolite way, such