Friday, September 24, 2004

Demand Your Rights

My neighbor is obsessed. It seems everyday I’ll catch sight of him in his garden watering, weeding, pruning, or whatever. He is constantly tending to his vegetables, relentlessly working the soil, and endlessly bearing the burdens it takes to have a successful garden. Me, on the other hand, basically do as little as I need to just to keep my veggies from drying up and being blown into the wind. His tomatoes, as you may guess, are large and numerous. Bright red and thick. Juicy and mouth watering. Mine, however, are usually smallish and teeming with worm holes. And if they are red at all, it is that darker red tomatoes tend to turn as they go to rot.
Well, recently I decided I would have no more of it! I thought long and hard about how to resolve this problem. He had such beautiful numerous specimens and mine were so embarrassing and few. What could I do? How could I hope to do better?
Well here is what I certainty wouldn’t do. I wouldn’t spend more time in my garden. That could take away from my time watching ‘The Simple Life II’. No way would I hit the books and learn what it might take to make my veggies flourish. My God, not with Madden 2005 due out this week. Nor would I ask my neighbor for his help or ideas as to how to make my garden a place of growth and beauty. He would obviously think me inept if I had asked for his help.
Here is what I decided to do instead. I sat right down and wrote my congressmen! “It is Unfair!” I wrote, “That one man has such a beautiful bountiful harvest and another has so little!” I demanded something be done. I insisted they propose a law that would take some of my neighbors prized vegetables and give them not just to me, that would be selfish, but to everyone in my neighborhood. I was adamant that this was my right and must be acted on immediately.
Well here is what happened. I received two letters back. One from a Democrat senator and one from a Republican senator.
The Republican senator wrote that he was astounded at my lack of resourcefulness and personal responsibility. He lambasted me for asking the government to take what was rightfully one man’s and give it to another. He added that I needed to brush up on my readings of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution. I was at once both angry and appalled. How dare he speak to me in such a manner. Still steaming I opened the other letter; I smiled as I was informed that me and my family would soon be receiving the reward that was rightfully ours…if this senator had anything to say about it.

You gotta love America!