Notebook
up — bills, statements, that sort of thing.
First I balanced the statements, then I organized, but didn’t actually pay, the bills. They are now arranged in the order of impending doom. It’s a little game I play, just to keep alert, and because we don’t seem to have much money these days. It’s in the gas tank of our twelve-year-old jalopy, and at the utility companies, and at the grocery store, which charges far more than it used to because, among other things, the price of fuel and energy have skyrocketed. So we pay, over and over again. We’ve turned down the thermostat, but our heating bill goes up anyway. We hold off on buying “extras,” such as bread, milk, cheese, meat, eggs, grains, beans, and vegetables, but our grocery bill continues to climb.
The only thing that keeps us going are the reports in the corporate, state-run media that say the economy is making major strides. It hardly accounts for the fact that Ford is shutting several plants and laying off 25,000 workers, or that millions of people are working two or three jobs and still only hanging on by a thread, but, hey, if the media says things are great, things are great.
Of course, we know where the money is. It’s in the hands of a few
fat-cats who are making obscene profits in the ever-expanding war,
and by hijacking foreign economies, and bilking people on health care, drugs, and energy. For them, it’s all in a day’s work. A phone call here, a speech there, a few bombs and sanctions, a little wiretapping and torture — after all, someone has to do it. We certainly can’t leave it to poor mothers and fathers with children to raise. They’re far too busy and worried. That’s why we have “elected leaders” — those unselfish knights in shining armor who possess the intelligence, grace, insight, and moral courage needed to build a brighter tomorrow.
The good news is, in the course of doing my paperwork this morning, I found three dollars in my wallet. Instead of investing it in the stock market as I usually do, I’m sending it to the editor of a new small press magazine in New York and asking him to send me a copy. After I read the magazine, I’ll probably eat it, or burn it, or use it to deflect the ultra-violet light leaking through the depleted ozone. Then I’ll turn on the news for the latest on how we’re winning The Battle Against Evil. Hurrah!
Also by William Michaelian
POETRY
Winter Poems
ISBN: 978-0-9796599-0-4
52 pages. Paper.
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Another Song I Know
ISBN: 978-0-9796599-1-1
80 pages. Paper.
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Cosmopsis Books
San Francisco
Signed copies available
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