Stupid, I Say

Ever look at something you have been

looking at all your life, and suddenly realize

how stupid it seems. A word on a page for

instance, a simple word like, cough, doesn’t

spell like it sounds. “Coff” makes much more

sense phonetically. I picked up a dollar bill

today and thought to myself, how ridiculous

is this paper money thing. George Washing-

ton, Lincoln, Benjamin Franklin, Hamilton

and Grant, a silly illustrated face and printed

denomination—1, 5,10, 20, 50 and so on (all

things being equal), allow you to buy and

indeed survive in our egalitarian society.

It’s ink on paper, folks, with nothing sub-

stancial behind it except a fictitious, super-

ficial idea. So and so says this here Benjamin

can buy that there doohickey I want to own.

Gimme! Gimme! And I want a Lincoln and

3-Washingtons as change. Don’t give me any

of those copper things either, they just add

extra weight to carry around, and are a pain

in the ass to unload. On second thought, I’ll

be paying for that with my debit card today.

No actual paper money needs to be exchanged.

All those presidents and statesmen can remain

bundled up in a bank vault just in case. In case

of what, you say, inflation, devaluation? It’s

friggin’ paper, man! And not even worth the

paper it’s printed on. Now, I brought up that

debit card thing...They say for all of this buy

and sell thing to work, you gotta have faith,

man...How stupid is that? Consider the word,

“knapsack?” What in hell does a “k” have to do

the sound of that? How’s a guy like me suppose

to believe anything you say?

-30-

Chris Hanch 3-26-2020