A Heartwarming Tale
 
 
        when I told chung yung i was returning to the village almost three years ago, she said it would be ok as long as i promised i would attend church on sundays.  i said i would.  and i do.  i do worship on sunday mornings.  i worship at the $1 book stands at the strand bookstore.  it is my church, my tabernacle, my temple, my vishnu, my shiva, my buddha, my yahweh and my odin.
     last september i was an hour past my usual arrival time at church of 11, which is when the strand opens.  i was standing by the side door which is where one enters to sell books to the strand.  i have made hundreds and hundreds of dollars through the years doing just that.  most often it's not even my books.  it's mostly my generous neighbors who leave their books out in the 12th floor hallway.  back in 1999 when i took vacation in a house on the outer banks of north carolina with bubba and the family, there was a sign which read "take a book, leave a book".  you know, people would read a book and leave it there, or not read a book and leave it there.  i took four bags full.  the sign invited me to.  bubba was yelling his head off about how i was stealing or something, but those books didn't belong to anyone.  there were stacks up the walls.  it was quite surprising for a man in the insurance business to be ranting about an act of capitalism on my part.  america was built on people finding natural resources which belonged to no one precisely and grabbing it.  read your history books.  my opinion is that bubba was ranting because he's republican and he can never overlook someone helping himself.  republicans only help each other.  anyhow, those books helped me eat during the fall of 1999, thanks to the strand.
      on that september sunday i was talking about as i stood by the side door, two disreputable looking men emerged from a car carrying boxes that were evidently heavy.  disreputable, of course, is in the eye or mind of the beholder, but that's how i appraised them.  the first was a loud speaking black guy littering expletives in each sentence.  the second was a silent white guy with lanky hair and scraggly beard, like, not the first guy to lend money to.
      the black guy approached the side door with his heavy box.  he obviously was going to have a tough time opening the door, so i said, "may i help you?"
     "no!" he shouted.  a wave of alcoholic fumes hit me.  i could smell them a foot away.  now, i'm a big fan of alcohol myself, but to be awash in booze at noon on a sunday is...sleazy.
      and he'd hurt my feelings too.  i turned my back on him.
      he couldn't seem to get that side door opened.  i don't know if it was locked or he was pulling on it the wrong way.  he said, "are they buying books today?"  i knew there was a sign around the corner posting the hours and days when books were bought, but he'd hurt my feelings, so i didn't tell him.
      he kept tugging at the door handle.  then the door opened outward with a rush.  a head came jutting out.  it was the head of the strand security guard, a middle-aged black man i have never known to smile.  not once.  after all these years i feel like i know him, and when i catch his eye i always nod my head.  he might as well be the sphinx.
      anyhow, he stuck his head out the door, startling the drunken black guy, and the black security guard said, "don't be a fucking nigger."  then he slammed the door shut.  the drunken black guy turned around to face the street.  his eyes goggled and his mouth was slack.  he said to the white guy, "that guy's a racist!"
 
 
      i don't understand why so many people want political power.  me, i might want to have absolute political power, but because i understand myself, i would tell anyone who wanted me to rule, "don't.  don't.  you don't want me to rule.  you don't want me to rule."  you see, if i had absolute political power, i would make uncle joe stalin look like albert schweitzer.  you see, i am a dirty harry liberal.  society would be fairer and politer and more equal and the earth would run red.
     i believe i only ran for election once in my life.  it was for treasurer in the sixth grade, i believe.  i came up with the idea of bribing the electorate.  and i enlisted my mother's help.  i did.  we got a stack of palm cards.  on the front of each we wrote 'chewz' archer irby.  on the back of each we taped a stick of chewing gum.  this is a true story.
     i lost.  i have always wondered if some of the teachers were offended by my polling methods and tilted the election.  but if they didn't, i admire the acumen of the sixth graders.  they couldn't be cheaply bought.  in fact, i thought of those sixth graders when bush tried to buy the hispanic vote back in 2000 with his offer of immigration legality.  i thought, 'my sixth graders were smarter than the people of america today."
    if i were absolute in the u.s., ooooooooooh!  i remember a scandal in the new york public school system where funds meant to buy classroom computers had been diverted into the pockets of school administrators.  if i had power, i would line up all the adminstrators on the school steps.  i would pick out six at random and have bulltets put in their brains.  i would point to the bodies, warm blood still running down the steps and speak to the other administrators thus:  "you have been warned.  go and sin no more."
    i'd nuke texas of course.  however, the fact is that there has never been any tyrant with truly absolute power.  study history and you will see that they all must manufacture some excuse for their slaughters, some excuse to please the world.  after all, hitler said poland attack germany.  so i'd nuke texas, but i'd have to have an excuse for public consumption.  i'd say i was gonna take away their guns.  yeah. that would do it.  all the texans would make threats and then i'd have no choice, i'd have to send in the bombers.  leave it a smoking glass plain.  irvine, california too.  take out the brain of the rot as well as the sinew.  and for that, i'd claim it was an attack from some foreign power on the innocent enclave of irvine.  blame zimbabwe maybe.
     well, my point of linkage between the heartwarming story at the strand and my career as generalissimo is this:  i didn't read 1984 and learn nothing.  your proper dictatorship has posters everywhere encouraging proper behavior from the citizens.  i mean, chung-yung told me when she was growing up in korea under the rule of president park, all the streets had loudspeakers mounted, and at 8 a.m. they sang a little song: 'awake!  delight!  it's time to go to work!"  i'm not kidding.  i sing it to her when i wake her every sunday for church.  and if i were generalissimo, i would have posters everywhere of an owl with one eye winking shut and a pointer in one wing, and the pointer would be pointing towards these words:  blinky sez, "don't be a fucking nigger."
     so don't let me be the ruler.