Oh lord. C.W. wants to stage a protest.
Don’t ask.
He was busy making posters when I came in this morning. In
fact, he was so busy that he didn’t notice me. I could hear him muttering as he
carefully lettered the words, “We won’t take it anymore. Heck no.” His shape
was incongruous, somewhere between a golfer and a migrant worker.
“Power to the protesters,” he said, adding a period to a
protesting sentence and looking up. “Big Dope,” he said, “just the person I
wanted to see.”
I walked to the
nearest chair and sat, saying nothing.
“I need your help,” he said. “You need to help me stage a
protest.”
“A protest?”
“Yeah,” he said, “a protest. Maybe we’ll seize a building
somewhere.”
“So what, exactly, are you going to protest?”
“That’s where I need your help,” he said.
“My help?”
“What do you recommend we protest?”
This stunned me. “Do you mean,” I said, “that you are
planning a protest and you don’t know what it is you’re going to protest?”
“I’m full of rage,” he said. “I just have to protest
something.”
“Like what?”
This time he stopped to think. “What about all those
terrible things they say about aliens?”
“I don’t think they are talking about aliens like you.”
“Who then?”
“You know,” I said, “the regular kind. Say, what about civil
rights? That’s always good for a protest.”
“Hell no,” he said. “They turn dogs loose on your for that.”
“I don’t think they have done that for a while.”
“Well,” he said, “you never know when they might start back.”
Then he brightened. “How about Husbands’ Rights? That’s something that needs attention.”
“Husbands’ Rights?”
“Yeah. We could march against Mrs. Big Dope and her friends.”
“Count me out,” I said.
“As one of your country’s founders said, ‘A right not
protected is a right forfeited.’”
“Which founder said that?”
“I don’t know. One of them probably did. Anyway, we can catch the
women coming out of the supermarket and surround them with our signs and posters.
Then we’ll take over the fabric store. Come on,” he said, grabbing a brush and
turning to a poster. “Help me.”
“You are on your own,” I said. “But I do hope you will have
plenty of help.”
“God hates hags,” he said, as he began to paint the letters.
“Uh, C.W.” I said, “you have had some bad ideas in your life
but this is the absolute worst.”
He ignored me and grabbed another poster. He looked away and
thought for a moment, then began to paint, muttering as he did so. “Male lives
matter.”
“Give me a break,” I said. “This is ridiculous.”
“Great causes call for great courage,” he said. “That’s what
one of your famous statesmen said.”
 |
Think of the money to be made
selling supplies for generic protests.
Is this a great country or what? - C.W. |
“Which statesman?”
“I don’t remember. Maybe Robert E. Lee.”
“Maybe we need to have a long talk,” I said.
“Don’t bother me now,” he said. Then he grabbed another
poster and began to write, “No piece. No pea…”
“C.W.,” I said, yelling it. He hadn’t heard the car arriving
or the voices growing near.
“What?”
“It’s my wife and her friends,” I said as the door opened.
He glanced up. He quickly swept up the posters and thrust
them into my arms. “I’ve told you a dozen times,” he said. “This is a
monstrously stupid idea. I’m telling your wife.”
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