The Skeeter Daddle Diaries

We just bought a new car. Our meager attempt to prime the economic pump. I’d list off all the things this vehicle is capable of doing, from self-activating braking system to rear view camera, but it would be easier to list what it doesn’t do. You can’t crank down the windows. And without a computer, good luck diagnosing anything past a burned out light bulb. It doesn’t fly — at least I haven’t found the button that switches into Aero Mode — but essentially it’s a Jetson ride, mostly computer driven, sensor controlled and definitely futuristic.

And yeah, it cost what my first house cost. $24,000. That house was a used ghetto hacienda, built about 50 years before I won it bidding in a sealed auction offered by HUD. Course back then I was buying cars for 2 or 3 hundred bucks and yeah, the windows cranked up and down, although some didn’t work at all. Maybe this a story about inflation or maybe upward mobility or even, I hate to believe it, conspicuous consumption, I’m not sure. But it definitely is one about the American Dream of my days. A house, a car, a family with 2.3 kids. A job, a career, a one wage-earner family.

Mostly gone now, replaced by two wage-earners who make less than Ward Cleaver. The Beaver is hooked on Game Boy, Wally’s a heroine addict and June has become the primary breadwinner now that Ward has been laid off. They’re mortgaged to the hilt, retirement is postponed indefinitely now. I suspect they voted for Trump first go-round, figuring what did they have to lose?

Second go-round, I’m betting they did again. They still got plenty to lose. Maybe the American Dream was diminished before but now it seems like it’s on life support.

My new car has self-activating brakes when I’m headed into peril. America apparently doesn’t. Maybe too many of us are like this old fool, watching the rear view and not the detour ahead. I suspect when we get where we’re going, the levy’s gonna be dry.

We’re less than a month into the Second Coming of the Trump Administration and already the temperature down at the Pilot Lounge is hotter than a New Delhi tenement in the last summer’s global warming. Jolene’s Beauty Salon, thanks to Ronald’s constant up-to-the -minute hair on fire news commentary, has resulted in the loss of three of Jolene’s most reliable clientele, a fact which she has tried to impress on her gay beautician without much success. A couple more and Ronald will be going with them, she thinks. Although, truth be told in these post-fact times, Rebecca Arnold pretty much instigated the argument when she announced to the entire salon that she was happy the Man in the High Tower had declared that only two sexes were admissible in the new definition of gender. No trans and, according to her, maybe no gays either. Red flag to Ronald’s bull.

The Diner, as always, is a hotbed of insurrectionist talk, liberal outrage, militia supporters and even a few customers who seem only interested in breakfasts and lunches. Even the Flatheads left off the usual arguments of stock vs. after market carburetor replacements, 6 to 12 volt upgrades, the only topics across their DMZ concerned now with geopolitics. Did Trump really mean he’d bulldoze Gaza and make a Riviera on the sea? Was Greenland worth a war with the Danes? Should we take back the Panama Canal? Fuggetabout carb overhauls and white wall tires, the vintage car guyz were weighing in on the Ukraine War, the China/Taiwan threat, the NATO debates. Don’t even get them started after two refills of Brenda’s high octane caffeine on the purges going on with the Musketeer crews or the confirmation battles split evenly down Party lines!!

The only thing that united these patriotic diners, the only thing, was their unanimous outrage when Anita inked in on every spattered and battered menu: “Due to the spike in egg prices all egg items will be $2 extra.” The great wailing and the drumbeat pounding of chests that emanated from the formica tables could have been heard clear to Stanwoodopolis. As Two Toke intoned once the hubbub had died down a few decibels, “It’s the eggonomy, stupid!” And for possibly the first time in months, we all laughed.