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Retirement Talk for Boomers, Seniors, and Retirees |
Frog Spit
Jackie Spinks
Chapter Thirty-Five
Mama hit upon a solution to cure the ills of humankind and it wasn’t another prohibition of “booze.”
She came upon this idea during WWII, an idea straight up her Mormon alley. And her idea was—and here it is—music and applause now--RATIONING.
First off, it would solve our problem of self -discipline. As we are unable to deny ourselves anything--it would tear off that mental caul of self –contempt, surrounding our psyches, because we try to discipline ourselves and continually fail. With rationing someone else would do it for us. What a relief.
Of course, rationing would cook the capitalism goose, unless the conglomerates could unearth some flush markets for our stuff. So to start off capitalism would be down for the count here, but being inventive in money-making, I’m sure they would find a creative way out.
Overweight
is one of our biggest problems. Read recently 70% of us are overweight
and half
the population, or at least the female half, needs some pressure
outside
themselves, that forces them to eat less.
This force would be worth all the fold in
Every woman that’s been polled or interviewed given the choice between being permanently obese and rich, or permanently thin and poor, chooses thin and poor over obese and rich every time.
Mama’s whole idea started during WWII when we’d stand in line to get our rationing books. We’d use our rationing stamps when we wanted to buy food, gasoline, shoes, etc. Sometimes, though it seemed like the government rationing was a whimsical operation, as for instance, it took less stamps for a pound of hamburger than for a pound of better. One pound of butter took 18 points, while one pound of hamburger too 16 points. Wouldn’t you think a cow would give more in the way of butter in its lifetime, than meat—or at least a female cow? So why was butter more precious? Somebody suggested, maybe, the war scared the cows so they weren’t giving as much milk. Not funny guys.
To be honest, our whole family liked rationing, during WWII. The Sunday afternoon drives went with the winds of war—gas rationing, for which my brother and I were thankful, although, probably not as thankful as Mama and Grandma D. Plus, nobody could buy a new car—metal was non-existent, it was all used for the military. So nobody could show off with their new car. Furthermore, it’s a good idea for people to stay home and get acquainted with each other. This would also eliminate our problem with the oil supply and curb the pollution. Wow, all that with rationing.
And as I’ve read and been told 75% of our health visits are actually an unhappy life which a doctor can do nothing about and for the other 25% which is usually a concurrent problem with obesity and it’s companion diabetes and circulatory problems, rationing of food would solve those problems.
And then there’s the clutter problem. I’ve read about women who have 400 pairs of shoes—what a lot of clutter and oh, the conflict and indecisions about what to wear. Shoes and clothes were rationed during WWII, so why not with our new plan. All of this spending and materialism is the result of consumerism, hedonism and waste, none of which provides the satisfaction it promises. Get your stuff home and the next week you’ve probably forgotten about it.
And rationing will bring us together. Nothing like having to go over to the next door neighbor to borrow a cup of sugar to finish that cake or pie, which we reciprocate when the neighbor needs the same—making for camaraderie and generosity. I was always running over to a neighbor, to borrow something Mama needed and they always came through.
Most unhappiness comes from poor or no relationships with others. You pick up through their body language or words the other person doesn’t like you much. Never return your calls. So you intuit, “I guess I don’t like me either.” But everybody, rich and poor, would be sharing the problems of rationing.
And rationing would clear up, not all, but most of the anger the poor have against the rich. When the rich are allotted the same amount of gasoline, brogans and pumps (shoes, as I said, were rationed then) lard and yachts (metal and lumber were rationed) all this divide and dissatisfaction between rich and poor, that makes a person want to scratch the paint off BMW and Porches would disappear as rationing would be share and share alike for both the rich and poor. About the only thing the rich and poor share equally today, is life. But I’ve read recently, the rich can buy more of that now too. That old rhyme:
If living were a thing money could buy
Then the rich would live and the poor would die -- is not that applicable nowadays as with all this new medical technology the rich can often cure excesses of living, and live to an old age a ghetto black can’t. And wouldn’t it be interesting if a rich person used up their ration stamps and were worse off than we. No room for anyone to gloat, as we will be in the same boat sooner or later too, but than there’s a nice feeling of not being inferior.
So think of how rationing would take some of the heat off social problems. A homeless drifter would have the same number of ration stamps for shoes as Imelda Marcos.
I know it would be a drag for those addicted to shopping and consuming, but they’d get over it and heave a sigh of relief. The only negative effect of rationing in our family during WWII was that Mama was never quite sure the war was over and so continued to hoard, but now she hoarded, not the Mormon’s allotment of one years supply of food, but enough food to last us through six wars and famines.
As once she could buy sugar, she bought and bought sugar. And although hoarding was as unpatriotic as having loose lips. We were admonished from posters that “loose lips sink ships,” and so being patriotic kept our lips zipped, but we, or at least Mama, continued to unpatriotically hoard food. She felt it was okay though, because it was approved by a higher power—her Mormon God.
During the war, sugar was as precious as god dust. And for at least five years after the war, we could go upstairs and find at least fifty bags of sugar piled up against the wall. It took Mama a long time to realize they’d never ration sugar again.
“
“Well, you never know. You just never know,” Mama would reply.
Mama thought her rationing idea was so good, that perhaps she should take out a patent or copyright, so I’m handing it on to you.
Therefore, if the communitarians want to bring us together, maybe they should consider rationing. And along with gasoline, lard, and shoes, maybe ration trips to ski resort, diamond bracelets, and 20,000 square foot houses might be in order. There is nothing like equal deprivation to bring people together. And as the population is multiplying like barnacles on the good ship Earth, eventually we’ll be forced to divvy up.
We don’t need a tenth of the stuff we own. It’s just a bunch of junk and we’re hostages to its care and protection. And you can’t tell me even the rich won’t appreciate a way to clean out their clutter and upkeep of all those cars and shoes and closets and garages.
Mama promises you’ll like rationing. Of course, you might not always have agreed with Mama.
And the last word goes to Mama.
Don’t build any skyscrapers on landfill and put out a good wash.