Yesterday morning I got up, had my usual coffee and bagel, showered, looked into my bathroom mirror, and smiled. This is election day. The day I go to the polling place alongside every other morally responsible American, and cast my ballot. As with all other election days, some choices I make leave me feeling I've done something good, assisted in positive change, helped a little old lady across the street. Others, not so much, as though I need to go home and take another shower. It's the way I feel when I know the best I can do is enter the boothe, hold my nose, and cast my ballot for the least objectionable, stench-reeking, dirty, rotten scoundrel whose vulgar name I would never say out loud in front of my mother.
What? You missed it? You missed election day? You didn't vote? Well, no, you didn't miss it. And you did vote, several times, a dozen times, more than a dozen, maybe a thousand, or more. In America, every day is election day. Here lately, I've been trying to choose my polling places with a bit more discretion. Growing up in the sixties, the only child of Kennedy Democrats, I was taught that voting was a sacred act, not all that different from going to church.
This particular morning I was certain of doing the right thing. I headed for my local Wachovia Bank branch, today's first stop on my tour of local polling places. A bit nervous, I exited my very used old dodge and headed for the door. Would this be the gunfight at the OK coral? What would I say when they asked, as they surely would, "Why are you closing your account?"
How could I keep my cool? How could I keep from launching into a two-hundred page dissertation detailing the long list of faults and crimes against human dignity of which I found this foul establishment guilty as charged? These are good people who work here. They are not the enemy. The real enemy is far more subtle, more hidden behind cloaks of respectability. These are my neighbors who, as Lama Surya Das reminds me in his Prayer for the New Millennium, "want and need as I do." The criminals I'm after live in gated communities, guarded by rent-a-cops, meet in suites, ride in limos, and, not having to work three jobs waiting tables to make ends meet, usually tip quite poorly.
I approached a nice looking lady at the counter, handed her my check and said, "I'd like to close this account, please." I didn't want trouble. But then, here it came. "I'm sorry, sir. But I can't do that. You'll need to speak to the manager." Careful, I thought to myself. Breathe. Don't reach for that verbal six gun. Repeat. "She's not the enemy... She's not the enemy..." The last time I felt like this was upon many of the occasions in high school when I got kicked out of class and sent to the dean's office. Once again, referred to a higher power for judgment.
With trepidation, I approached the manager's desk, took my seat, and stated yet again the cause for my visit. "I'd like to close this account." She smiled. Good. Maybe this won't be so difficult. She took my info, then the fun started. Here it came. The question. The opportunity to state my case. Would I follow through, or wimp out? "Why are you closing your account?" A moment of pride, courage welled from the depths of my battered consumer soul. I sat up straight, looked into her eyes, and delivered the big one: "Because of Wells Fargo/Wachovia's disproportionate support of the Republican Party and it's policies."
The poor woman could not have looked more surprised had I leaned over the desk and slapped her across the face with a wet and slightly rotten flounder. Ah, I thought. I've landed a point. A moment of awkward silence ensued. "I'm sorry," she said. "Did you say you're closing your account because we don't support the Republican Party enough?" Prior to this moment, I'd always thought I spoke fluent English. Apparently not. Pulling another smelly flounder from my bag, I sallied forth with another attempt. "No. I'm moving my money because this bank disproportionately supports a political party, the Republican Party, whose agenda and policies I am vehemently opposed to." There, I thought. That's got to do it. We have a meeting of the minds.
Reaching for her mouse, she scrolled down her screen, befuddled, taken aback. How to record this frontal assault, this arrogance, this act of defiance of the establishment status quo upon my permanent record? More awkward silence. The system didn't allow for this impertinance. Surely, she must have thought, these things do not happen in civilized society. No one defies the mighty Wells Fargo/Wachovia Empire! She breached the silence that had fallen between us. "I guess I'm just going to have to check other."
Out the door, smiling, I'd made my statement, defied the status quo, struck a blow against the establishment. This must be the kick ass feeling King David had when he let fly the stone that slew Goliath!
Down the street I flew to Freedom First Credit Union, where I struck a second blow for human dignity and freedom. Sitting down with a very nice young lady, Leslie, I opened my new account. I'd studied this phenomenon, done my homework. Respected friends, far more in the financial know than I, told me credit unions are most often locally owned and operated, worked for their members rather than just the stock holders, and that I, indeed, such as I!! actually had a stake in the enterprise! I'd cast my ballots of cash against the tax dodging, foreclosing, blood sucking, CEO bonus taking with my tax money Evil Empire! "Take that you generation of Swine!"
I headed for my next polling place. More ballots to cast. Another statement to make. But this time, it would leave a foul stench my nostrils. I pulled into my local Walmart. Walmart. Was I really going to stoop this low? Pulling my hat down low over my forehead, I hoped no one would recognize me as I passed through the door, a pilgrim in an unholy land.
Yes, this was one of those hold-my-nose choices I had to make, despised though it was. Walmart has a long history of discriminating against women, and generally of treating their employees as chattle. And here was my moral dilemma. I have a choice to make. I can spend a few bucks here, cast a few cash ballots, and have a few left over to put into the collection plate on Sunday morning where God knows my church, not to mention other charities I support, needs such little as I can give. The choices we face on election day are not always pretty, nor easy. The electoral politics of the market place are rarely pure as the driven snow. Nothing high minded about this, I thought as once again I plunked down my hard earned debit card.
In America, every day is election day. Some choices are more good than bad, others more bad than good. There are always choices. And all choices are in between choices. No ballot I cast is without taint of moral ambiguity. Despite most everything I read these days, I'm sure the big banks, and even Walmart, do a little good every now and then. Even if it's no more than providing a decent job to some of my neighbors while saving me a few bucks to give to causes I really believe in.
Another election day has passed. Having cast my ballots, I return home where I will get online and puruse the daily records of humanities' endless struggle to find, let alone do, the right thing. This is not unimportant, though I often find it infuriating. There's war going on. A war in which, like it or not, I am a combatant. A war declared by the rich against the rest of us. A war of budgets that take from those who can least afford it, and give to those who already have more than their fair share. Daily we read of it's disasters and the hooray for me and to hell with you battles.
Naysayers will tell you it doesn't mean shit to Wells Fargo/Wachovia or any of the rest of the big banks that one guy moves a few hundred bucks out of their coffers. They lie. What if the one gets multiplied by a million? ten million? tens of millions? An avalanche starts with the slipping of a single stone. Movements that bring down tyrants begin with one pissed off sister who decides she's mad as hell and isn't going to take this lying down.
Goliath is big, but he doesn't always win. Every once in a while, we David's get to strike a blow for the little guys.
Mahalo,
The Jawbone
