Back Home
To say the first week back home was a bit of trial for Joleen is a bit of an understatement.
“Have you ever thought about how things work, Joleen?” Jack slouched in his red and blue plaid La-z Boy chair, feet up.
Joleen looked up from cleaning the kitchen, rolled her eyes, and sighed, “Have you ever thought about taking out the garbage?” She knew it was a rhetorical question. Here we go again.
“I mean, big things, like how the financial system works? What the hell are hedge fund managers anyway? What exactly is the treasury bond yield and why does it go down when it sounds like it should be going up? Derivatives, are you kidding me? Deriving money out of your bank account, I bet. What do you venture capitalists do besides throw money at harebrained schemes? Apps that shine my shoes? Bitcoins, are you kidding me? Think I could take one to the bank and exchange it for a hundred thousand dollars or whatever? Hell, you never even see your paycheck, do you? What exactly happens with it, do you know, I mean, really, if you never even seen it?”
Joleen blew her hair up out of her eyes and wiped her brow. “Why don’t you get a job and find out for yourself, buster?”
“I’m busy thinking about big things, like what if Jeff Bezos went to the bank and wanted to cash out his trillion dollars? Did you ever think about that?”
Joleen vacuumed around the La-z Boy and muttered, “Oh, brother.”
“Trillions and trillions of dollars or so they say. Where are they? I tell you where they are. They aren’t. It’s all funny money, little electronic bits flying around computers, that’s all. The Chinese will pull the plug on those computers one day and poof! all gone except what you carry around in your purse. Speaking of which, could you run down to the gas station and get me another six-pack?”
Anything to get out of the house, Joleen thought and gathered up her keys to go to Walmart on the other side of town. When she returned four hours later with a six-pack and groceries for the week. Jack had slouched even further in his La-z Boy as if that was even possible.
“…and sewage! Did you ever think about where all that poop goes?”
“No.”
“All those tunnels underground just blooping along, bloop bloop bloop! Maybe it all goes to the Gulf and just washes back onshore. Maybe that’s why Galveston beaches are so dingy. Or maybe it all goes to the mighty Mississippi and that’s how the delta keeps getting bigger and bigger. Or maybe …”!”
“That’s enough, Jack!”
Joleen put the groceries up and passed Jack on her way to get dressed for work.
“…fracking? They oughta call it cracking, the crackers. And all for what? Gas! Why, I’ve got enough gas to…”
Joleen passed through the living room on her way to work as a Covid-19 nurse. For once, Jack noticed.
“Don’t work too hard, darlin’!”
Copyright © Johnny Clack 2022
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