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Car
Keys or Underwear?
May
12, 2004
Satire by Joe Fields
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I was looking around the house for my misplaced freedoms
the other day.
This happens a lot with my car keys. But it's the funniest
thing - they are always in the last place I look. This also
happens sometimes with my socks and underwear, but for some
strange reason I almost never find them. Once an odd sock
or a pair of underwear come up missing, I never see them again.
It's a good thing I don't get emotionally attatched to socks
and underwear.
Anyway, so there I was looking for some of my missing freedoms
and wondering if they were going to wind up like my car keys,
which I always end up finding, or my underwear, which get
lost in some as yet unexplained black hole.
Hmmmm... Car keys or underwear. This was really beginning
to perturb me because, unlike my socks and underwear, I do,
from time to time get emotionally attatched to my freedoms.
(One freedom I could do without has to do with eating liver
and onions.)
I looked in all the usual places, including under the cushion
of my chair, but all I found was 27 cents and a handful of
popcorn. I ate the popcorn and continued my search. But subsequent
investigations of my bedroom, the closets and kitchen cabinets
met with the same disappointing results.
Now it was time to call in the cavalry. With the enlisted
help of my wife and son, we renewed the search for my freedoms
in earnest. I should have known better. Like all other group
searches we ended up wandering around following each other,
as if we were the ones that were lost. Again no luck.
Desperate, I turned to my last hope - my dog, Gypsy. "Girl,"
I pleaded. "Do you have any idea where my freedoms are? I
really need them."
Sensing the seriousness of the situation my faithful dog
promptly led me to the back door and barked. With my hopes
raised, we went into the back yard where Gypsy made a beeline
for - you guessed it - a half-buried pair of my underwear.
(Could it be she was trying to tell me something?)
My dog, tail wagging and grinning from ear to ear, was very
pleased with herself, knowing she had done her part to help
out. I patted her head and thanked her. I can always use another
pair of underwear.
Disgusted, I kicked at a rock laying just outside of my
rock garden. Now usually when I kick at a rock I miss and
fall down in a contorted heap. But as luck would have it I
hit this one squarely. It was a thing of beauty, reminiscent
of a football sailing fifty yards in slow motion and gliding
perfectly through the uprights.
It only took a second for reality to set in however; I watched
in horror as my rock shattered my next door neighbor's window.
Dutifully, I marched myself over there and offered him some
duct tape and plastic sheeting, which I had a large supply
of. He was not amused.
Feeling pretty sheepish at this point, I slowly walked back
into the house. Slumping into my living room chair, and about
ready to give up for the day, I got help from a most unexpected
source.
There on T.V. was the president of the United States, George
W. Bush, telling me that our soldiers were in Iraq fighting
for my freedoms.
"Hot diggity dog," I yelled out with excitement. "So that's
where my freedoms are at."
"But I thought they were looking for weapons of mass destruction,"
said my wife.
"Never mind all that, honey. It's my freedoms I'm worried
about."
Yet, the more I got to thinking, the more puzzled I became.
What were my freedoms doing in Iraq? I could not recall ever
having an Iraqi over for dinner and loaning my freedoms to
him, which by the way, had it been my brother I would have
played heck ever getting them returned to me.
In fact, I had not even seen any Iraqis jogging in our neighborhood.
I was positive that no Iraqi had broken into my house and
stolen them. And after thinking long and hard I was reasonably
sure that I had never been to Iraq.
Besides, had I ever gone to Baghdad and accidentally left
my freedoms in my hotel room under my bed, I know the maid
would have turned them in and I would have gotten them back.
No doubt about that.
Still, I couldn't figure out how my freedoms ended up in
Iraq. But, according to the president that's where they were.
Being a man of action, I was determined to take matters into
my own hands. I called up the airlines and asked when I could
book the next flight to Iraq. The ticket agent, in a rather
rude manner abruptly informed me that his airline didn't fly
to Iraq, never did fly to Iraq and never will fly to Iraq.
Then he proceeded to ask me a whole lot of questions. Being
the polite person that I am, I related my story to him.
Now it couldn't have been more than fifteen minutes after
I had hung up the phone, when I heard a knock on the door.
It was two men in identical suits, both wearing sunglasses.
I guess they must have been airline employees, but I couldn't
figure out how the two had arrived so quickly, when the airport
was forty miles away. They asked a lot of strange questions,
then did a really thorough search of my house.
The two men finally left, taking my computer hard drive
with them. Now that was the one place I hadn't looked. But
by the time I realized that my freedoms couldn't be in there,
and that the president assured me that they were somewhere
in Iraq, the two men were already gone.
Well, maybe those boys and girls fighting in Iraq will find
my freedoms. I would like to have them back, as well as my
hard drive.
Joe Fields is a freelance writer, covering the politics
and issues of the day.
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