There once was a utopia where -believe it or not - all citizens were declared free and equal - where women enjoyed the same rights as men, where education was free, and work communal, where the state provided for its elderly, where racism was outlawed - and fascism in all of its ugly forms was verboten - and rule by the workers for the workers was enshrined in law... All of the traditional hierarchies were overthrown condemned to the dust heap - the old rulers eliminated, the old oppressive class hounded, vilified and cast out - the backward types requisitioned, called to the cities or for military service or else left to their haggard and destitute form of agrarian subsistence...Oh the songs and posters, the artwork, the inspiring films, the news broadcasts, the daily papers - a spirit of "can-do, must-do..." in the face of imperial threats from abroad ...a terrifyingly beautiful conformity - a state of single-mindedness - all questions answered and known by all ...yet still yet still - desperate people afraid for their lives, whispering in corridors anxious of being denounced as enemies and traitors - or else singing the praises of the leadership loudly in fulsome agitated little declarations - and still and still waited to be carted off...In this perfect world - everything must be "just right" - the slightest deviation from the norm will bring the entire weight of the punitive state down upon you...The world was already made "perfect" - as you describe it - not once, not twice, but three, four times over with harrowing monotony - and still you demand another round of cleansing and overhaul ???
We had made our way down busy Palm Avenue towards the crosswalk. after zigzagging the usual route from busy Bandini Avenue to Tower Road to Rosewood Place. Bret was our wild-man companion - a fifth-grader with a take-no-prisoners approach to life. The local crosswalk, that most mundane of enterprises was soon to become the scene of spontaneous absurdist theater when suddenly out of nowhere came the random yelp: Hey...Hey...What do you want with us lady? - What do I want with you? said the most predictably normal gray-haired woman by whose ever so brief guidance we measured our daily jaunt to school. Yeah - where are you taking us? - There's only one way kid - It's this way... - You're not really a crossing guard are you? came the cheeky interrogative. The slightly bemused, limping, beleaguered woman was dwarfed by her bright yellow uniform as she held up her STOP sign - showing Brett. The other smaller kids walked by us single file in the middle of th...
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