Bonus Blog Post – Independence Day 2023
Nothing to do with Surfactants
July 4th. I’m sitting on the front porch with a coffee and the paper about 7.30AM and a US Postal van pulls up. Guy gets out with a small brown box and fiddles with a phone and a barcode or something on the box, then walks up the drive. He looks tired. Me too, probably, but he looks a bit frazzled, which I probably don’t. I’m thinking – It’s July the bloody 4th and this guy’s out delivering packages and one of them is to my house. I feel a little guilty honestly, because of two things – one is just that he had to get up this morning when his wife or girlfriend was still asleep and he had to remind her again that he's working this morning – when will he be back – dunno – depends on how many packages – my parents are coming at 2 so you better be back by then – I dunno right I just dunno - depends. I didn't have to get up, I’m just up reading the paper, thinking big thoughts about stuff, you know, Ukraine, AI, interest rates, stuff like that. The other reason I’m guilty is – the package. What about it? It’s hardly what you might call – essential. I mean look – if it was life-saving medication arriving just in time, well fine. If it was even a super-important document that had to be signed “in hard copy with wet ink with a blue pen” to enable a massive amount of money to get where it’s supposed to be to pay people their salaries and such – well OK then. But it wasn’t those things. It just wasn’t frankly that important. It was vitamins OK – shipped from some place in PA – and it was cuttingly obvious from the livery on the box, that’s what it was. No-one was going to be even mildly inconvenienced if this box showed up on July 5th, 6th or 7th or not at all. No-one.
I get up to meet the dude halfway, smiling. I’m thinking though - do I try to make it seem like I’ve been waiting for this thing to arrive – thank goodness it’s here! In fact that’s why I’m even sitting out here.. waiting for this box. Nah that would seem disingenuous. In fact it is disingenuous. And it’s obvious, way too obvious. Putting on that act would diminish us both, I think – him more than me though, probably. I put out my hand. He places the box in it.
Cheers man. How are you doing?
I’m working, July 4th, so…
Yeah I know, working right.. July 4th – good luck man
Thanks man.
He gets in the van, winds down the window and waves as he drives off. I wave back. Why did I say good luck. ? Good luck with double or triple time for this crummy shift? (I have no idea). Good luck getting back at 2 for the girlfriend? Good luck just getting these boxes into the right hands when most people are sleeping late and literally could not care less if the box is there today or tomorrow or never. Good luck making it through the next 30 years of your time not being your own but the healthcare’s good (again, no idea)
I sit back down on the porch and gaze out at the suburban idyll and get back to thinking big thoughts. Dude doesn't need luck. He needs a culture change. A big one. Like, when did it become necessary to deliver vitamins on July 4th? Not only that, really, I mean, when did it even become OK for that to happen? When was it acceptable to mobilize the power and resources of the federal government to get a box of bloody vitamins to a house in the suburbs on July the frickin’ 4th? When, really, and whose idea was it and how is that just fine with everybody? Everyone’s like – Oh there’s Billy the postman on his rounds, delivering vitamins to needy customers on Independence Day- what a fine fellow! No actually they’re not because one they don't care; two they’re still asleep; and three if they’re not asleep, it’s kind of a mild annoyance to have to deal with this guy delivering stuff and trying to decide if you have to feign excitement and relief at this box arriving.
I’ll go out on a limb here and say that something important happened on July 4th. And so the holiday’s a good one to have. Back in England we would say things like – yeah the Yanks have a great standard of living but the quality of life, you know, the culture, is not as good as we have it here. Baloney. We were just jealous of the flashy cars, big houses and women with perfect teeth. Now that I have the cars, the house and such, I’ve realized that there is even more to be jealous of – freedom of speech, economic freedom, the idea that all men are created equal. Things that the declaration really spelled out to a candid world. But the culture though.. the culture apparently says it’s OK to have a bloke get out of bed, leaving behind a pissed-off girlfriend who’s gonna cut him off for a month or more if he’s not back in time to grill burgers for her mam and dad, and drive around out there in this dinky little white van delivering vitamins and shit to people who just don’t care – on a holiday that commemorates something pretty bloody civilization shaping. ‘Cos you know the other thing we would say about the Yanks back then, in more generous moments, was that if it wasn't for them, we’d all be goose-stepping around with our right hands in the air. And that really means – if it wasn't for that declaration on July 4th.
So what am I saying? Give the dude the day off! Of course, but more than that – is there a way that it’s actually not really OK to even think about or suggest that he not have the day off? Is there a way that merely considering the mobilization of an arm of the federal government to deliver vitamins to the burbs on July 4th before even the lycra-clad soccer-moms have begun their power-walking down tree-lined streets, is as uncool as, say, I dunno, smoking or drinking and driving or whatever? Is there a way to bring about a culture change by weighing in the balance the right to have a box on your doorstep on a day the world changed vs the importance of that change and the need to remember it – and finding that the box is really empty?
