Joy’s Dad, Haines Cody
By Eric Westerlind
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It was perfect for me, all that changin’. Yeah, I look back fondly. I mean I was racking label ink and stickers to the tops of my storeroom so’s to keep up because every business with a product was stickerin’ over daily.
I saw it coming. I was lucky. And sure this is before those digital things you got now, that light display — this is back when it was pen and ink, okay — mom and pop. This is when you had Storeroom Ralph and Notepad Nadine to tally your incoming/outgoing. Hang on, sorry. Back me up, would you? Thanks, yeah. I think clearer by the window.
What time is it? Oh no, they don’t shut the smoker’s entrance until ten so cut me off in twenty minutes so we can make it down. I’ll want a cigarette before lunch.
What’d you ask again? Ah. Mmhmm. Your economics paper. The Laugher Curve. Yeah, I mean they explained it to us then — perfect taxes, they said. Based on some Muslim scholar who’d been in the smarts before his time. Perfect taxes. You’d think nonsense huh, but eight years in, this country was boomin’ baby. That’s what everybody said anyway. Boomin’. The guy Laugher who drummed it up, he went a bit nuts but enough folks had sat in on his lectures and calculations seminars that they could pull it all back together when they got access to his office.
Died? Yeah. Died. Pew pew. Rest in whatever peace economists get, I guess. Yeah, thanks. Yeah. Yeah, I get thirsty thanks. Especially, don’t get many visitors in January.
What’s that? Aw no, my daughter’s up at Syracuse — teaches Biology to nutheads and tree huggers. I tell her she’s saving the world but truth is I’m not sure it’s worth saving. Heh. Don’t quote me on that okay, for your paper or whatever. I don’t need somebody finding out I was a pessimist.
The sticker shop? Well yeah — it was an easy sidestep from labels and I was a policy geek just because I liked to gamble on stocks and races and so on so I kept up, you know. So when they said perfect taxes you know most people just moaned and said here we go, taxes are going up but they couldn’t look past a headline. You know how it is. I mean — well how did you decide to get into economics?
Oh? Oh, oh really? Yeah. Oh. Well, you’ll grow out of that if experience says anything. Haha. Oh really? Hmm. Sure sure. Well it’s different now, see, since they started in with their big dig on rentiers and capital gains — oh sure, sure. Well, I mean sounds like you already know what’s going on, don’t you. Ha. How long is your paper? Well. No way. I never wrote anything longer than a check! Haha. No, yeah, I’m kidding. I wrote my daughter a card every year for her birthday. I like those gag cards, right? Know ‘em? Like Santa landing on the shithouse — ope, sorry — landing there — “I said the Schmidt house!” you know! Hehe. Yeah. She got on my case one year, said I didn’t write anything important, so I, uh. Yeah. Started writing little notes to her each year. She liked those better.
Ah, thank you, Marvin.
Marvin’s great. Three greens, on the hour. Cheers, Marvin. Everybody in blue gets three. The folks there, you see, Dottie with the curlers and her friend Essex don’t suffer the same cystic stuff as us so they’re pill-free.
Hmm? Oh yeah. Practically a bouquet of them at my age. You wait! You’ll get your own flowers, tell you what. Take care of those teeth and what you eat, but, hehe, little secret: do whatever you want. If there’s anything being around a little longer than you’s taught me it’s that trying to keep one gopher in the ground’s about the same as stopping the rain from gettin’ you wet.
Speaking of which! Yeah, thank you. Just a little ways down the hall, hang a right. Let’s stop by my room, get my pack and hat and coat. They don’t like you going out in the cold in these flimsy things. Truth be told, I don’t mind. Joy paid extra for this funny chair so I can just turn up the heat and I’d sweat enough to slide right off. Yep, the yellow hat. Yep. Oh why thank you. Yeah, it’s my happy hat. Happy days. Oh. No problem. Yeah. I’ll just wait here for you.
Oh. Very nice. I like that. Suits you. Nice cut to the shoulders. Yes. Were you military? Hm — could’ve fooled me. Yes, I like that very much. Yes. You’re welcome. Yes. Yeah. Just through the main hall, that set of doors. Yeah, just there. Hi Annabelle.
Perfect.
The winter air strikes the old sticker maker and the student, abbreviating all conversation. The parking lot around the facility is as flat as the land around an airplane hangar until the concrete lip of the parking lot, and beyond that, only frost-frozen grass amidst clumps of crusty snow and the great bulwark of a Northern sky.
The sticker maker offers the student a cigarette.
The glass doors behind them open and re-close as the student accepts.
Yeah, a strange time. Hard to believe they had the nerve to call them perfect taxes, but they did. “Predicted daily!” Haha. And wouldn’t you know it, they tried. And it worked! I mean, for some, you know. Like anything. They’d print them and run them daily in the paper for the day after. Up 3%; down 1.5%; up 6%. In the beginning they tried to tell us why but it was pretty clear people didn’t care. Taxes are like — oh well maybe a little like getting old, right? You know it’s going to happen and some people take care of them right on time and take their pills and other people try to get around them or make a big fuss, but in truth most folks just accept it’s happening and get on trying to enjoy themselves, you know?
Mmhmm. Oh sure. You don’t mind? Feels like a two cigarette kind of morning.
Yeah. Mmhmm. I’m not one to let an opportunity pass. I told you I was keeping up on it more than most. Sure, taxes were going to change daily which meant what? — Ah — don’t let them say you’re slow — yeah — prices would change. I mean, not all prices, right, but remember this is back when we were doing everything by hand, so we transitioned with the change — receipt paper, percentage table sheets — we even for awhile worked as calculators, me and Joy’s mother. We’d leave Handy to man the stickers and we’d just go store to store — this was back when all the stores were nice and close together — and we’d adjust anything. I mean, people were doing income tax for every employee by the day, because, you know, composite taxation & interest, they couldn’t just run it all on April 15th! No way. Defeated the whole idea of perfect taxes. Haha.
Was it crazy? Sure as hell it was crazy! It was a nightmare, but it was a rich nightmare. I mean 3/4 of the universities the country has now were funded in the years following. We built the highways system. The national airlines. All the magnet lines. It all happened because of those twelve years. Miserable years, but, eh. We survived. And now look at what you’ve got.
Oh yeah. Hm. True enough. Yep, well. Like I said, there’s always something, isn’t there. Yeah just stub it out there. Here, yeah. I’m just going to let the cold hit my head a little bit. Then you can roll me back in.
Oh really? Wow. Yeah. I should introduce you to my daughter. She thinks a little bit like you do.