Promising keys

I was at the hardware store getting 5 duplicate keys made from the new key for the new exterior lock I installed because the old lock was dented and dinged and the keyhole was chewing up my old house key.

I was nudged into getting a new lock with new keys when I bent my old house key nealry in half using it to pop open my car battery’s caps so I could add distilled water to my battery because the starter was making that noise they make when your battery is no longer giving your engine the oomf it needs to start. I was right. Water did the trick. Starter starting cranking like it should.

But I still had a bent house key. So I bought a new door knob and got new keys.

After screwing the new lock in place I drove up to the hardware store listening to a Meidas podcast about the tariffs and Trump and Washington’s insider trading billionaires. I found the key making kiosk and in an instant a man with the name of the hardware store on his shirt arrived. He was tired but earnest. Can I help you?

I liked him immediately. Working class. Like my family. Can you make me 5 house keys, brother?

Sure thing. $3.99 each.

Works for me.

Black working class man comes up next to me at the counter with his cute daughter in her Sunday best. He has a digital key in his hand.

Hey.

I say hey. Good thing you’re replacing that digital thing now before the tariffs kick in and the price goes sky high.

He looks at me like I’m nuts. The man making my keys interrupts our awkward silence. He thinks these tariffs are a good thing. Damned straight. When it's all over, and Trump makes those trade deals, by next year, I'll be looking at a $30 an hour job.

I said nothing.

The black man smiled. That’s exactly right. We just got to tough it out. Got to be a man through these tough times. Good things will be coming our way in the long run. These tariff’s gonna bring manufacturing jobs back. Big time.

I said nothing.

Jesus. They both watch the same “news”. There is no point in challenging the false hopes of these burned out working men. They’re dreaming of a better life, a way out of their low wage servitude. I couldn’t say it. Hi, I’m a perfect stranger. Your lives are going to get worse. You’re fools. These guys could give a shit about Harvard or El Salvadoran prisons or the Supreme Court or the Bond Markets.

I walked out with my new house keys jangling thinking to myself that’s why FOX is selling the be a man BS. Hard times are coming. Be an Alpha Male. Wait it out, peasant, and King Trump will reward you with a job working in a factory that’s never going to built. In a country that’s sliding into economic irrelevance. In a country that’s becoming a banana republic, a shithole.

I turn the car key and with the battery properly charged the starter works. Well I’ll be damned. Something works. I drive home happy, listening to NPR and the latest madness. The madness creeps closer and closer every day. So far my quiet life is good in this forsaken fascist state. It’s liberating to stop searching for keys to unlock the hearts and minds of Trump followers.

At home I test each of the newly milled house keys in the new lock I installed that morning. I dance a little old man’s jig. They fit beautifully, locking and unlocking our ancient front door with ease. I close our door, lock it and pocket my keys. Security will be more important than ever in the turmoil that’s coming.

REFERENCE

https://meidasnews.com/