No News From Doodlebug Island
The Doodlebug Island Philosopher’s Society meets more or less monthly in a back room of whatever hotel, tavern, or business from which their rancorous disputes haven’t gotten them barred, so, over time, their circumstances have been reduced to less conducive places, and the meetings themselves occur somewhat sporadically.
Festivities this month took place in Mildred’s Hair Salon amid dryers and styling paraphernalia. But, strangely, it was reported to be the most peaceful and decorous on record! Why, it might have been thought to have been a gathering of Quaker Friends, for in the face of normal threats of violence and mayhem, there was an almost benevolent spirit present.
Now, it might be imagined that the issue under discussion contributed to the unanimity of thought and purpose, but alas, it was not so! After all, the announced topic—An Effort to Understand Global Forces and How Mankind Is Currently Impacted—was so abstract one could go to sleep debating it. No, it wasn’t the topic. It was because program director Jeremy Billings had forgotten to send out meeting notices to members, and he was the only one there!
This might have gone unnoticed, but Jeremy took the occasion to keep minutes of the meeting with himself, and these he remembered to mail to members, who, upon receipt of said minutes, entered upon a debate of their own, and the issue was whether to tar and feather him prior to ejection from the Society, or to forego the public humiliation and simply string him up.
A few days passed, and members’ nerves settled down to the point they were able to function rationally, assuming that was ever a promising capability, and they began to read and consider Jeremy’s ‘minutes’, which, in this case, was a one-man peroration that ran to five single-spaced pages.
It then began to dawn on these associates that, while the work was bombastic in the sense it lumped and labeled the actions and motives of whole groups of people with but a few rather non-specific, generalized examples, the conclusions were not entirely unacceptable, for they tasked the same people, parties, and causes everyone else in the society would have. In the end, Jeremy was stripped of his office but not excommunicated.
In other instances of events whose achievements rise to the level of ‘No News,’ Doodlebug Islanders, in keeping with long-established tradition, spent brief New Year’s moments crafting resolutions they didn’t think would impinge too heavily on whatever fragile resolve each could muster, but they gave more consideration to those having to do with temptations they hadn’t tried yet.
The caveat, “to excess,” appeared at the end of most resolutions. Reformers of various persuasions have been known to leave the Island seeking psychiatric help.
Many of us married men tend to ignore opportunities to form New Year’s resolutions for the simple reason anything we would decide has, in all likelihood, already been suggested (read REQUIRED) by the fair one who accompanied us down the aisle. A goodly number of us even claim a fair degree of perfection from having been married so long and from close attention paid to those many character amendments urged by our wives. This is our view. The women may possibly have another.
The Doodlebug Island Kiwanis Club has, for years, observed the perfectly lovely tradition of furnishing firewood to widows and elderly, but this year they ended up hiring a commercial company to gather, split, and deliver the wood. Members laughingly confess that though they went out in September to cut Juniper logs, they instead devoted themselves to retrieving a wild bee hive from the fork of a tall pine, which meant they spent a good part of the day erecting scaffolding that would enable them to rob the honey.
With considerable difficulty, they managed to gather enough comb for a brief orgy, but not before a good many of them were stung by the incensed bees, and one sustained a broken arm when the scaffolding collapsed. Members have vowed to be more focused next year, but whether on wood or honey they haven’t said.
The year ended as it began, regrets mingled with triumphs, the contemplation of improvements of opportunity if not in character contributing to an optimistic hope for the future. In that connection, the next meeting of the Philosopher’s Society has been announced for this coming Tuesday, appropriately scheduled for Danny’s gym where participants ill adept at fisticuffs can nevertheless be exorcized!
