“The Fine Print”, by M.H. Schrader
WHY IS IT?
(Published
10 September 1997 in the Neighborhood Journal. Posted 10 March 2003)
One of the favorite questions that
my eldest two daughters like to ask is “Why?”.
And to be quite honest, most of the time, I really don’t know. Just because, that’s why. But it does make one wonder why things
really are the way they are.
Why
is it that when I am in a hurry everyone else seem to be going so S-L-O-W? Why is that? Especially at the bank.
Do the bank tellers have some kind of internal radar that tells them
when someone is in a hurry? It always
seems that when I have ample time the tellers are more than happy to shove me
out the door, but when I am crunched for time (like on lunch break), it always
seems like they are only making transactions in denominations of one dollar or
less. (“You want one-thousand dollars,
Mr. Smith? Okay. One, two, three...”)
Why
does the phone only seem to ring when you are walking out the door? Why is that? I can be at home all day and the phone will never ring, but as
soon as I decide to go somewhere, inevitably it will ring as soon as I open the
front door. Or it will ring when I am
in the shower, and then the person on the other end thinks I’m not home, which
of course can be really bad if the person who is calling just happens to be
one’s spouse. (“Where were you buster,
huh? Why weren’t you at home?!”)
Why
is it that we have ridiculous laws that say that a vehicle with a crack in the
windshield but good brakes is unsafe to drive but a vehicle with a good
windshield and bad brakes is safe? Why
is that? Is this arcane law really
making the roads safer?
Why
is it that people act like their house is on an island? I can see the feeling of isolation and
privacy out in the rural areas, but in the subdivisions in the cities? Yes, neighbor, you may have a privacy fence
around your yard, but you know, I can still see your yard from my house and
thus can see you when you are sunbathing au natural, so please, put some
clothes on, will you?
Why
is it that folks will walk for miles inside the mall but yet will parked
(illegally, I might add) in the handicapped spots because they don’t want to
have to walk too far? Why is that?! Hello, out there...are you listening? You’re walking farther inside the place than
you are to get to it! If you are well
enough to spend hours upon hours on your feet walking and shopping, you can
walk a block in the parking lot.
Speaking
of parking lots, why is it that the same people who are more than willing to
walk across acres of asphalt at Wal-mart insist on driving their cars one
block? Why is that? Here’s a newsflash--if you measured the
distance from the furthest parking spot at a typical discount store to the
door, it would be greater than a block.
Why
is it that folks insist on driving 40 on the freeways? Why is that? And why is it that I always seem to get behind those folks? Freeways are meant to be driven on
fast---that’s what they’re designed for.
If you want to take a leisurely drive, please don’t do it on the
freeways. I really don’t enjoy having
to slam on my brakes to avoid seeing what is in your trunk. Thank you.
Why
is it that swing sets are becoming extinct but jungle gyms proliferate? Why is that? I don’t know about you, but personally I find it hard to believe
that swing sets are more dangerous than “monkey bars.” I’ve never gotten a bruise from a swing set,
but I’ve broken a wrist falling from the “monkey bars.” Yet some bureaucrat somewhere insists on
telling me that my personal experiences did not really happen, that I must be
mistaken, because, after all, we all know that jungle gyms are safe because
they say so, so I couldn’t have possible gotten hurt on something that they
deem is safe. It must have been my
imagination.
Those
are the questions. Do you have any
answers?