While I'm no fan of Big Corporate America, there comes a time, usually around 11:30 p.m., when a guy like me (read: just me) says, "Man, I'm bored."
I could go to a party or a bar. I could even leave town -- just point myself toward a mystical land where cool things happen on the cheap.
But nay, I say, for those things are too involved.
I need an excursion that involves no thinking -- where my glazed-over expression and sense of pride that my country is super-duper is welcome, hallelujah.
So, with few choices, I speak the sacred words: "Let's go to Wal-Mart."
At that, the earth trembles, the sky darkens, my guide flees, and a boulder chases me out of my apartment, lodging itself in my door.
Good thing I'm Harrison Ford.
And so I hop into my chariot (Pontiac) and head out to Muncie's finest late-night hangout for bored college students and mullet-wearing locals.
Wal-Mart: Where popularity and nudity meet.
"That's the only place where you can walk in buck-naked with a pair of flip-flops on and nobody will pay any attention to you," comedian Rodney Carrington once said.
During the day, Wal-Mart is a maelstrom of child-beating, oil-changing, NASCAR-loving doom. (I realize I'm generalizing, but as you may infer, I don't care.)
Late at night, however, Wal-Mart is a calmer place of consumer salvation. Where else can you get zit cream and envelopes at midnight?
Verily, the fluorescent lights shine for miles (yards). My eyes glaze over as I buzz toward the light, knowing thousands of drones have taken such ill-fated flights, only to be zapped to death by deep discount prices.
Shopping at Wal-Mart spells doom. But even with Meijer only 0.2 miles away (I checked), I can't drive that far. Wal-Mart's light is beautiful -- even Zen-like.
Run toward the light, children. There is only Wal-Mart.
I once read an article about Wal-Mart's music policy. As the world's largest retailer of recorded music, Wal-Mart is the Promised Land for musicians.
This puts Wal-Mart is in a position to dictate what an artist can and cannot say or do. Album covers and lyrics must be changed to comply with Wal-Mart
policies.
We wouldn't want shotgun buyers to hear any curse words or see any boobies.
Sure, other retailers are guilty -- but Wal-Mart is the leader.
"Don't like it?" Wal-Mart asks in the voice of C. Montgomery Burns. "Try selling millions of copies out of your van. Smithers! Release the robotic Richard Simmons!"
So artists bite the bullet and obey the corporate giant. To disobey Wal-Mart is blasphemy. Resistance is futile. Try to run. Try to hide. Break on through to the Wal-Mart side.
The censorship should keep me away. But in the wee hours, when a man needs zit cream, standards drop. The stores all look prettier at closing time.
So I'm tempted by Wal-Mart's music section, with such popular recording artists as the B-52s -- but I don't buy.
I'm mesmerized, but I'm not stupid.
It's not much of a stretch to say that if you buy your music at Wal-Mart, you're supporting censorship. Naturally, this is a stretch I don't mind making.
For your zit cream, shampoo, ice cream and Doritos, perhaps you will go toward the light.
But if you can, resist the music section.
Write to John at kingseyeland@bsu.edu
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