By Sam Letchworth

I was hanging out up the road yesterday afternoon with a friend of mine when another buddy rolled up in his pickup truck. It was B.S. Mosley, local Zydeco musician and radical facial hair sporter. When I saw him last he had a full black beard, but today he had shaved a straight line right down the middle of his chin, making for two grotesquely enlarged sideburns. He looked like a damn Civil War general.

“Blaine,” I called out to him. “I want to write an editorial but I can’t think of a topic.” Blaine is always good for ideas.

“I’ll tell you what,” said Blaine, “you should write about these blackguard hippies electing these illiterate janitors so that they can turn Garland Avenue into the Champs-Elysses and spend $115 million on these no-account, snot-nosed kids who need less than half that amount for their school – and all on my hard work and dime!”

“What are you talking about?” I asked him.

“Are you registered to vote in Fayetteville?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Why?”

“Come on,” he said, “we’re going to the polls.”

We jumped into his truck and rode down Garland Avenue to the Methodist church on the corner of Sycamore.

Blaine told me all about it on the way. “I make no money. I’ve got a truck, the only thing worth a damn in my life. I pay 250 dollars a year in property tax. If this thing passes for a $100 million high school then my property tax will be more money then I’ve ever seen in one place at one time. The vote for this thing is TODAY. They better still be open.”

How had I not heard about this? Had I not been paying attention? Had I read the New York Times instead of the Morning News when they announced this thing? How could I be such an irresponsible member of democracy? Was there even time now for me to form an opinion on the matter?

It was six o’clock when we pulled into the parking lot of Trinity Methodist Church. The polls were still open. But it was almost impossible to tell. There was no line. There was no one even in the fellowship hall except the volunteers working the poll booth.

“I am here to vote!” I exclaimed as I walked through the open door.

“Well, then, you can come over here and talk to me,” said an old lady in a red cardigan. “What’s your name?”

“Sam Letchworth,” I said, “and I hope to God this is where I’m supposed to vote.”

“Hmmmm,” she murmured dubiously. “Let’s see.”

She opened a binder and flipped through pages and pages of names. There was a line next to every name where one had to sign to obtain a ballot. As she scrolled from “A” to “L” I saw hardly any fresh ink anywhere on any of the pages. Just a lot of empty blanks. I guess I wasn’t the only one out of the loop. Or maybe everyone else just didn’t care.

“There you are,” she said. “Samuel?”

“Yes ma’am,” I validated, and handed her my driver’s license. She handed me a paper ballot, and I sat down with it and read the proposition.

Sure enough, the city wanted tax payers to pay for a new high school. There was a breakdown of how many millions were to be allocated for each particular facet of constructing the school. It added up to around $115 million. I thought about it for a long moment, and I voted. I placed my ballot in the cardboard privacy holder and dropped it in the box.

With a “thank you” I was out the door, where Blaine was sitting in the bed of his truck playing harmonica.

“Did you do it?” he asked me.

“I voted,” I said. “I can tell you that.”

“Good deal,” he said. “Good deal.”

Responsibility is the word of the day.