Seeing Through the Forest to the Sky

“Hence clinging to the term “capitalism” may be one of the factors reinforcing the conflation of libertarianism with corporatist advocacy. In any case, if libertarianism advocacy is not to be misperceived—or worse yet, correctly perceived! —as pro-corporate apologetics, the antithetical relationship between free markets and corporate power must be continually highlighted…”

-Roderick Long, Corporations versus the Market; or, Whip Conflation Now

There weren’t any jobs Peter Laughner was interested in coming out of the State’s required schooling program. He hopped from job to job until one morning he was in his bathrobe, a toothbrush sticking out of his mouth like a foaming stalk of wheat like some deranged farmer, and saw it on TV—“Become an ordained minister by mail! IT’S THAT EASY! WHAT’S THE CATCH? THERE IS NO CATCH!” So he mailed in a check to the preacher people for $400, franticly scribbling on that self-addressed envelope like some kind of psycho mailing in a confession to the police. Ever since then, he hadn’t made that great of a living, but it was enough to get barely by, to pay the rent and buy a few groceries and a few things he wanted, which usually amounted to some hash and OG vinyl records of the Velvet Underground. He’d marry people who didn’t want anything to do with tradition and didn’t want to go as far as getting hitched by Elvis.

Most of the time, he’d stand up there at the alter looking like Lou Reed before the newly in love that couldn’t wait to pull off their dress clothes and climb into a car with tin cans on the back strung on there one by one, their loud clanking ushering in a new life together. Peter didn’t have much time for relationships since he was on the road constantly traveling to the next joyous marital occasion in his slightly worn Dodge Sprinter van he decided to live in shortly after his apartment lease expired a few months ago. If there were a few words to describe Peter, they would be somewhere between a hippy, a hobo, a drug addict, a philosopher, an idealist, and a guru.

He hit the road from his squat spot, which was a park under a bridge in a nearby city where everyone ignored him and didn’t bother him that much, and headed a few hours south where someone named Kyle wanted to get hitched with he was sure was a fine young lady named Sally. Things went from urban to “out in the middle of nowhere” in a hurry once you got passed a comfortable commute length to any city in either direction. Before Peter knew it he was at a rest stop about an hour north of his destination just before the state line. He saw a few buildings, open-air strip malls which never made sense to him in an area where six months out of the year was frigid cold and blizzards, and then farmland as far as the eye could see until he got there. The wedding was set for later that night but he wanted to be an hour or so early just to get his bearings and talk to everyone.

There were a few times the party insisted on him dressing up, but this wasn’t one of those times. He was pretty sure he would pronounce them in their backyard, which was more than fine with him. He looked in the rearview mirror to check himself, running a black barber comb he kept in the center console through his thinning brown hair, looking up his nostrils, and inspecting the gaps in his teeth. Once he was satisfied, he turned up the volume on what he was pretty sure was one of the last functioning FM radios in the area. The once classic rock station—now called “oldies”—faded in and out slightly with each passing mile marker into BFE. He had taken a quick shower earlier at a Pilot station, where you got a ticket from the counter and could get a good meal, shower, and a shave before hitting the road again. Peter guessed it was as good as meals on the road would ever get, at least ones he didn’t have time for.

There was still some time on the road to Kyle’s parent’s place, a quant 30-acre property at the foothills of a mountain range. The water flowed through the valley into local rivers and streams, and most drank it right out of the ground. It was far enough away from anything to be safe. Peter had come through this way once before, but it was another one of those things where he had no time to rest on his laurels and take in the sights, probably on the way to another wedding event whereby the power bestowed on him by the local TV preacher, an 800 number and $400 he pronounced another lovely couple man and wife until death do us part.

“Kyle! Hey, it’s Pe--” Peter tried to get a word out as Kyle was being encroached on by busy parents, wedding planners, an eager photographer, his best man, and a dad who looked happy, sad, and excited all at the same time. The thick trees gave shade to the backyard and provided a cool space on what was otherwise a hot summer day.

After a near attempt to escape for a brief moment, Kyle stepped away and spotted Peter, “Heyyyy! There he is! The man of the hour!” Kyle said, no doubt already a few drinks deep.

“I don’t know if that’s true, man, I think that’s you, brother! Congratulations. Have you seen the bri-- . . . oh, of course not, bad luck . . . my bad!”

“Of course, you need a drink? You’re lookin’ good. I mean, in all seriousness we didn’t want you do dress up or anything, you look good. Love that hippy thing you got goin on there.”

“Well, this is me, hahahha,” Pete said with a half chuckle.

They both wandered through the labyrinth of people in the forest of his parent’s backyard and toward the open bar, but Kyle supposed it wasn’t really “open” for him since he spent at least a few grand on it. He looked like he knew who to avoid, people he didn’t care to gab on for hours with at this very moment. He was feeling nervous, but he supposed that was normal.

“Yeah, sure, I’ll take a whiskey, whatever you got, man.”

“I appreciate you coming out here to marry us. It’s greatly appreciated. You come highly recommended. Both my friends and of course, the good ole Yelper, hahahha,” Kyle chuckled, polishing off the last of the Rolling Rock.

“Of course! No problem, Man. Of course, Yelp. I always say I’m not your daddy’s preacher, am I right?”

“You got that right, man. Well, Sally’s gonna arrive any minute now. Let me show you where you can stand, get ready, and such. And, there’s something I need to tell you quick. . .” Kyle looked kind of bewildered as he pulled Peter aside as if to tell him a deep dark secret. “You see, Sally, she comes from another area of the world, and this area, they got a different way of doing things than you and I might be used to. It’s more communal, but also State run, they have handed over their entire lives to the State and trusted that these busy-bodied bureaucrats wouldn’t get fat and happy but rather would properly administer their economy in a way that was “fair.” It doesn’t make sense to me. Oh, man, why am I tellin’ you this, I’m all freakin’ nerves, Peter, I don’t know what I’m sayin’ right now.”

“Hey it’s okay, it’s okay, man. Perfectly normal right now. You love her, right? That hasn’t changed? So, get out there and follow my lead and I will do the rest, okay? You got your vows written somewhere?”

Kyle pointed to his head. “Right here, brother.”

Peter looked a little disconcerted. He’d been through dozens of these. The groom was always in need of a bit of consoling before he got up there and said what he needed to say. He had a bible in his hand but it was just for show. He used it to hold a piece of white, college-ruled paper with a few things written on it in blue ink. Do you --- take this man to be your lawfully wedded. . . and so on. “Well, that’s good I guess. Maybe you can write a few things down because I guarantee you’re gonna blank out up there.”

“Say no more,” Kyle said as he grabbed a cocktail napkin and began transferring what he was going to say all in his head to the thin napkin that was ready to rip into a million pieces or be used to rest another drink on.

“That’s really great, man, really great. So, about where this chick is from, did you know about this before? I mean, I’m guessing this isn’t the first time you’ve heard about this.”

“No, no. Of course not. I’ve been there, to this area, it’s actually kind of nice, but like I said, she isn’t too fond of where we are from, let’s put it that way. We’re much much different as far as living, see we live under capitalism, which is way better. . .”

“Why do you say that?”

“Well, I just know so. I mean I know that State is also here too, and involved in practically every aspect of our lives from cradle to grave, even up to and including this marriage ceremony, but you know, somehow Sally’s background is different, where she’s from is so much different.”

“Ah, gotcha. Okay, well, I’m sure you two will make a very lovely couple. Well, shall we get into our positions?” Peter asked, trying to take on the role of a coordinator of sorts. It would have been better if he stepped in at this point. Kyle was already sloshed and It’d probably get worse as the evening progressed, and that was okay, but Peter wanted to gracefully try to leave around 10 pm so he could catch a vacancy at a cheap motel and have some time to himself before he hit the road in the morning.

“Let’s do this!” Kyle got up in front of the rows of chairs, which must have been borrowed from the local church in town. His family sat on one side and Sally’s, the other as was customary and to avoid any unnecessary confrontation.

Everyone took their places. Kyle went to the back and his party began pairing up with the bridesmaids. He gave his dad a nudge with his elbow the way dads do man-to-man with their sons. Sally’s mom was in the back too and Peter waited up front and the ceremony began with the music being played by a DJ Kyle probably found right next to Peter on Yelp.

The forest gave all it had to offer to the two who had been brought together by some stroke of luck. Sally met him at a diner between their two areas and they found themselves having pie and coffee at midnight together, and well, the rest is history.

Everyone paired up and marched down the aisle in unison and took their respective places. Everything was going very well, as well as weddings could go, Peter thought, but what happened next, was an absolute first for him in the history of his adventures as a traveling hippy, nomad, infomercial-ordained preacher.

Peter proceeded into his spiel, “We are gathered here today to admire the union of these two, Sally and Kyle. . .” Kyle looked like he was going to faint and Sally looked beautiful in that dress and was on the more calm side. Peter looked out over the crowd and paused before asking Kyle to start the vows. “Kyle, do you have something prepared?”

“I do,” Kyle said as he fumbled into the inside pocket of his navy blue suit jacket for the cocktail napkin. “It’s somewhere here. . .” There was a light laughter from the crowd. Collectively they seem to know this was expected, that Kyle was all thumbs and would fumble even the most basic of tasks if in front of an audience.

Peter tried to stall for time by reading a passage he read in front of dozens of crowds, the one about how love is patient and kind while Kyle continued rummaging through his suit for the napkin he probably used to plant his tenth or eleventh Rolling Rock on before getting up on stage like a duffus. It was only one of the most important days of his life and he was going to---

“Well, you know what?” Kyle said to the audience, “I’m just gonna wing it. Sally, I need to know. . . I need to know, right now! Something I’ve been worried about for. . . Years now!”

The audience was in shock at Kyle’s unpredictability. What the hell was he going to say now? Sally was even more horrified, since she was playing with dolls when she was not even seven or eight when she had the perfect wedding in her mind, and Kyle fumbling his words and making an ass of himself was not one of those things she had dreamed of.

“Sure, what do you want to know, Kyle?” Sally asked, blushing and trying to hold back her very strong feelings.

“I want to know how you guys can live over there in that commie area and how you could fall for a guy like me? I mean everyone knows, our State-Capitalist land is much much better, and just how evil it is that comes from where you come from?”

“Kyle, where is this coming from, can we talk about this late—“

“No, we have to talk about this now! I don’t know if I can spend my life with someone who comes from a State-communist-run area like yours. How can you live like that?”

This was an absolute first for Peter. He was aware of these two areas, one State-communist controlled, where Sally was from, and one that was State-Capitalist controlled, where Kyle and everyone else were from. Although it was hard to see each from their respective points of view, Peter, being the diplomat, and the neutral party, thought he knew how to solve this:

“Kyle and Sally, please listen. I know that you and your families each come from different areas of the world. Kyle, you come from a State-Capitalist society and it is hard to see how Sally could have possibly lived in a State-Communist society. And Sally, it is probably very hard for you to see Kyle’s point of view, being strictly brought up in a State-Communist society. But, I think I can solve this both for you. Is it not the fact that Sally is communist and you are a capitalist the main issue, isn’t the real issue here, the State itself? Everyone is so blind to it because we are so caught up in attacking each other for one reason or another, but the problem here is the monopoly on violence and the power that BOTH of your areas have granted them. The State is the ultimate evil. In the case of State-Capitalism; it distorts free markets with its regulations and bureaucracies until even free market supporters can no longer recognize it anymore, and certainly at the very least can’t be called a free market, and at most can be called fascism. The corporation is a mutation of the State and its regulatory alliance with the power-hungry and the worst of the worst of centralization and hierarchies. And, Sally, in the area of State-Communism you live in, your people have given over control and entrusted power of administering the economy fairly to the evilest and bureaucratic power-hungry thugs on the planet, so it is so far from communal living that it is unrecognizable. Do you understand that? Do all of you understand that?”

“Yes, yes I think I do,” Kyle said.

“That makes a lot of sense, I just never thought about it that way before,” Sally said, agreeing with Kyle.

“I guess we never saw it that way because we were so busy attacking each other personally, attacking our way of life, how we’d each blame each other for what was really, ultimately the State’s doing. I’m sorry, Sally. I love you so much and I want to spend my whole life with you. I want to wake up with you every morning and go to sleep with you every night. I want to laugh, cry, dance, and sing with you.” The vows came out of nowhere but were filled with love and admiration for the woman he loved.

Peter smiled and said, “Beautiful words Kyle. We can both agree that we can all work together and love one another and even live with each other, as long as we recognize that the State is the enemy, and we spend our lives fighting against it. Never lose sight or confuse an economic system or a way someone wants to live their lives or whether or not something can work in the absence of the State, with the State itself ever again, and I have a feeling you will be together the rest of your lives.”

“I love you, Kyle,” Sally said, tearing up.

“I love you too, Sally.”

“Well. . . By the power invested in me, you are now husband and wife! You may now –“

The audience stood up and applauded the couple as they embraced and kissed under the cover of the green forest. Somewhere in the world, a good thing had begun, an idea, and was brought together through love and the desire to bring about greatness in the world. And at that moment, Peter looked up at the sky through the trees and everyone around him began to dance. JW

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