A POSSIBLE STORY

Fortunately, so far, this is a bad nightmare based on real facts. I hope it never happens, but just in case... here it goes...


Once upon a time, in a very remote land, called Bestonia, where no one would leave, except to the other world (is there another world?), there lived an almost-old man with his almost-old wife. They had both been celebrating his retirement and whatever was left of his 401K (considering that on September 11, 2001 he had lost a big chunk of well earned and saved money from more than 30 years of hard work and stressful days).


His name was Adam. her name Eve. Well, not really, but those names fit perfectly well, because sooner or later the nightmare would commence and they would eventually also lose their clothes too.


One day, after many years of living happily, things started to change in that land, which many claimed as the "Best Land in the World" (Hence the name...Bestonia). All the basic things to maintain a joyful peaceful life started going downwards. It all began with an invasion to a foreign land, where its people, in spite of all the deficiencies and lack of freedom, lived considerably contempt, as long as they would not infringe in their master's deranged ideology.


The original excuse for that invasion was to protect the entire planet earth from a possible man-caused-cataclysm, also known as Weapons of Mass Destruction, or WMDs. The excuse kept changing along the years to accommodate to the C.Y.A (and CIA too) convenience, as one by one, all excuses became apparent they were just that, excuses, justifications to hide the real purpose of that invasion. The invaders, along the years, depleted all the budgets assigned to different sectors of the economy in their own land to sustain their occupation, while many big corporations profited from it. Among them, Exxon Mobil, Shell Oil, BP, Chevron, and Halliburton, KBR, CACI, Titan, and Blackwater. I probably left out many more, but I am not a researcher, I am just a story teller who also lives in Bestonia, and who cares about Adam and Eve and their family's future.


Five years after that invasion the price of a barrel of oil shut up from $30 to $135, and that uncontrollable rise was felt at the gas pumps. People started paying more than $5 for a gallon of petrol, commonly known in that far, far away land as "gas".


As a consequence of the unmanageable cost of gasoline, all food products suffered unimaginable price increases, mainly the healthy ones, such as fruits and vegetables, because all those products had to be transported from other lands across the oceans. See, Bestonia could not grow them anymore because one of the parties that ran the land decided it was time to deport all illegal foreigners, who had entered Bestonia through areas that originally belonged to them and lost to another of the Bestonian invasions, many years ago. Therefore, Bestonia was left without farm workers. No more fruit pickers, no more vegetables growers. No more good healthy food. Imagine, Bestonians were not going to perform jobs for less than the minimum approved salary by their rulers, who had recently passed a bill to guarantee themselves the sum of $15,000 a month for life during their retirement.

Nevertheless, some of the more necessitated Bestonians who had lost their jobs to natives of India working in Bangalore for at least 1/10th of the salary, applied for odd jobs which they would have never done under normal circumstances. One of these weird jobs entailed picking tomatoes. Obviously, the tomato farmers made a colossal mistake giving these Bestonian those jobs. First because they had to dish out more money to meet the minimum salary requirements; and second because this was hard work, with no time to get to a bathroom to relief themselves. Consequently...Salmonella spread throughout the vast land of Bestonia by consuming those tomatoes. Rumor has it that this epidemic was probably caused by the few remaining illegal foreigners as a way to retaliate for their comrades sent back to their lands of origin, but the theory of hard work and incontinence by the new laborers was not far fetched either.

As everything in life, one thing lead to another and Bestonians had to be driven to hospitals, where many of them died waiting on line or trying to fill up 187 different forms to make sure, in case they would not die, the bills would be paid for, or if they succumbed to Salmonella somebody in their family would have to cough it up, should the insurance refuse to cover the $100 charge for a couple of aspirins administered by a licensed Filipino nurse.

All these back and forth trips to hospitals, added to the regular commuting to/from their jobs, plus the sky rocketing prices at the supermarkets, became a gargantuan burden and finally lead most Bestonians to bankruptcy. Unfortunately, the Maximum Ruler of Bestonia for the last 7 1/2 years, had passed a command eliminating the Personal Bankruptcy for all individuals. Big Corporations had nothing to worry, as the rule did not apply to them. Some of those screwed people from that immense land had a little money saved and opted for staying home and would walk to their closest supermarket to buy some groceries, except fruits and vegetables, and milk and many other items, that had experienced a price increase of up to 50% . Meanwhile they hoped that "things" would change by themselves, as if that ever happens. They really did nothing to provoke a change. Actually, all they did was to complain and whine, but they, as usual, were contempt with their situation because during many years of brain washing, they knew they lived in the Best Country in the World, Bestonia!

Unfortunately, nothing changed and Bestonians found themselves in a real jam. They already had lost their jobs to outsourcing, and now their savings got depleted. Soon they could no make payments on their homes either, actually on homes owned by the Banks or Mortgage companies, because let's face it, Bestonians, unless very rich or well off, never owned a home. Those homes were always owned by those Banks and/or Mortgage companies. Bestonians just made monthly payments to live in them, and no matter how much they paid and how many years had passed, they still owed the same amount of money due to a brilliant idea by those Banks, called Equity Loan. That caused millions of "homeowners" to default and "their homes" to go on the "F" word. (In this case both words apply...
...Foreclosure, and the other one you thought of first).

Adam and Eve, who saw the handwriting on the wall (who ever came up with that stupid saying?), decided to cut down on many superfluous things, such as long trips, clothes, Blackberries, long distance calls, the already mentioned unaffordable fruits, except bananas imported from another land, shoes, prescription eyeglasses, and dental care. Of course, gas was now a luxury, and every short trip to the food store or to the Doctor of the Week (remember that Adam and Eve where retired and their lives were programmed around food shopping and medical specialists) was calculated to eliminate backtracking, thus reducing gas consumption in their mid size car. It should also be noted that the mid size car they owned was sold to them as a good gas guzzler, 21 in the city and 27 in highways, but like everything else Bestonians bought, the real mileage was 14 in the city and 21 on the road.
Ah, those car sales people! and double Ah!, those TV commercials!

The years passed and although the economy improved a little bit, the damage was already done and Bestonia and most of the lands in the planet were never the same. Adam and Eve eventually passed away, but their children and grandchildren, and their great grand children had to witness all the changes that occurred on planet Earth. Bestonia and many other lands had been given new names by their owners. names such as HSBC Holdings, General Electric, Bank of America, J.P.Morgan Chase, Exxon Mobil, AT&T, Walmart, Chevron, AXA, and many more.
These were the rulers now. There was no more middle class. There were only 2 defined groups, The Corporates and the Poorates. Life as we knew it in the 50s, or 60s when Adam and Eve were proud of being Bestonians, had suffered tremendous changes. Instead of Elvis Presley or Nat King Cole, or Frank Sinatra, or Charles Aznavour, Earth was now the most noisy planet in the universe. Musicians and singers did not play their instruments or sang songs. They competed to break noise decibel records. Even Rap was considered outmoded and nerdy!

There was no more food, except in the form of pills invented by major Pharmaceutical companies and approved by the FDA, which in turn would get a big chunk of the generated sales.

Sex was only allowed if you paid a special tax to these companies. How did they control that? Very easy, most of the pills you ingested as food contained a fatal sperm killer. If you wanted to have sex then you had to buy THE PILL. It was only good for one shot, but it became the best seller of them all.

Until one day, whether because of the noise pollution, or the other killer pollution, Earth exploded and shattered throughout the universe. It was the end of it all!

Adam woke up that morning and his heart was pounding faster than ever. IT WAS A NIGHTMARE! OR...WAS IT?