Chapter 3: Anna

Anna was born to a pair of open minded, highly intelligent, deeply caring individuals, who being open minded,  intelligent and deeply caring found it necessary to join every political movement, organization, and religion that they believed would give them the opportunity to feel like they were more open minded, spiritual ,intelligent and caring than their friends and family. They had in fact been members of so many movements, organizations, and religions that the only thing Anna could think of to rebel, was to decidedly not join any movements, organizations, or religions at all. This she felt made her an anarchist by default, which according to her was the only way to genuinely be an anarchist, after all if you wanted to be an anarchist that would be counterproductive.

The only confusing part of all this to Anna was that she was never quite sure what, as an anarchist, she should be doing. After all it not like she could do what  the other anarchist were doing., which might be perceived as an organized effort , and that she was sure was not anarchistic. She tried several books her friends had recommended, but again she felt relatively confident that real anarchist wouldn’t be writing “how to” manuals on anarchy. This left her with a few options. She heard somewhere that anarchist were against the government. And though she did not believe in what her friends called the “Establishment” she did not believe it was her job to UN-Establish it (After all if people wanted to be governed that was their business).

 

 So she decided to go the route of general lawlessness. But there was a problem with this. Though as an anarchist she did not believe in law, she did, as a person of conscience, believe in morality and humanity, and things like that.  This is to say she was generally against terrorism, mass murder, or anything which might be considered generally harmful to others. This left theft. The only problem with theft was, that as an anarchist she did not believe in possession, and not believing in possession she could not justify taking other peoples things, especially if she was going to possess them herself afterward. So completely out of options she resorted to a kind of petty theft. At first it was antenna balls. Then it was Jesus fish. Eventually however she ran out of room in which to hold her balls or fish, so she decided that rather than taking them home, she would simply transfer the items on the car directly next to the car of the victim. The result of which was often far more humorous than the simple removal of such objects. She called this “swapping”.

 Eventually she started “swapping” all sorts of things. Hula figures bobble heads, deodorizers, and her personal favorite, steering wheel covers. And thought she personally gained nothing from such things she found that the violation of rules and conformity gave her an inner peace that she had never felt before. So she began looking for as many ways to violate the rules of conformity as possible. And she found quite a few. She would enter exits, walk thru the drive-thru, use the wrong restroom, smoke in nonsmoking, laugh in church, and on occasion bring her own snacks to the movie theater. This while it did nothing to dismantle society, it did give Anna a sense of accomplishment, and tended to embarrass her parents.

 

                This all being said Anna still had a dilemma. She still wasn’t sure what she should be doing (if anything) as an anarchist. It wasn’t until late one night while hacking into various websites that she had stumbled across one of the papers Jack had written. Its philosophy was simple. The philosophy was this. You are what you are. You only have to work to become something that you are not. So if you are happy with the person you are. Don’t worry about it. This was her answer. She liked who she was. If she was an anarchist she was an anarchist no matter what she did. There was a link to a different web page; it was the contact information for the movement.  She called one of the numbers provided. A man answered the phone.

 

“Hello is this Jonathan Scott.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Hi my name is Anna, I found your website.”

 

“Ahh”

 

“I was wondering, what your organization did, exactly”

 

There was a pause.

 

“We mostly just meet and discuss existential issues.”

 

“Oh, like a support group?”

 

“No, it really is just an excuse to meet with friends and eat pie.”

 

“Uh when do you guys meet?”

 

“Whenever.”

 

“No schedule or anything...”

 

“Nope.”

 

“When are you guys going to meet again?”

 

“Tomorrow.”

 

“Where?”

 

The man on the phone gave directions to a local diner.

 

 

 

                The next day Anna had arrived 30 minutes late, only to find two men one of which seemed to be in what appeared to be in a staring contest with his coffee, the other was just sitting eating pie. This was not what she had been expecting. She had expected….. More people first of all and second…she wasn’t really sure what she expected but it wasn’t this. Of all the things she did not belong to this was by far the strangest she had ever seen. One of the men looked up from a half-eaten piece of pie.

 

“Anna?”

 

She nodded. He gave a large smile.

 

“Hi, my name Jack, and this” he pointed a dirty fork at the other man “is Leo.”

 

Leo nodded in her direction. He seemed to be somewhat distracted.

 

“Hi” she said somewhat in awe of the situation. “What’s up?”

 

“I am eating pie. “

 

Jack looked across at Leo

 

“And he……”

 

There was a pause

 

“Leo what are you doing?”

 

Leo looked up.

 

“Thinking.”

 

“And he” Jack continued “is thinking.”

 

“Oh, did I miss the meeting?”

 

“No, not at all, go ahead and sit down.”

 

Anna pulled up a chair and sat at the side of the table.

 

“So what’s the topic?”

 

Jack Smiled “whatever you want to talk about.”

 

Leo sat up straight, his eyes bright. He took a sip of coffee and spoke.

 

“What if, before I die, I ingest some peyote, and……”

 

Jack put his hand up.

 

“How would you know the difference between the death, and the peyote?”

 

Leo gave him a blank look, opened his mouth, and then sunk back down into silence.

 

                Anna wasn’t sure what to talk about so they both sat and watched Leo. Eventually Jack convinced her to order pie.

 

“What’s wrong with him?” Anna asked looking at Leo.

 

“Nothing.” Jack had started a new piece of pie. “He just doesn’t know that yet.”

 

“Oh”

 

“He’s trying to figure out what his problem is, which ironically his problem is.”

 

At this point Leo Looked up from his coffee.

 

“I think I’m Terminally Agnostic, although, if I am completely honest, I’m not entirely sure. There is really no way to tell.”

 

“So you have a problem of identity.”

 

“No I  know who I am,. It’s the rest of the universe I ’m not sure about”.

 

“So what’s the problem” At this point Anna was intrigued.

 

“That is what I’m trying to figure out.”

 

“Ah”

                It was shortly after this Anna had decided not to join the group. (Even though technically there was nothing to join.). She did however decide that despite, or rather because of, their strangeness, she liked Jack, and Leo, and would continue to meet with them. It wasn’t that Anna didn’t agree with the group’s purpose (which was pie) or particularly disapprove of its methods (which were eating pie). No, she did not belong for the simple fact that she was an anarchist and felt a strong moral obligation, as an anarchist to not belong to as many movements or groups possible. In this regard she felt as though she had done well, because, after all she had not belonged to a great many things.  In fact, there were so many, movements, organizations, and religions, she did not belong to, that she began to lose track.

 

For this reason, she had decided, to only consider herself a “non- member” of the groups that she was particularly fond of. This she found was far easier than finding, listing, and actively not belonging to, the groups she was not fond of.  Of course she did belong to one or two things (such as her local library, because after all if there was ever an organization that embodied the ideals of a anarchistic social institution, it was the library) but this she did not feel should count against her, because after all the number of things she did not belong to vastly outweighed the number things she did belong to. So all in all she felt like she was a good anarchist. And being a good anarchist she felt that she could not, in good conscience, join the movement even if (as was stated as often and clearly as possible by Jack) there was nothing to join.

Author's Note

Need help with punctuation. Grammar and style are intentional.