All I did was add one man to this ad:
Dear diary,
I’m dreaming of a perfect village. Where is this village? Somewhere in the mountains. Far up north. Does this village belong to any state, like how Thief River Falls belongs to Minnesota? No, this village is just a few small houses built on a flat valley surrounded by a crown of mountains at the top of the earth.
What is the optimal number of citizens to have in one’s perfect village? I’m only asking cuz I wanna make one of those signs that sez the place’s name, and then underneath the name is the population; for instance:
ALEXANDRIA
POP 13,008
(I just did an Internet search and the above was the first result to show.)
So what is the best number of citizens to have? I say seven citizens. That way, each one can have his own house, and the village doesn’t get crowded. And, like I said, all the houses should be small: they should have about three bedrooms and two baths per unit. So here’s our sign:
Wait — before I write the sign, I need to amend the population amount. I said seven above — but I was wrong: it should be seven families, not just seven individuals. Cuz I’d like the people in the village to be able to interact with each other in sophisticated ways; and if there’s just one person per house, and they’re all adult males, then there’s no women or children to make life colorful. (Men are traditionally dull; women are alluring; and children are mean.)
Now, a family can be anything from two people to ten. If it’s just two people, that would represent a man and a woman who are married but childless. And ten people would be two grandparents, a pair of regular parents, and exactly six children.
I repeat, any group containing between ten and two members shall be considered a legal family. One family might be a husband and wife and their two kids; another might be a single mother living happily with her three children. A third family could be two women who’ve adopted a young lad named Bryan Ray. But none of these families have any pets.
And one of our village’s seven houses features an unwed maiden as its sole occupant.
So here’s what happens. Everyone in the village possesses a different talent. One woman is good at shoveling snow; another is good at repairing machinery. The damsel who lives in the purple house might be an expert at archery, so she can feed the whole village for a year when she manages to slay a grizzly. And even the children have their talents: one of the young boys can play the guitar faster than anyone else; and one of the young girls is a certified electrician.
My point is that each villager is not only willing but eager to help the other villagers in whatever way that she can offer. When the grass in Todd’s yard starts getting long, Judy comes over with her riding lawn-mower, as she’s the only villager who owns and knows how to operate such a contraption. (If it weren’t for Judy, all the grass in the village would go to seed.) She waves at Todd while he sips his gin and watches from the window in his living room. And if anyone ever needs their chimney cleaned, Brad comes to do it — he lives in the orange house with Nancy and their two kids, Junior and Elizabeth. Brad Junior is the aforesaid guitarist, and his sister Elizabeth does all the village’s electrical work.
So how does Neighbor X pay back Neighbor Y, after the latter has rendered the former a favor, since this village does not use money? The answer is that I’m not sure. I’ve never seen anyone really address this issue. Everyone just does whatever they’re good at, and nobody worries about getting “compensated” for their labors — they’re simply happy to be alive.
Yet, one day, the neighbors all gather in the middle of the village for their annual meeting; and they decide to try an experiment, just for the hell of it. Nick sez:
“Here’s my idea. Let’s keep a written record of all the deeds that each of us performs for the good of the populace. Then, at the end of next year, we’ll all gather together again, in this same place, and review this record. We’ll count up all the good deeds that each citizen has accomplished, and whoever has the highest score will receive a fantastic garland made of orchises (those long flowers that grow wild near the brook just northwest of Richard’s place), and whoever has the lowest score will be banished from the village. That’s my suggestion. Now, all who are in favor of trying this experiment, shout the word ‘Aye’.”
And the whole village hollers and toots their pea-whistles and air-horns, except for Bryan, whose voice distinctly murmurs: “NAY!”
“Well, it looks like the ‘ayes’ have won,” announces Nick.
So life continues as usual for the next year, with the addition of there being now a public record of all the helpful deeds performed, which is meticulously updated via an app that is hooked directly to everyone’s Personal Electronic Monitoring Device.
Hyperborea’s population of 33 now gathers in the middle of town for their 200th annual meeting, whereon the good-deed numbers are tallied...
Mademoiselle Becky turns out to be the winner, with a top score of twenty thousand points. (She makes her living repairing band instruments.) And Bryan loses with a score of sixteen eleven.
So they kick Bryan out of the village. He then wanders in the mountains and grows a beard. He survives by eating mushrooms and the roots of certain trees. Lucky for him, it’s freezing in the outlands, so he always has bits of ice to chew on. This keeps him hydrated. Some vultures eventually begin to follow him around. (He’s now walking in circles.) And, after dying, his ghost returns to live in the village.
It’s not too bad, living in your old neighborhood as a ghost. (I myself am the ghost of Bryan, in case that wasn’t obvious.) Although you can’t interact with the people who are still alive and well, you can form meaningful relationships with the other spirits that haunt the other houses; and sometimes really sick people can almost perceive you — tho it’s usually not worth dealing with them, cuz they’re prone to misunderstand what you’re trying to say.
So the couple who lives in the gold house became fast friends with me — the specter couple, I mean: David and Sarah. And also the family of four who haunt the Indigo house: the parents, Vanessa and Cordelia, and their adult daughters Julie and Christa — these all became like an extended family for David, Sarah, and myself. What’s nice about being ghosts is that everyone is roughly the same age — about fifty-two or fifty-three — and everyone glows and looks extremely attractive: for each ghost appears as an ideal version of its previous human form, sort of an animated snapshot of its mortal body when it was in full bloom — like a harlot wearing the perfect amount of makeup. And, because there’s neither marriage nor children in the afterlife, all the spirits can embrace each other, any time they want. Also, although there’s no need to, everyone dresses really well: in formal attire, constantly, just for the sake of looking ritzy. It’s the same reason we phantoms all sport expensive timepieces, even tho we’ve transcended the temporal dimension — cuz it’s fashionable.
And the best day yet was when David and I completed our invention. It was this glassy chamber, cylindrical in shape, which you could enter by way of a door that would slide open and then slam shut automatically. Once inside, you felt comfortably warm, and there was a faint, skunky aroma. Then, lightning would flash, and the auto-panel would slide back open, and you’d be physical again: alive in the land of the living!
What I’m trying to say is that David and I figured out a way for us ghosts to re-infiltrate Hyperborea. So that’s how we increased its population by roughly seven souls. And my old enemies there didn’t even recognize me, cuz I was so handsome now; so they allowed me to stay and live with them. — When I say “enemies” I’m referring to those who formerly banished me from town because I got the lowest score in that stupid contest that they played for one year, where they recorded everyone’s philanthropic exploits, and I was only able to rack up a few more than sixteen hundred points, while Becky roasted everyone with twenty thousand! — I still don’t understand how she did that… I suspect that she gamed the system.
So now we live in the sky-blue house together, cuz its previous inhabitant passed away. So David and Sarah now stay in the master bedroom; and I myself alternate between sleeping in the two smaller bedrooms, depending on my whim: sometimes I stay with Vanessa & Cordelia in the red room, and sometimes I stay with Julie & Christa in the pink room. It’s really fun. We all have a really good time.
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