Beauty is the beginning of terror.
That’s what my Uncle Randy used to say. It always stood out among his other sayings, like, “Quick, ‘fore the government catches you,” a holdover from his bootlegging days, and “Dammit, Gladys, you’re one mean old cow,” a phrase of conjugal endearment. Only later did I find out he had learned it in a book of words by a deadbeat German with a sissy name: Rainy Mary Some-in-er-nother.
If only Uncle Randy had been there to offer those wise words last Monday. Then I would have known that the beautiful gift in my mailbox was not to be trusted. Instead, when I saw that card emblazoned with my name, I shrieked with joy, “I’ve been admitted to the club!” Thanks to my remarkable display of character, wealth and sartorial taste, I had become a card-carrying member of the West Coast’s most prestigious organization: Safeway.
I don’t even remember how I got to the store, I was so ecstatic. I vaguely remember driving, but I am certain I do not own a car, especially one with a baby in the back.
The doors to Safeway opened before me, no doubt sensing the club-member pheromones I was emitting. Inside, the fruit looked riper, the Cheez-Its cheezier, even the pock-marked baker had a charming Gallic air about him. Every Muzak tune on the loudspeaker was my favorite song.
As I danced my way through the aisles, it became clear there were two kinds of people in this world: club members and non-members. You could smell a non-member from the other end of the store. They slouched, were usually deformed, had a mucous-like film covering their hands and were improbably flatulent. The more respectful ones bowed and groveled when a member passed by. The others just growled and stared at their betters with desperate eyes.
At least these clubless hordes were forced to pay a higher price for the foodstuffs they clawed off the shelves. But, really, I began to wonder whether having to suffer their presence were a violation of my member privileges. What right did they have to nourish themselves on my groceries in my club?!
These questions sent me marching in indignation to the meat department. I couldn’t let the riffraff feast on the precious flesh of animals, particularly not the meat that had been collected caringly from the feces-ridden floor and put mindfully through a rusty grinder for me and other club members to enjoy at 88 cents a pound. I grabbed all the ground beef I could fit in my cart and made for checkout.
I’ll spare you an account of the emotion I felt when they swiped my club card. Let’s just say the $6.57 I saved on groceries was only half as valuable as my sense of belonging.
Back at home, I slipped into my Members Only tracksuit, put on some thumpin’ club music and whipped up some club sandwiches, along with 16 pounds of rare hamburger meat and a sleeve of club crackers.
An hour later, the trouble started. I felt a rumbling in my gut, followed by swelling in my ears. I tried to cure it with club soda and lime, stirred with my Safeway club card. Then I blew a gasket.
The E. coli sent my sphincter and all 16 pounds of rancid hamburger through the back of my track suit. The bacteria attacked my softening brain, sending me to seizure country.
I came to in the hospital parking lot, paralyzed from the teeth down. The hospital had refused to treat me because, apparently, I didn’t have what they referred to as “health insurance.” They must not have seen my club card, which, at the time, was in my mouth to prevent me from swallowing my tongue.
Now, drooling on my benumbed body crumpled on the asphalt, I felt like a non-member.
Suddenly, a mustachioed man wearing a skull cap, stropping belt and a straight razor appeared from behind the hazardous waste bin, hoisted me up from my wretchedness, and brought me to a door marked by a moving candy cane pole.
Inside was a bustling scene of combs and cauterized flesh, the floors wet with blood and barbicide.
“Where am I?” I asked.
“Welcome, poor man, to the barber-surgeon local No. 37,” said my barber savior. “We are an ancient guild. Once the beacons of modern medicine, we were forced underground by doctors. Now we ply our trade in secret, treating those infirm or in need of a trim. We are the shadow public option, healthcare for the clubless.”
Just as I was about to protest and show him my club card, he kicked my inert body into a spinning chair and lathered up my sideburns.
“Don’t you worry, young fellah. Let me give you a good bloodletting whilst you browse the nudie magazines.”
And there, as the lifeblood drained out of me while I stared into the swirling centers of two areolae, I again felt like a club man.
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