I just started working on this bit, and I thought it might be educational or/or interesting and/or pretentious and boring to publish every draft of the work, rather than finetune, edit, and tweak it for a week before releasing the buffed and polished final. This hopes to show the process as much as the product, because I think writing is an ill-understood, neglected art and we, as a nation, competing on the world stage of creative thinking, should know it better …

And we should vote, recycle, not guzzle energy, and pay attention to what our politicians are doing, or else we should just shut up.

Anyway, ...

My original intention here was to write an essay comparing/contrasting national brand stores with local ones, but through a magic bolt of lightening from the sky, I found myself speaking as preacher in a church. Surprised? No. I’ve always fancied myself as a religious figure.

Here goes. FIRST DRAFT. Without editing or spell checkin’.

... and so far, without an ending …

... feel free to suggest one…

... though I’ve got one in mind, in case you’re all stumped ….

... no more elipses, promise …

Antiglobalizationderstanding

Okay folks, settle down, if you will.

... Please …

Helen � would you mind, please? Sorry, that sounded like a good one, �. but it’s near 11:12 already, and we’re fast approaching the pot luck, so if we could all sit down for just � this won’t take more than ten minutes. Eight. Five! minutes. That’s all I want.

Just five.

Great.

Thank you.

Thanks a lot.

All right. Great. I’d like to officially call into session this week’s congregation … er sorts. Yes, and I, Dwight Little, this month’s acting elected Pasteur pesiding, do hereby call to session … it. Hmmmm.

Right, then. The topic of this week’s sermon is going to be the Church of The National Brand, and what it means for our humble little Church of Local Flavor.

Great.

Now that I’ve said that, and maybe I’ve thus given some of you cause to wonder, \’What the heck is Dwight gonna say?\’. Well let me say, this is a subject I’ve given some considerable thought to, these past few months, the time since our beachheads were assualted by the corporations � our virgin sands left defensless by that darkest of evils, the derugulatory bill we all know about that mail bomb from our friends in Washington D.C..

Anyway, I just wanted to let you all know that, first off, I’m aware of the problem. We’ve lost a lot of local businesses, an ever-growing list of extinct species: the local video shop, the coffee shop, Astral books, the sofa store, the � ummmm bed, bath, and or beyond that shop. We’ve all seen our city gutted of its charcter, it’s urban centers where people congregate like citizen � like contributors to a community, have been hoovered out like purple fish caught in a trailing net, anonymously devoured by the MACHINE.

But what can we do? Give up? Go with the flow? Just stop getting angry and get on with our lives? No. I say no. I say we will not roll over and play dead, we will not just Get with It. We will fight, even if the fight looks unwinable and pointless. It isn’t pointless to us. It’s what will give us our identitiy, our sense of greateer purpose. Nay, may I say it, it will give us a COMMON CAUSE. Because, let’s face it, some of us don’t like each other very much, in fact, I’d say very few of us like each other � tolerate maybe, � but mostly, all we can think about other people is their bad qualities� But with an enemy to share, a villan we can talk about and point the finger, one that’s sufficiently far from the both of us as to clearly belong in the ‘THEM’ camp. I say we will use this crutch. For the fact that you’re hear listening to me is just more indication that we WANT TO SHAPE OUR FUTURE. We see what’s going on, what processes are in progress, see how the world is moving to just these few companies, and the limited choices we’ll have, because companies have become the prime forces in our lives, we work for them, we buy their products, they take care of our health and insure against bad fortune, they reinforce our feeling that WE’RE WINNING THE BATTLE AGAINST DEATH.

But just as we all know the Borg is our supreme enemy in the universe, and a seeminly one, just as corporations seem to always win, to bend the rules, buy the votes or buy the Man � we will not lose.

But how?

How will we not lose?

What’s our way, our David versus Goliath stone to knock between the eyes? How does a small business compete with superior-marketing-beats-a-superior-product-nine-times-out-of-ten?

Boycott?

Firebomb?

I’ve considered all the options, and let me just tell all of you, especially those three of you sitting in the back row, that there are other options. It doesn’t have to be them or us? No. We must stand for reason and understand their side of the story, the other side. What do smell like the shoes that thine opponent walketh within? See? We’ve got to know ‘em to stand even a Just Like a Prayer to beat them. Seriously. Little Madonna ref there for your teenagers. Anyway’

I did some research.

Yep.

I checked ‘em out.

I’ve got a membership card at Blockbuster. Yeah�. And I’ve a got a Safeway saver card.

Please. It’s okay. Their just pieces of plastic, with, admittedly, my personal information stored on them, and that same information within their computer systems. That’s why � bear with me � I started a new identity, in order that THEY WOULD NOT KNOW about me. Yes. Because I, like you, am afraid of the identity theft, when they take all our money electronically, without our even realizing tha we’ve been robbed of everything, our IRAs, credit ratings, and we’ve got angry and suspicious people calling us on the phone, wanting to know about our credit card minimum payments!!!

I say no.

I say fuck you.

Fuck you credit card.

�.

Sorrry. Got off the track. I guess I should now recognize my star witness, because THIS IS A CHURCH, people, where we can bear witness to the greatness of God, I don’t mind saying. And let us all pray Amen�

Amen �

Thank you.

We believe in the local, in our own community’s right and ability to shape itself, to not be merely molded by a coprorate interest in Utah, a place that shares little with us in belief. Most men, in this state, would gladly marry two or three wives, if we could get away with it, be we know our first wife would slice our balls off with a divorce lawyer if we even tried it once just to see. But in Utah, apparently, they still try to sneak in a little bigamy here and there. It’s what they’re known for, at least. But did we all vote them as our Chief of State of home movie entertainment? No. They just took the throne, and they’ll hold it until some other monster knocks it off their head, and even then, the corporation will probably morph, mutate faster than any signle living organism species, it’ll just adjust its prices or move into cable or something, it’ll still be around. We couldn’t kill it if we wanted. In fact, it probably couldn’t kill itself, since the Utah monster’s shareholder base is so wide. And if another monster did waltze up and steal the controls to the our Home Box Offices, well then we’d have to just hope that it would a kind, none sociopathic monster, perhaps a benevolent, lazy one, somehow, somehow not interested in money enough to rape the earth, perhaps someone like our Lord Graig.

Hail craigslist.org!

Hail!

Thank you �.

But let reprise my point of the matter, faith. Our belief in the local, in our community, it is A MATTER OF FAITH. Let us not forget that it appears to make much better sense to go to Blockbuster, right around the corner, where that Jennifer Aniston pick is in stock and on the shelf. Where it’s good times seven days a week, with our friends, the movie stars and the good laughs, with or without a Pinot Grigio accompanyment.

Anyway, as you know, our own Dave Lemmings owns the Crystal Delight shop on Bank of America street. Sure, we know it’s the first place we’d post a photocopy of our missing cat, or wantanly list our cellphone number when we need to sell the coffee table A.S.A.P. to buy some food� But I thought we might like to get to know Dave in a larger sense, perhaps glimpst some Behind the Music outtake footage of what it’s really like to own the Crystal Delight.

Right? Dave? Would you mind standing up?

if he’d mind talking a bit about his success.

Dave?

if you wouldn’t mind standing a bit. Thanks.

As you might imaginge, for Dave, the life of an entrepreneur is never easy. He works long hours, I’m sure, and wears a ton of different hats, advertising executive, systems analyst, public spin campaigntionist, he’s got to do it or it won’t get done. But I thought we might all benefit from how you’ve done it? What’s been the secret of your success?

Secret?

Yep.

Of my success? Success? Well, I haven’t heard it put that way before but �

Well, first off, let me say that there’s nothing to replace hard work. And integrity. And sticking by your word. And,.. unfortunatley, it’s not always a bed of roses, let me tell you. Sometimes you’re looking at people you thought were your friends, and you hear the horseshit that comes out their mouth, and you think to yourself, should I kill this person? Would that make me feel better? Cause he deserves it, for what he’s doin to me right now�

Right, well. We aired this, thoroughly, I’d say, last week, and you Dave � and Glenn� you agreed, you both gave your word, that there’d be no more words on this� and the police left with that understanding.