middle class morality

Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer, that's the book I read about the Mormons.  He's the guy who also wrote Into the Wild about the guy who holed up for a winter in an abandoned school bus in Alaska and did not come to a good end.  Both good books and the latter had a good movie made out of it.

The book starts with a murder and the author used that to begin talking about Mormons.  He went into it thinking he would be making fun of the Mormons, but as he got to know them he became very fond of them, and I've heard this before they are very nice people. 

But back in the day they did try to take over places they moved to and nobody liked them much and I'm not surprised that the killers of that king fellow got off with a small fine, but I hear back in that day you could buy a Buick for a buck and a quarter.  Well there weren't any Buicks back then, but I reckon you could have bought something big.


There's this place, Baker's Nosh that I go to for a focaccia and a coffee before my watercolor class.  It doesn't open until 8, and then there is a line and I am out there in their outdoor dining area with my art bag and my portfolio which are kind of bulky and awkward, but  that's okay I can leave them at the table when I go in to get my coffee and focaccia because nobody is going to steal them.  When I get in line I don't have to worry about anybody trying to butt in front of me, and I don't have to count my change because those guys behind the counter would never steal from me.  If I happen to jostle somebody on the way out, or if they jostle me, we will both be all smiles and apologizing, "Oh I'm so sorry."  "That's fine, probably I shouldn't have been in your way."  That sort of thing.

Middle class morality.  We are all middle class, which is to say well enough off, and we always mind our manners, but we don't get taken advantage of because the people we deal with are the same as us, and that is just not done.

When I go to the Jewel, sometimes the clerks are nice enough to me, but sometimes they just grunt when they take my money, and sometimes I am in a hurry and i just shove my money at them because I am in a hurry.  At Whole Foods however the clerks always have a smile and the customers, knowing this, always greet them with a smile back.

If I were in the ghetto however, where the living is not easy, I would probably not be able to leave my stuff outside, I would have to worry about some big guy shoving in front of me.  The guy at the cash register might cheat me.  If there was a jostle it might well end up with a fight. 

When I was young I was kind of against what I thought of as middle class morality.  It was all so, so booshwah.  But settling in my chair in the outdoor dining area with my stuff right where I left it, not sore about somebody butting in front of me, with my correct change in my pocket and no shiner because of that mother fucker bumping me in line, I take a bite of focaccia, a sip of joe, and I think, ain't life grand.