Dateline Normal School District: The Catalog Caper; Or, The Cart and the Horse.---FICTION

(Ed.note. This is one of a long series of fictional tales from the Land of Normal, Mn., just west of the Land of Lake Woebegon and south of Garrison, Mn. They are available for download from the Observer (right click the mp3 icon) and are also available FREE on the Itunes store. Any resemblance between these tales and reality is purely accidental.)


With the pace of everything picking up here, the election, the roadwork, the restoration, I thought I would just kick back and head out of town for a little R & R. Up that long winding road, Hwy 10 up north of the Twin Cities, to my favorite getaway---- Normal, Mn.. After checking in at the Spruce Goose Motel, where all the comforters are down, and all the walls have stuffed game, I headed over to the local diner for my usual coffee, lots of sugar and whipped cream, to chat with my old friend Herman, the country boy lawyer, and member of the Normal School Board.

I reflected to Herman that I just could not understand how he and the whole town of Normal seemed to be so calm and all, whereas, I seemed to be caught in a flurry of change. And to be more specific, I mentioned that whereas we seemed to be in a flurry of change in schools in Wisconsin, he seemed to be the picture of tranquility up there in Normal.

"How do you achieve such perfect tranquility up here, Herman?, I asked.

"I understand how you feel, Wolfman. Some of my best friends down in the big Cities feel the same way. I used to feel that way until I went through the "big change."

"What BIG CHANGE?" I asked.

"Well," Herman went on, " years ago at the Normal School District, there was lots of stress and all. It was real exhausting. Then, one December, Louise, the administrative secretary for the Normal School system, was in the process of ordering the course catalog. The usual order was 250."

"Well, to make a long story short, she made a slight decimal point error, and ordered 25,000 catalogs. Yes, the local printer was her boyfriend, but.....well...it was a real prediciment."

"In the end, we all recognized that this was the Lord's will. To waste would be unthinkable. So, for the past 10 years we have made not one change in the course offering. "

"What does the School Board talk about then, Herman?"

"We go over all the options, Wolfman, (that's what he always called me) a real democratic process and all, with lots of tolerance to difference in feelings and such, but ......in the end.....nothing changes.

"Over time we have grown to love the peace. Love the stability. Love the nothing ever changing. It's become the natural law up here in God's country."

I was just speechless. "You mean that everything----all the decisions are driven by the catalog order error?"

"Yup," Herman replied.

Thank goodness I am back in good old Wisconsin. Where we have school boards that make decisions on course offerings and where the catalogs are printed after the decisions.... and not before. Where our peace of mind is based on something else....anything else....rather than an ordering error. Alleluia.

How peace and tranquility was achieved in the Normal School District though a simple decimal point adjustment


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