Just a Story

Allow me to narrate a story today.

Once upon a time there existed a place known as the Me-Me land. Most of it was inhabited by two very distinct species. To be exact, there were more of them, but our story concerns only two of them, the most important ones.

The first specie was called the Mankind. They were THE human beings. With their towering heights, raucous laughter and their way of looking down upon everything, they were the dead center of the Me-Me land. They were, in fact the axis around which the whole place revolved.

The other specie had quite a small population, but they always made mischief and brewed trouble for the humanity. This species, known as Woe-Men, was so named because they were always the origin of mankind's woes.. Most people thought that they were mankind’s punishment for the Original Sin. The more philosophical ones said with a shrug that what cannot be cured must be endured.

They looked like underdeveloped human beings, but the mankind was convinced that they were utterly false. They knew that Woe-Men were just a bad copy of the human race. A mere shadow, they had failed to evolve with time and were  devoid of the faculty of thought. ‘Who needs brain for making sandwiches, unless it is brain sandwiches they are making?’ the mankind often said.

Another thing that needs to be introduced here is the Tail-Ban school of thought. The Tail-Ban philosophy was quite popular in some sections of the society. It was very simple, and stated:

“Woe-Men are the ungainly tails of our society. Ungainly tails MUST be hidden away as best as possible, preferably under lock and key.”

It needs not be mentioned that  the Tail-Bans believed in the transitive property of equality.

Most of the elder human beings, those who ran the Me-Me place, can not be accused of belonging to the Tail-Ban school of thought in any way. They even publicly supported the idea that a Woe-Man can operate a plane, provided that it is plain enough. But in their heart of hearts, they religiously believed in the Tail-Ban philosophy.

Due to a number of reasons, most of them political, the ruling people had to tolerate Woe-Men. So, they did what every sensible human being would do: they made a special set of special rules and devoted themselves soul and heart to see that these rules were obeyed to the last radian. Some of them are given below for the enlightenment off the reader, along with the reason due to which they were enforced.

1. The Woe-Men had long, thin strands of hair growing out of their heads. These cables could send powerful signals that had the potential to jam and flabbergast every single system and signal in the Me-Me land. To prevent this from happening, these strands had to be covered all the time with the best insulator known: thick fabric. All the time.
2. Woe-Men were crafty creatures. The authorities believed that wherever there was a Woe-Man, there must be some thing fishy. They knew a trick: they could make food invisible just by looking at it and move it to their bags. So they were forbidden from setting foot in any restaurant or eatery. A small slit was installed for them in the back wall of each café , so the café owners would not lose their bucks. Special care was taken that nothing edible should be visible to them through these ‘windows’. They were just large enough for a plate, a bowl or a glass to be passed through them.
3. Another very important rule was that Woe-Men could not wear shoes with laces. Otherwise they would start thinking that they were human beings, too. Whoever ever heard of such a thing in the Me-Me land?
   To be exact, there were a few tiny problems in the place that were not due to Woe-Men. There were people who managed to speak for hours on end without letting a single intelligible word escape their lips. There were water coolers which had heaters installed inside them. Inexperienced people came and paid loads of money to play with seriously out-of-order machines. But all of these were honest, unintentional mistakes and could be easily forgiven: Woe-Men, on the other hand, could not be.

At this point, the storyteller stopped.

P.S. It is, as the title says, just a story.