Imagine tomorrow you wake and the world is black and white

Imagine tomorrow you wake and the world is black and white. No color.

You slip out of bed and notice your house is cold. 

Before you get to the kitchen to make coffee, soldiers burst through the door and remove two thirds of everything you own…even the new Keurig coffee maker.

Before they leave you’re handed a piece of paper and something like a cheap credit card; solid white with only a number stamped on it. No logo, no name, just a white card and a number. “Card’s for food. The paper details your designated assignment.”

“What? Assignment? Food? Wait. That’s my stuff. Who do you think you are? I’m calling the police!”

The last one out the door turns, “We are the police.”

You look around at your black and white world. Your home in shambles. You clean up the mess. Crumple the paper and throw it in the trash…then, pick up the wadded paper and shove it in your purse along with the weird looking card.  

With a pounding head and racing heart you go back to bed thinking, hoping, praying, it’s just a dream…a nightmare.

The next morning, Monday, you head off to where you’ve worked for years, to the job you chose, you enjoy, where you plan to climb the ladder until you retire. But, when you pull into the parking lot, you see the doors are locked…with a chain and padlock.

A paper taped to the door has one word with large black letters stamped at an angle across the middle, “CLOSED.”

How could a thriving business be closed without warning?

You go to your favorite coffee shop and find it’s closed, too. That’s when you notice store after store with the same black word stamped on paper, CLOSED.

What’s going on?

You drive, slowly, down the street. Finally, you see one grocery store still open. Inside you find a cheap coffee maker, grab some coffee, donuts and a few other items.

At the checkout counter, you hand the teller your bank card.

She shakes her head. “We don’t take that.”

“Oh, really? Here try this.” You hand her your credit card.

The teller shakes her head. “Sorry, that’s no good.”

By then, you’re more than irritated. “What are you talking about? Of course, it’s good. You haven’t even scanned it.”

“None of them are good, anymore. Weren’t you given a card?”

“Huh? You mean—” you pull out the weird looking card—“but, I thought this was a mistake...a nightmare.”

She shakes her head and looks around. Then whispers. “It was a mistake…a whole lot of mistakes.”

You feel like you’re about to faint…or hit something. “I have money.” You grab a wad of cash and thrust it toward her.

Once again, she shakes her head. “Sorry, that’s no good, well not here anyway. I suppose it’d be good for starting a fire or… if you run out of toilet paper." She looks at the card and holds out her hand.

“But…but, I thought this was only for folks on welfare.”

She pulls in deep breath and frowns, “Honey, we’re all on welfare.”

Then it gets worse. Your head is pounding, from lack of caffeine, or this nightmare…or both.

The teller swipes your card and her face goes white. An obnoxious red light starts to beep. “Um, I’m sorry but your card has been, deactivated.”

“What does that mean?”

The beeping continues. The teller types in some numbers and then asks, “Did you go to work today?”

“What? why? …yes, well, I tried, but it was CLOSED.”

“Closed? Did you go to your, designated assignment?”

“My what? Oh…you mean?” You pull a crumpled piece of paper from your purse.

The teller nods. Lifts a piece of paper just like yours. “Yesterday, I was CEO of my own company, today—” her eyes gloss and a tear spills—“welcome to socialism."