Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is (7/17/08)

I’ve been told several times throughout the course of my life that money doesn’t grow on trees. As a wide-eyed seven year old scratching for another set of Pogs to complete my collection, I can assure you, no matter how high you climb, it doesn’t. Although my father’s lesson was learned in just a few moments and multiple scuffs later, it took a bit longer and countless bruises to realize that the juiciest and plumpest fruits of my labor were never something that I once longed I could cultivate in my own backyard.

But if it did though, I don’t think currency is the type of vegetation that would grow on a tree. It seems more of viney or bush plant to me, reminiscent of a deciduous, perennial shrub that can only be harvested in a temperate continental climate. And change, of course, would be a root vegetable, akin to a potato or a peanut where you must pull them up from underground so you can never tell exactly when a nickel or quarter is ripe. The species of flora would inevitably vary from country to country, making exchange rates all matter of floral preference. A hairy and prickly shrub: likely found in France. Stubborn to uproot or pull out yet easy to blindly overtake on other vines: America. Ultimately, businessmen and politicians alike would turn on a dime to take a new found love for the environment by turning global warming from a dubious theory into a first priority reality.

And that’s my two cents-nonsense for the day.