Free Pastoralia by George Saunders

folks, I’m not giving her that half a chance, because I’ve installed a protective screen over my oatmeal—not a literal screen, but a metaphorical protective screen. Ellen knows it, Gene knows it, and now they pretty much stay out of my hair and away from my oatmeal, and they’ve made a nice life together, and who do you think paid for Gene’s wheelchair ramp with the money he made from a certain series of Seminars?”
    The crowd burst into applause. Tom Rodgers held up his hand.
    “Now, what about you folks?” he said softly. “Is now the time for you to win? Are you ready to screen off your metaphorical oatmeal and identify your own personal Gene? Who is it that’s screwing you up? Who’s keepingyou from getting what you want? Somebody is! God doesn’t make junk. If you’re losing, somebody’s doing it to you. Today I’ll be guiding you through my Three Essential Steps: Identification, Screening, Confrontation. First, we’ll Identify your personal Gene. Second, we’ll help you mentally install a metaphorical Screen over your symbolic oatmeal. Finally, we’ll show you how to Confront your personal Gene and make it clear to him or her that your oatmeal is henceforth off-limits.”
    Tom Rodgers looked intensely out into the crowd.
    “So what do you think, guys?” he asked, very softly. “Are you up for it?”
    From the crowd came a nervous murmur of assent.
    “All right, then,” he said. “Let’s line up. Let’s line up for a change. A dramatic change.”
    He crisply left the stage, and a spotlight panned across five Personal Change Centers, small white tents set up in a row near the fire door.
    Neil Yaniky rose with the rest and checked his Line Assignment and joined his Assigned Line. He was a tiny man, nearly thirty, balding on top and balding on the sides, and was still chewing on his mustache and wondering if anyone or everyone else at the Seminar could tell that he was a big stupid faker, because he had no career, really, and no business, but only soldered little triangular things in his basement, for forty-seven cents a little triangular thing, for CompuParts, although he had high hopes for something better, which was why he was here.
    The flap of Personal Change Center 4 flew open and in he went, bending low.
    Inside were Tom Rodgers and several assistants, and a dummy in a smock sitting in a chair.
    “Welcome, Neil,” said Tom Rodgers, glancing at Yaniky’s name tag. “I’m honored to have you in my Seminar, Neil. Now. The way we’ll start, Neil, is for you to please write across the chest of this dummy the name of your real-life personal Gene. That is, the name of the person you perceive to be crapping in your oatmeal. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
    “Yes,” said Yaniky.
    Tom Rodgers was talking very fast, as if he had hundreds of people to change in a single day, which of course he did. Yaniky had no problem with that. He was just happy to be one of them.
    “Do you need help determining who that person is?” said Tom Rodgers. “Your oatmeal-crapper?”
    “No,” said Yaniky.
    “Excellent,” said Tom Rodgers. “Now write the name and under it write the major way in which you perceive this person to be crapping in your oatmeal. Be frank. This is just between you and me.”
    On an erasable markerboard permanently mounted in the dummy’s chest Yaniky wrote, “Winky: Crazy-looking and too religious and needs her own place.”
    “Super!” said Tom Rodgers. “A great start. Now watch what I do. Let’s fine-tune. Can we cut ‘crazy-looking’? If this person, this Winky, were to get her own place, wouldthe fact that she looks crazy still be an issue? Less of an issue?”
    Yaniky pictured his sister looking crazy but in her own apartment.
    “Less of an issue,” he said.
    “All right!” said Tom Rodgers, erasing “crazy-looking.” “It’s important to simplify so that we can hone in on exactly what we’re trying to change. Okay. At this point, we’ve