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So much for an easy week. My column was all polished and ready for the presses by Monday night -- a full four days before deadline. It was an effortless write, an account of a trip that my wife and I had made to Florida, leaving me the rest of the week free to let my mind wander unabated.
Then Judith Hope ruined everything. Oh, the state Democratic Party Chairwoman had accomplices, mind you. 548,434 of you, in fact, came to her aid in helping take the happy, happy out of my joy, joy. That's how many New Yorkers stood behind the curtain on Election Day and pulled the "yes" lever on the amendment to make our 244-year-old New York State Constitution gender-neutral. As a result, the 46-page document will be amended in 170 places. "She's" will be added where previously only "he's" dared to tread. "Firefighter" will replace "fireman" and "worker" will stand in for "workman."
Said Hope, "We are no longer living in the dark ages when women were excluded from the political process. Our official documents should reflect the progress we've made."
Hear, hear!
Of course, this left me with a huge quandary. If something as lofty as the State Constitution was deemed unfit in a non-gender-neutral state, how could I proceed with my column as written? With its masculine nouns and pronouns, it was downright blasphemous.
Up against the clock, I feverishly went to work. What follows is my amended column. The changed words, which replace the gender-offending ones, have been marked in italics. All "man's" and "guy's" have been replaced with "people" or "person," all "boy's" with "child," all "he's" and "him's" with "she/he" or "her/him," and all "Mr.'s" with "adult."
It felt good to get away from the November cold. The temperature in Niagara Falls when we left had been in the single digits, but on our cruise ship, which had just set sail from Miami, it was a balmy 88 degrees. Jack, our mailperson, had turned me on to the low rates. I'd have to remember to send a thank-you note. No, that would just increase her/his workload. I'd tell her/him in person.
I joined my wife at the ship's bar.
"Let's go check out the jukebox," she suggested.
Looking over the selections, I asked, "What do you want to hear?"
"Well, let's see, there's 'Blinded By the Light' by Personfred Personn, 'Land Down Under' by People at Work, 'You've Got to Fight for Your Right to Party' by the Beastie Kids or 'Karma Chameleon' by Child George."
We finally decided on "The Kids of Summer" by Don Henley.
Later, we went to the upper deck to watch the sun reflect off of the water. Just then a school of peopleatees swam by, closely followed by a flowing Portuguese person-o-war. My wife was startled to see a praying persontis posing on the ship's rail.
"Must be a stow-away," she remarked.
"Yeah, you won't find one of those in the Captain's personual," I noted.
A yenta from Long Island reclined in the sunlight behind us getting a personicure from an Adult Clean look-alike -- right down to the bald head and golden earring. A cowchild reclined on a La-Z-Child chair eating childsenberry sorbet while yelling orders to a repatriated Her/Himalayan national. A She/Hebrew, sipping some Personischevitz wine, crawled out of a personhole and asked if anyone wanted to visit a personsion to watch old Adult T. reruns of "The A-Team."
I felt that the Israeli was trying to personipulate people, so I decided to outpersoneuver her/him. First, I sang a few verses of "Personchester, England, England" from "Hair" just to catch everyone off guard. Then I yelled, "This boat's headed for She/Hedonism, Jamaica, so let's not act like we're in Adult Roger's Neighborhood."
I guess my peoplenerisms must have been to their liking, because I had them all coming around to my way of thinking until some oversized Child Scout led a childcott against me. Just as they were gathering the peoplepower needed to erase me from peoplekind forever, we heard a loud splash and a woman reading Tom Wolfe's "A Person in Full" screamed, "Person overboard!"
We rushed to the railing to see a person, possibly Gal/Guyanese, frantically flailing to stay afloat.
"Person the lifeboats," someone yelled.
They weren't needed because, just then, a bearded crewperson, as if working from a well-written personuscript, appeared with a 10-foot pole -- personufactured in Personitoba, Canada -- and pulled the passenger to safety.
We all hailed her/him as a she/hero.
Just then my wife shook me awake.
"Honey, are you okay? You were yelling in your sleep. Did you finish your column?"
"Yeah," I told her. "Unfortunately, our trip to Florida -- just like the gender-neutral Constitution -- was nothing more than a stinking load of personure.