Yesterday I met the neighbor on the other side, Ralph. He was passing through his yard from the garage while I was standing outside. For some reason I found myself behaving like a Stepford wife. He said, “We were just wonderin’ if you were going to put the flag back up,” and instead of saying, Yeah, we’ll get to it at some point, I was like, “Oh yes! We’ve purchased a new one. The old flag was so torn and faded we didn’t feel it was right to fly it.”
“Was it?” He scrunched up his eyes. “We never noticed. We just sure like looking out the window and seein’ it.”
“Oh, yes!” I said. “It’s terribly torn up. We’ve wrapped it up and have it sitting on a shelf. We’re not sure of the proper thing to do with it.”
“I guess maybe they burn them,” offered Ralph, “but we’re sure glad you’re putting the flag back up.”
“Oh, yes,” I said again, like I couldn’t imagine a yard without a flag.