It started on a whim.
Okay, maybe a whim is not the best word
for how everything started. To be clear, Ryan's actions have never been very
whimsical. It started with a shrug, in an empty
park, in a not so far away stopover town, on a plain looking bench, when fourteen
months, twelve days, and eight hours ago Ryan took a stand…by taking a seat.
It was March when Ryan gave up. It wasn’t
that the bench was particularly appealing, it was simply where he sat. The
hours and minutes inched away until day one turned into two, then three gave
way to four, five, and six.
It was after the first week that his
friends began to talk. Echoing the typical feigned responses you might expect
from acquaintances trying to fill the gaps of time before the inebriation took
hold:
“Apparently, he shrugged and sat down....”
“I bet it’s over a girl.”
“He will be back here tomorrow.”
“Have you heard he stopped eating?”
The last one was true, it was almost two weeks until he even
noticed he hadn’t eaten anything.
That continued until spring came, when
he found he had been alone for a month; his friends and acquaintances
dispersing among the more densely populated watering holes, where they might have greater opportunity to have their
plumage talked about. By the time summer began, Ryan's benching had
become a cautionary tale about those who could no longer hack the scene. Oddly,
it was when the summer ended that his name found his way into back into the
local vernacular. Coincidentally, this was around the same time much of the tourism
started drying up and his neighborhood ran out of things to talk about.
By Halloween, groupchats saw a nearly
four-hundred percent increase in the “shrugging guy” emoji. This can be
directly attributed to the locals deciding that Ryan was a symbol for taking a
stand, and the emoji served as a perfect textual abbreviation. By November, it
was not uncommon to hear the phrase “idleing” or “benchwarming” being used in sidewalk
banter, out-front some of the more frequented establishments, where an angry
thirty-something with a mustache and mullet, or a near frozen girl in a white
Hanes undershirt, short cut-off jeans, and pair of ankle boots, are not ready
to leave said establishment, and are therefore, protesting like that park guy, Ray.
Ryan’s voluntary inactivity became a
thing of legend when he made it through winter. Signaling this, newspaper
articles with headlines that read "Nativity Scene" and "New Year
Resolute" filled local coffee shops and fusion brunch bars. Those
interested being part of the story, which was most the town at this point,
shared digital updates under the hashtag "#APbenchwarmer".
Finally, Easter weekend, someone
actually thought to ask, "Ryan, why are you doing this?" It stirred
something in him…
***
Ryan sipped from a crinkled water
bottle, while to his left, a twenty-year-old girl with wide-eyes and the start
of an indiscriminate floral pattern sleeve tattoo, enthusiastically, scribbled his
responses into moleskin notebook. Truthfully, a part of him wanted to impress
her, but like with everyone he has met since reaching legendary status, that feeling
was overcome by a much stronger feeling of disappointment. Disappointment that she didn't laugh in his
face, that she didn't cut him down and pull the curtain away from his entire
protest. Disappointment that she was not disgusted by the theatrics of this
entire novelty.
Hearing the slowing of her pencil, Ryan
spoke up, "You know, I see 'em, I hear what they say. It's dumb. They're
dumb. Really dumb." Ryan's body lurched forward, like he was
adjusting the weight of his unworn baseball cap that was resting on his head. He
continued, "For Christ sake, if everything is art, then isn't nothing art?"
Shouldering the pivot and holding his head, his elbows dropped, landing firmly
above his knees and pressed deep into his thighs, grinding the unused muscle,
and softened sinew.
The scratching of paper sped up and it
was making Ryan sick. It dried his throat, tickling the knot resting near his
Adam's apple. He was tired of fighting. It is why he shrugged and sat down in the first place. Only now his protest is no longer his.
When he rode the wave, it pushed him to
shore, when he fought the current, it pummeled him...
...the difference is that the air tastes so much sweeter when
you fight for it.
On a bench, in a recently crowded park, in
not so far away stopover town, at the end of a fourteen-month hiatus, a former
benchwarmer, Ryan, had an epiphany...if we protest everything maybe living our
lives to the fullest is the greatest protest we can mount?
It was time Ryan mounted one.
Ryan shook of the rust, leaned back, held up his head, and threw
himself forward. There was no net for this feat and the only thing there to
catch him was his own sheer will. Stomping directly onto the pins
and needles that he had been collecting in his legs over the last several months, Ryan got up.