Michael Pulley: Arguments and kitchen scraps — most end up in the same place

“Don’t let that food go to waste,” I was told many times, as my mother looked at my partially eaten plate.

Until one day I said, “But if I eat what I don’t need, then it’ll still go to waste. To the sewer either way.” I must have been a snotty little kid.

My mother rightly ignored the remark because our town had no sewage system — septic tanks all the rage — and we had no garbage disposer, so the kitchen scraps were tossed into a large barrel with the other trash, to be burned. Scraps and bodily waste never met.

She rolled her eyes. “Just finish your plate.”

I said, “But … ”

“If you don’t eat it, then give it to your dad.”

He lit a Lucky Strike and nodded, meaning, Do what your mother says. And don't get her upset.

But I wasn’t finished. “So if Dad eats it, it’ll just go to the septic tank instead of the barrel. Either way, waste is waste.”

“Don’t provoke me,” she said, one of her favorite responses. She'd told me that many times.

Yet, my obligation as the youngest was to provoke her, me the spoiled child who always got more than my older brothers. I was smart enough, I thought, to apply clear logic to the waste issue, topping my parents with solid argument. But remembering my Dad’s nod, I said, “I’ll eat it,” watching my special cleverness go to waste. So sad, I thought.

A few years later I started following politics where, I noticed, self-confident people sat in esteemed places making majestic speeches full of lofty arguments reduced to snappy sound bites. That special crowd impressed me. Smart folks, I thought.

I voted in my first election when Nixon, Humphrey, and the segregationist George Wallace ran for president. I attended a Wallace rally to heckle the guy, antics I’d seen on TV. He said the usual things, “Black children have their own schools.”

“Boo!”

"You," Wallace said, pointing to the protesters, "need haircuts!"

"Yeah," said his supporters.

It felt good to boo. But I noticed the real hecklers were grouped-up off by themselves. Wallace taunted them.

But on each nightly newscast I saw many of the same hecklers, just different towns. Did Wallace carry his own adversaries — a planned confrontation? Was that the way winning arguments worked? Stage the show?

For a time, I tried arguing with Christian fundamentalists, knowing I could lay them low with facts and logic, proving the errors of their doctrines, until I realized that playing around with another’s religious beliefs might knock the moral slats and comfort out from under a person. Who was I to tell people what to believe? I saw that arguing merely to win had its dangers. And what would I gain?

Now, my arguing skills are pitifully weak. I don't try. I’m tired and place scant value on winning these days. Exactly what would I have to prove anyway? Dang near nothing, when I think about it. Still, I’m glad not everyone is like me. I’m happy for special, winning people and often marvel at their cleverness and rightness. I even envy them. But I look around and see lots of empty triumphs and empty conquests — just for show. For bragging rights. To bolster egos. So much goes to waste.

Michael Pulley lives in Springfield. He can be reached at mpulley634@gmail.com.

This article originally appeared on Springfield News-Leader: Michael Pulley: All gone to waste