Thursday, September 25, 2008

Taxes

Interlibrary loan. How can that be? If your library doesn’t have a book, you can just get it. Magically! Because of interlibrary loan! The library just pays for it, they just pay for it! You don’t pay for it, they do. I have often felt deeply guilty for requesting interlibrary loans just because I feel like reading a book they don’t happen to have. I mean what if I don’t even like it? What if I don’t even finish it because of how much I don’t like it? Then all the library’s money – wasted!

But then I remember that libraries are funded by tax dollars, and I am paying taxes. I figure, I work hard for the money I earn, and a lot of it gets taken away for taxes. That’s fine, and I support taxes, but a lot of taxes pay for things I would rather not pay for. Like the salaries of people I really dislike, such as John McCain and David Vitter. And when my tax money is paying for something I do like, even though it is not something I desperately need (like all the rest of Martin Millar’s out-of-print books), I should nevertheless take advantage of it.

So hurrah for interlibrary loan! My tax dollars at work! Now that I'm no longer in school, and I'm all with the job, I am no longer reaping the benefits of public-school tax money; nor am I in a state of poverty that requires financial support. Thus I must take joy where I can in the use of services paid for a little tiny teensy bit by me, like roads and sewers and interlibrary loans.

...Interlibrary loans are more joyful than the other two to contemplate, but I would rather have roads and sewers than interlibrary loans. Just wanted to clear that up.

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