Thursday, April 14, 2016

the carrot


by nick nelson

illustrated by palomine studios




donald was a regular guy who did not have very high expectations.

he wanted people to like him or at least ignore him.

he did not understand life or his fellow humans very well but hoped to improve in that regard.

one day he was feeling a bit nervous about some applications he had made to participate in certain activities.

he decided to relieve his nervousness by going for a walk.


at the last minute before embarking on his journey he decided to take a carrot with him to munch as he walked along.

this proved to be a mistake.

it was a pleasant enough day and there were many other people on the street besides donald.

all of them noticed that donald was eating a carrot and most of them made some comment, either to a companion or to the air or directly to donald.

"dude, how's the carrot?"


"that guy is eating a carrot."

"mmm - good vitamins."

"look at that person - is he doing what i think he's doing?"

"it's always a good day for a carrot."

"i don't believe this."

"bro, try rutabaga some time - easier to digest."

"down the street eating a fucking carrot."

donald did not enjoy these attentions but he did not want to throw the carrot away either - he felt that would represent some sort of obscure defeat.


and would be littering.

he did not want to put the half eaten carrot with his teeth marks in his pocket - that seemed unsanitary.

the climax came when he was stopped by a broad-shouldered young man with a posse of five other young persons, male and female, tagging behind him.

the young man pointed a finger not quite in donald's chest and with a big white toothed laugh, announced - "i know what you're doing."


donald was too startled to answer.

"you're making a movie, right?" the young man looked, or pretended to look, up and down the street. "where's your buddy with the camera?"

"he's filming it himself," said one of the entourage. "he's got a camera in his shirt pocket."

donald still didn't know how to respond. one of the two young women in the group grabbed the arm of the first young man.


"come on, adam, you don't have to be a total dick every minute of every day."

the group moved off, laughing. donald heard the first young man say "nobody eats a fucking carrot in the street -"

donald finally got home safely. he felt that the nutrition he had obtained from the carrot and the fresh air and exercise from the walk had been more than offset by the relentless mockery he had received.

he never walked down the street eating a carrot, or any other vegetable, again.