Dilemma (di-lem’-ma): Offering to an opponent a choice between two (equally unfavorable) alternatives.
“Do you want to shit your pants or go blind?” I offered these alternatives to my little brother. Of course, the answer is shit your pants. Going blind is clearly a worse alternative. But, I was reminded that Carl had fallen out of his crib several times after he learned to stand up. We got a baby-cam so we could monitor him in his crib. That’s when we learned he was not falling from the crib. Rather, he was jumping. So Mom had a metal grommet installed in the waistband of Carl’s pajamas. She would hook him to a bungee chord so he wouldn’t hit the floor when he jumped. Problem solved. This was pre-bungee jumping. Mom was a genius!
I had struggled with dilemmas enough in my life to make me a walking crossroad. No matter where I go or what I do, there’s always somebody hitting me with a dilemma. Way back in the eighth grade, my wood shop teacher told me “If you want to pass this class, you can drive a nail through your thumb, or date my insane daughter who just got out of prison for trying to electrocute our neighbor. I know the options are cruel, but it’s how I roll with assholes like you.” I went out with his daughter. She tried to stick my hand in a blender. I overpowered her and escaped.
Then, there was the time my employer’s accountant told me to start embezzling money and channeling it to him or he would make sure I was fired. My daughter was in college, so I needed my job to pay her tuition and buy her books and a car too. I went down the embezzling road. The accountant got caught and he ratted me out for a reduced sentence. Prison is pretty good. Everything’s free and I have a definite deadline: I got 6 months with work release and weekend home visits.
When I was assigned to work release, I had to choose between two jobs: cleaning graffiti off walls or looking for shell casings on the floor at a well-used notorious crime scene: an abandoned warehouse where gangs kill rival gang members. Given all the manual involved in getting rid of graffiti, I thought the warehouse was a no-brainer until gunfire erupted on my second day. The bullets made a whizzing sound as they flew past my head. This guy came walking toward me with a gun in his hand. He said, “Hey, I’m Tony.” I told him my name. I told him I worked in the warehouse and he said he did too. We made friends. He told me to “Just hide behind something and keep your head down when the shooting starts and you’ll be ok. I did what he said. I was ok. We got to where we’d go down the street for a beer after a shoot-out was finished and I had picked up all the shell casings.
On the weekends I’d go home and this guy named Stan was always there. He Slept in the spare room. I was suspicious, but not enough. One night, I had to pee. As I got up, I noticed my wife wasn’t in bed. That’s when my suspicion kicked in. I peeked in the spare room and there she was taking a ride on Stan’s happy stick.
The next day I asked Tony if he’d murder my wife. He said “Sure. Give me your address and I’ll stop by tonight around eleven and whack her. You’ll have to get rid of her body though I just hit and run.” I agreed. I came home around two and BOTH Stan and my wife were laid out on the living room floor. Stan had a gun in his hand and a hole in his head. It was a bloody mess.
I called the police and their bodies were taken away in an ambulance. I was alibied at Noble Bar & Grill so the cops didn’t even take a second look at me. Since Stan was shot in the head and he had the gun in his hand, they called it a murder suicide.
When I saw Tony the next day, all he said was “Easy peasy.”
Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu
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