From
July-August 2004 (Updated 5/12/05)
A
Day in the Life of a Freemason
By Nick Pollotta, Entered Apprentice
After reading a list of how many Freemasons have done things
that added to the everyday world around us, I began to
wonder what would be the ultimate 'Freemason' day...
* * *
In a crash of cymbals, you awake to the alarm clock playing "The
Star Spangled Banner" (Francis Scott Key). Extracting
yourself from the tangle sheets as if you were a professional
escape artist (Harry Houdini), you put on the kettle (Paul
Revere), grab a quick shave (King C. Gillette), drink a fast
cup of tea (Sir Thomas Lipton), hop into your car (Walter
P. Chrysler), and drive downtown to have a proper breakfast
at a local restaurant (Bob Evans).
Finished with the meal, you feel like a million dollars
(John Jacob Astor), generously tip the waitress with a fistful
of one dollar bills (George Washington), and drive away humming
the lyrics to "Route 66" (Nat 'King' Cole).
Turning on the radio, you chuckle as the local DJ does
a spoof of the classic comedy routine, "Who's On First?" (Bud
Abbott and Lou Costello), followed by an up-dated version
of the incredibly funny routine of why nobody should drink
water (W.C. Fields).
Suddenly, you pass an old vaudeville theatre (Eddie Cantor,
Jack Benny, George M. Cohan, Florenz Ziefield), but nowadays
it is cinema multiplex showing: "The Ten Commandants" (Cecile
B. deMille), "Aladdin" (Walt Disney), "My
Favorite Brunette" (Bob Hope), "The Right Stuff" (Leroy
Cooper, John Glenn, Virgil 'Gus' Grissom, Edwin 'Buzz' Aldrin
and Walter Schirra of the original Mercury astronauts), "Gone
With The Wind" (Clark Gable and Darryl F. Zanuck), "The
Pink Panther" (Peter Sellers), the original version
of "Tarzan" (Elmo Lincoln), "A Day At The
Races" (Harpo Marx), "Some Like It Hot" (Joe
E. Brown), "El Dorado" (John Wayne), and a retrospective
of various silent films (Harold Lloyd, Buster Keaton), mixed
with some classic cartoons (Mel Blanc).
Pausing at an intersection to let a marching band play
by (John Phillip Souza), you're delighted to observe that
it's
announcing the arrival of the circus into town (all of the
Ringling Brothers). Apparently, they have the actual "Spirit
of St.Louis" (Charles Lindbergh), along with a full-sized
copy of the Eiffel Tower (Alexander Gustave Eiffel) on display.
Which gives you an idea for work today. Hmm.
In the elevator going to your office, you listen to some
classic jazz (Count Bassie), then spend the morning drawing
(compass and square) an advertising campaign showing the
Statue of Liberty (Frederic A. Bartholdi) learning show to
safely drive her new American car. (Henry Ford). Your boss
approves of the design quoting that, "Art should enlighten,
as well as entertain." (Voltaire)
At noon, you leave the office at the speed of light (Dr.
Albert A. Michelson) and considered having lunch at the local
KFC (Colonel Harland Sanders), but instead decide on Wendy's
(Dave Thomas). Relaxing in the corner, you eat your lunch
while reading a couple of chapters from "World War II:
The Gathering Storm" (Winston Churchill).
Completely refreshed, you return to the office only to
find that the boss has taken ill and cancelled his saxophone
lesson
(Antoine Joseph Sax) to visit the Mayo Clinic (Dr. Charles
Mayo) to get a shot of penicillin (Sir Alexander Fleming).
Left alone, you gamely start a new ad campaign for K-Mart
(Sebastain S. Kresge) using Western heroes (James Bowie,
Christopher 'Kit' Carson, Gene Autry, "Buffalo Bill" William
Cody, Samuel Colt, David 'Davy' Crockett, Richard Gatling,
Sam Houston, Tom Mix, Roy Rodgers) to teach people about
the environmentally safe chemicals (Herbert Henry Dow) used
to clean Mt. Rushmore (Gutzon & Lincoln Borglum).
At the presentation, the client is so happy with the job
that they give you free tickets to a musical comedy (Gilbert & Sullivan).
You would have preferred a nice Elizabethian tragedy (William
Shakespeare), you take it on the chin like a pro boxer ('Sugar'
Ray Robinson) and accept the gift with a polite smile.
Humming some classical music (Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart),
you leave work, and visit a bar to have a couple of cold
beers
(John Molson), listen to some swinging jazz on the jukebox
(Duke Ellington), and discuss the greatest, if flawed, baseball
player of all time (Ty Cobb). Before leaving, you secretly
stuff a twenty dollar bill (Andrew Jackson) into the charity
box (The Will Rogers Foundation) on the counter. After all,
a good deed unseen is it's own reward. (Rudyard Kipling)
Getting home, you relax by playing a little basketball
(James Naismith) with a neighbor, send some romantic poetry
(Robert
Burns) via email to your girlfriend, buy a copy of "Roots" (Alex
Haley) and "Little House on The Prairie" by Laura
Ingalls Wilder (Eastern Star) on-line, then refill the cat-proof
bird feeder (John James Audubon) in your backyard.
While dinner cooks, you do some laundry (Frederick Maytag),
decide not to shave your head bald to look like a famous
TV detective (Telly Savalas), and finish that jigsaw of the
White House (James Hoban).
After dinner, you catch a Science Fiction movie marathon
on cable: "The Portrait of Dorian Grey" (Oscar
Wilde), "The Thief of Baghdad" (Douglas Fairbanks),
and "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" (Mark
Twain, a.k.a. Samuel L. Clemens). Briefly, you wonder if
any of the actors in the movies belonged to a fraternal lodge,
but decide that it would take Sherlock Holmes (Sir Arthur
Conan Doyle) to solve that mystery.
Turning off the TV, you jot down a note to remember to
bring the coffee to the lodge meeting tomorrow night, set
the alarm
clock to play the bulge call 'Taps' (Major General Daniel
Butterfield) in the morning, and shuffle off to bed to
dream of freedom, religious tolerance, and world peace.
Sometimes, with the help of a Brother, dreams do come true.
My sincere apologies to the literally thousands of Masons
that I simply could not shoehorn into this bit of tomfoolery.
But if I used absolutely everybody, this article would have
been ten thousand pages long. And growing larger every day.
