What’s black and white and red (read) all over? Signs. Signs telling me what I cannot do. I am under their control now. Before I thought I had control. But the signs have won. Oh yes, the signs have won.

I had to switch cars because of the sign outside my house. I can’t even have an automatic transmission. The sign won’t allow it. I drive a Nissan now. I looked at so many cars, but the Nissan appealed to the rebellious side of me. It’s so close to being forbidden, but isn’t. Not yet anyway. No signs about that one.

See there? Seventy-eight words into this, and I ran afoul of the sign. Glad I had the foresight to get in my Nissan and drive to where the signs haven’t reached. Still, I need to be more careful. The signs seem to be growing in numbers daily. Soon not a block in the city will be safe to use.

At first the signs seemed harmless. Small zones of intolerance, nothing to worry about. It was just here and there. It didn’t really affect me. It was always someone else’s trouble.

Then the day came and the orange truck was in front of my house. MY house. A man in a blue denim shirt and blue denim jeans lowered himself from the cab of the orange truck. He checked a document fastened on a board, looked at my house, looked around the street I live on, looked back at the document, and then tossed it back into the truck. He slammed the door. It was time to do the deed.

With gravity, he lifted a drill from the bed of the orange truck. He situated the head of the drill onto the bit of weedy grass growing between the sidewalk and the road. He fastened blue ear muffs over his ears. He took his time donning the leather gloves he drew from the back of his jeans. With a single, manly tug on the cord, he started the drill. It chugged loudly, sounding eager, as if it knew what it was doing, and enjoyed doing it. Deftly, the man engaged the gear, and the great screw bit into the lawn.

Growing mounds of reddish brown soil twirled out from the hole the drill was boring. Suddenly, the man quit drilling, and hefted it out of the ground, causing bits of soil to fly all around. He looked into the hole, and, satisfied, turned and hoisted the drill back into the truck. With care, he removed the blue ear muffs, and set them in the bed of the truck as well. Then, he hauled out THE SIGN. Sure, I’d seen the sign before, hundreds of times. But in front of MY house, it had new meaning. Control had come to me. I was now affected.

Without ceremony, he inserted the metal shaft into the hole the drill had made. Somewhat sexual, yes, but what I felt was the reverse of an orgasm. An ingasm, maybe? I could feel my world become smaller, more constrained. Things went gray, and lost their definition.

I moved out into my yard, tightening the belt of my faded green bathrobe as I walked. I felt a look of fierce determination cross my face and stay there. Down, but not out yet. I asked the man in the blue denim clothes how long I had to conform to the new code. He looked at me oddly, shrugged, and told me he didn’t know, that he thought it was immediate, but that I might have as long as 24 hours before anyone really cared to enforce it. I thanked him. Another great irony. I thanked him.