The Sugar Siege

Yesterday, the State of Florida declared an unholy war against us. It was noon; the sun was shining through our windows bringing welcome warmth to our office.  It was the kind of day when it feels as though nothing could go wrong.  And then, out of nowhere, like the Japanese planes descending on Pearl Harbor, we were ruthlessly and relentlessly attacked. The aggression seemed to come out of left field. We had no idea why we were being attacked. And then an email appeared in our chief of staff’s inbox. “Your countrymen downstairs have taken something of great importance to us. Until it is returned everyone they love will suffer. Your candy jar will be returned to you when your ally returns the stolen goods. You may contact us when you are ready to enter negotiations.”

For a moment the whole office paused. How could they do this to us? We are innocent! We have no quarrel with the Floridians. For a moment, in our now sugarless office, we almost caved; however, we mustered our strength and boldly replied. “This office of the Great State of Texas does not negotiate with terrorists.”

As the first day under siege passed, we remained strong. We held out valiantly against the onslaught of a candy-less office and carefully rationed what little had been hidden in drawers. In this way, we were able to survive the first three o’clock sugar dip and by the end of day one we were still resilient in and the troops remained optimistic.

As the morning of day two dawned upon us, resolve had begun to weaken.  By noon, my fellow Texans had begun to look longingly at the place where our candy jar had previously resided and an air of unrest had begun to permeate the office.  By one thirty, it was becoming clear that something would have to be done before the three o’clock candy run. We were down to only two Kit-Kat bars and those would have to be used to keep up the strength of our most vulnerable. Things were starting to get desperate. As three o’clock arrived and the jar had not yet been returned, moral dropped to a low. We were like the citizens of East Berlin, separated from what we held dear and running out of resources. We needed a Ronald Reagan to intercede for us, to cry out, “Florida, the candy jar must be returned!”

People started to fall. Brave men and women who I labored daily with for the good of our citizens one by one gave way to sugar deprivation, sinking into doldrums from which they could not be pulled. At five o’clock, only one hour until the end of the day, our tormentors came into our sanctuary. Too weak to fight them, we merely watched as they plundered our office in search of their missing artifact. They again left us to our misery. There is however one bright spot in the midst of this trial. The large ceramic elephant, painted in a bold American flag pattern, is still safely hidden, in a place where they will never find it. They may take our candy, but they cannot take our spirit.

On the third day of the siege, the Texans and Floridians chartered a treaty. The candy Jar has been returned and peace has been restored. There were no casualties.

Sticking to your guns: accomplished