HENRY DAVID THOREAU knocks on a door. RALPH WALDO EMERSON answers
it.
EMERSON: What a grand pleasure to see you, my intellectual friend!
How goes your afternoon?
THOREAU: Ah, it goes, it goes, friend Ralph. But tell me --
EMERSON: Have you, perhaps, discovered some brilliant new tenet of
naturalism?
THOREAU: Well --
EMERSON: Or cross-analyzed humanity's tendency to complicate its
own existence through unjust forms of mass government?
THOREAU: Actually, I've been living in a shack in the woods.
EMERSON: Ahem. I see. So, what brings you here?
THOREAU: Well, you see, amid my ponderings -- do I smell fried
chicken?
EMERSON: Yes, my wife just cooked it. But continue, continue. Your
ponderings?
THOREAU: Uh, yes. You understand, as I was considering the, uh,
fundamental whaddayacallums of human nature, I realized that, uh, people
-- I'm sorry, but that smell is truly engrossing. Might I trouble you
for a bite of that delicious poultry?
EMERSON: But wouldn't that conflict with your goal of independence and self-sufficiency?
THOREAU: Well, yes, but you see, it smells so delightful --
LYDIA EMERSON (from inside): Is that damned Henry Thoreau
at the door?
EMERSON: Yes, dear, I'm afraid it is.
LYDIA: Well, tell him to come back when his transcendentalist
philosophy includes a job!
THOREAU: But --
EMERSON: You heard the lady. Go eat berries, or whatever it is
you do. (Door slams.)
THOREAU: Blast. Perhaps this sacrifice will lead to great
intellectual discovery. Or perhaps Lydia has left open the kitchen
window... (He exits.)