A lot of people have been asking why I’ve been looking down lately, for the last hour or so, and I’m finally ready to admit it: I found a beaner in my satchel. There, I said it. I’m not ashamed to admit it, although I’m really not even sure what it means. I feel naked, disoriented, like I’m in continuous vertigo. I keep asking, why? How? Is it something I did? What could I have done to deserve this? Is this because Matt Henning and I put a tack on Nicole Johnson’s chair in the third grade?

I never thought I’d be breaking down, this day in age, crying over a satchel, but that’s exactly what happened. I’ve heard the stories, people talk, sure, but nobody ever “really” gets beaners these days. Today it’s all fire, and kind, and lit, and dank, and top shelf, and with that, the mind-quelling assurance that beaners have been eradicated, wiped out, a thing of the past. But no. That’s just a fallacy we like to tell ourselves. It’s all fine and dandy until the universe just decides to wreck you a new one and throw a beaner in your face.    

Beaners are still around, and they can happen to you.

I can’t remember how this works. What am I supposed to do with it? Plant it? Pretend like nothing happened? I feel so violated! Like my satchel is sub-par, like I’m sub-par. This hasn’t happened in years! Maybe a decade, at least! I can’t help but wonder what millennia of random events would lead to this tragedy, this--humiliating spectacle! I can’t possibly pack a bowl with friends from this satchel, knowing what I know. What if they found out I’d discovered a seed? What would they think of me? Would they start asking me questions about it? I’m not sure where it came from, all of a sudden I just saw a beaner! Leave me alone! What if --Gasp! -- what if they found a beaner in the bowl I pack for them? The deepest of friendships are not so sturdy that they could withstand a sudden beaner -- especially, pre-meditated. They would accuse me of knowing and they’d be right! Oh, the shame! 

Nothing else in life makes you question all of your choices like this. Me, with a beaner, I just can’t stop thinking of it over and over again. I -- I, almost sparked that thing! The crackling, sickening fire, the harsh smake on your lungs, that was almost me again! I told myself years ago as I slogged through the tar of ratty brickweed that I would never again smake a beaner as long as I lived, and this, this is my moment. 

No, I will not be defeated! I will stand tall. I will smake this satchel and I won’t be afraid to say it. Hi. My name is Mr. Polkadots, and I today I found a beaner in my satchel.