Once, on a quiet piece of land, a husband and wife decided to build a life.
The husband was a man of the tangible world. His hands were calloused and strong, and he found a deep satisfaction in the physical act of creation. He could raise a barn, mend a fence, and turn a fallen tree into a winter’s worth of firewood. He was the sturdy frame of their house, the protector of its walls.
The wife was a woman of the internal world. Her mind was a map of the seasons and the stars. She knew the precise moment to plant the seeds that would become their harvest, how to manage their finances so that a little was always enough, and how to turn the raw materials of their life into the warmth and comfort of a home. She was the steady hearth of their house, the keeper of its soul.
They were a perfect, symbiotic team. They didn’t keep a strict tally of who did what. They simply fell into the work that suited their nature, each finding their niche. This efficiency wasn’t just about getting chores done; it was about creating time. Time to sit on the porch together. Time to walk in the woods. Time to simply enjoy the beautiful life they were building, a life made possible because each was doing their own part to make it a little better.
Their house was not just a structure; it was a testament to their partnership.
Then, the noise began.
It started quietly, a faint signal from the world outside. A new voice on the radio, a new channel on the television, a new feed on their screens. This voice was a salesman, but he wasn’t selling a product. He was selling a poison. He was selling resentment.
The voice spoke to the husband while he worked. It whispered, “Look at your hands. You are the one doing the real work. The hard work. While she sits inside with her books and her plans, you are breaking your back. You are the strength. She is the weakness. You are being taken for a fool.”
The voice spoke to the wife while she planned. It whispered, “Look at your mind. You are the one with the vision. The foresight. While he is outside swinging an axe, you are building the future. He is the brute force. You are the intellect. He is holding you back.”
The voice was a constant, low-grade hum of comparison and grievance. And slowly, tragically, they began to listen.
The husband started to see his wife’s planning not as wisdom, but as a critique of his work. The wife started to see her husband’s labor not as a partnership, but as a simple, unthinking act. The quiet symbiosis of their life was replaced by the loud, grating noise of a transaction. The question was no longer, “What can we build together?” but, “What am I getting out of this?”
The partnership broke. The house fell into disrepair. The firewood was chopped but never stacked. The harvest was planted but never planned for. They were now two angry, lonely people, living in the ruins of the home they had built together.
The salesman, the voice on the screen, never knew their names. His work was done. He had sold them the only thing he ever had to offer: misery.
This is the story of our country right now. We are all in a relationship with each other—a complex, challenging, and necessary partnership. We are a nation of builders and planners, of artists and engineers, of farmers and scientists. Each of us has a unique talent, a niche, a skill that we can contribute to enrich the lives of everyone else.
But we have allowed an army of “salesmen”—the politicians, the media pundits, the algorithms—to sell us the poison of resentment. They have convinced us that our differences are a threat, not a strength. They have sold us a world where empathy is the enemy.
The goal of a healthy society, like a healthy partnership, is not for everyone to be the same. It is for everyone to have the freedom and the opportunity to find their niche, to do the work they are good at, and to share the fruits of that labor with the community. That is how we create a society that doesn’t just survive, but flourishes. A society with enough time and energy left over to simply enjoy the life we are all building together.
It is time to fire the salesman. It is time to turn off the noise. It is time to have the courage to walk next door, knock on the door, and ask our neighbor for help fixing the fence.