Brookville, Ohio is a small city of 6,000 people. We are located along Interstate 70 just east of the state of Indiana. Our small city has grown considerably since Patty Custer Lincoln and I moved here in 1962 with our five children. We moved from Gordon, Ohio in Darke County just north of where we live now in Montgomery County. We both went to school in Darke County. Our children went to school here in Brookville where we live.
Young people feel immortal and are
willing to try and do things older people would not even think about.
History teaches us that it has been done before so taking your
clothes off just to run around a corn field isn’t something
new—Indians used virgins to run, naked, around corn fields. For old folks who close their eyes in
front of mirrors, the idea of going naked in public seldom crosses
their minds. Most senior citizens would decline offers of a free trip
to Disney World to get naked in a cornfield.
To make a point about our county and
our taxes—standing naked senior citizens standing along I-70, on
private property, might be more effective than letters to the editor
in the Star. If Freedom of Speech and the ACLU mean
anything to anybody it surely means sickly old people are not thrown
in jail for roasting wieners or for dancing naked in corn fields. I
don’t know how far out in the county our decency laws go but I
think I can pee in my backyard and moon passing police cars without
fear of arrest and imprisonment in the county jail.
The cost to maintain a standard of
living for old folks at the county jail might cost more money than
the arrest is worth especially if the old people decide to stay in
jail and not pay the fines. I mean they could get their teeth fixed,
have that operation, and eat something besides dog and cat food for
breakfast; the county would pay for dinner.
I think 18-wheelers would be inclined
to give an extra toot or two, on their air horns, when passing
Brookville and seeing a line of Playboy bunnies from the 1940s lined
up in the cornfields. Being naked in a cornfield, along I-70,
is something some senior citizens I know would do.
