Turn The Enterprise Around

Word Count: 495

"Now, what are we going to do?"

"I canna keep her together, Captain! This speed is about to fly 'er apart!"

"Please,...that Scotty impression is getting a little old."

"Alrighty then, but the truth is that we can't keep playing like everything is okay. Something has to change!"

"But what?"

"Well, for starters. As CEO of this little venture, you need to make some hard choices, and you need to make them, today!"

"Fracking is the wave of the future!"

"A farm in the middle of Oklahoma with a pile of underground slate does not necessarily mean you can become on overnight millionaire!"

"...but it doesn't mean I won't!"

"Joe, Buddy, we've been pumping untold gallons of water into this little sideways pipe for weeks now! We've yet to get so much as smoker's phlegm!"

"Scott, I've got too much into this investment to throw it all away because of lack of patience."

"When will it be time? We're losing money hand over fist."

"I know, but you remember when my wife thought she was pregnant after seventeen years without a child!"

"Yeah, but what's that got to do with anything?"

"She went to the OB/GYN at the suggestion of her friend, a nurse, who works there."

"...and?"

"She took the pregnancy test, but it was negative past the normal time period."

"So, like now, you realized you had to fish or cut bait!"

"Scott, that's not funny! You know we were walking out the doctor's office, when Julie came running out of the examination room shouting, 'There's a plus! There's a plus!'"

"O. Right. Your daughter, Joy, is now thirteen, and all is suddenly amazing in your life! Right?"

"More than just right. Joy has become a great source of joy in my life. She's the reason I tried fracking oil out of the ground."

"What's that rumbling sound?"

"Must be your stomach. It can't possibly be this hole in the ground. Right?"

"Alright! I'm wrong! You're patient and I'm a naysayer!"

"Smell that?"

"Yeah!"

"Smells like smoke! You had better run like never before!"

"Eat my dust, Old Man!"

"O...My...Land of Dust and Ashes! That was the biggest pipeline explosion I have heard in my lifetime!"

"Joe! I'm so sorry! Your house! Your farm! Everything valuable to you!"

"Not everything! Ann and Joy went to town for supplies early this morning! Thank the Lord! They weren't in the house!"

"But what's Ann going to say? Now, after 30 years of marriage, you have nothing of earthly value!"

"We have each other, even as cliché as that may sound."

"But what are you going to do now?"

"It may seem odd to you, Scott, but I really think I hit a gusher, today."

"How can you possibly believe that, Joe?"

"I lost everything I own on Earth, but the enterprise of my life has done a complete 180. My family is alive and well! I'm the richest man on the planet!"

by Jay O'Toole
on August 8, 2016