The Celebration of Incremental Wins (Also Other Small Things)

Mia had never organized a celebration before. She had signed off on parades, drafted permits for jousting competitions, and once even mediated a scheduling conflict between a necromancer’s memorial service and a pumpkin festival, but she had never been in charge of an entire event. And yet, here she was, tasked with planning The Celebration of Incremental Wins—a festival no one in Eldoria had asked for, but everyone seemed obligated to attend once the announcement went out.

The idea had originated innocently enough. Mia’s Ministry of Administrative Progress had, after months of grueling labor, finally reduced the Average Time to Approval for parchment duplication requests from seventy-eight days to seventy-five. Someone had called it a milestone. Someone else had suggested cake. And then, like all ideas in Eldoria, it had ballooned into a sanctioned festival with allocated budgets, committee charters, and a list of mandatory attendance requirements thicker than a wizard’s dissertation on the metaphysics of staplers.

The first problem was the banner. “We can’t just write ‘Congratulations on Three Days Faster!’” said Scribe Felwin, clutching a bundle of crimson fabric as if it were a newborn. “It lacks gravitas. We need something bold, inspiring, poetic!” Mia suggested, “What about ‘Efficiency is its Own Reward’?” Felwin wrinkled his nose. “Sounds like it belongs on a self-improvement scroll.” They eventually settled on “Celebrate Incremental Progress!”, which was honest, if not particularly rousing. The town criers rehearsed shouting it with trumpet accompaniment. None of them could keep a straight face.

The second problem was the parade route. Eldoria’s streets were notoriously difficult to map, given that buildings occasionally rearranged themselves at night to improve feng shui. The Department of Civic Stability had issued seventeen separate route diagrams, all of which contradicted each other. By the time Mia convened the final planning meeting, the committee was arguing whether the parade should march clockwise, counterclockwise, or “in a dignified zigzag pattern to symbolize bureaucratic perseverance.” Mia rubbed her temples and said, “Let’s just march straight. As straight as the streets allow.” Which, in Eldoria, wasn’t very straight at all.

The festival began at dawn with the ceremonial ringing of the Bell of Marginal Gains—an enormous bronze contraption that required six officials to lift the striker and three to verify the sound was within acceptable decibel ranges. Citizens shuffled into the main square, holding flags printed with graphs that displayed the reduction in processing times. The graphs were unlabeled, and most people held them upside down, but the symbolism was clear enough.

“Friends, colleagues, loyal taxpayers!” cried Herald Bramblewick, standing on a dais draped in paperwork streamers. “Today we gather to honor not great leaps, not bold revolutions, but small, barely noticeable steps forward!” The crowd applauded politely, as if they’d all been told their rent would rise by only one silver coin instead of two. Behind Bramblewick, a float shaped like an enormous inkwell rumbled forward, pulled by six overworked donkeys. Inside the inkwell sat a papier-mâché quill, bobbing precariously. A banner read: “Now with Fewer Delays!”

Mia marched at the head of the parade, carrying the Ministry’s official seal like a standard-bearer. Her uniform was pressed, her boots polished, and her patience thinning by the second. After the parade looped the city (or at least the parts of it that hadn’t reconfigured themselves overnight), everyone gathered for the speeches. First came the Minister of Parchment Supply, who spoke at length about the “heroic sacrifice” of paper mills that had worked overtime to meet the new demand for celebratory flyers. Then the Comptroller of Magical Revenue delivered a speech that was mostly footnotes and disclaimers about how incremental wins could not be converted into tax deductions. Finally, it was Mia’s turn.

She stepped up to the podium, stared out at the sea of politely bored faces, and took a deep breath. “Today,” she began, “we celebrate progress—progress not in leaps, but in steps. Progress that may not change the world, but does make it slightly less unbearable to live in.” The audience stirred. A few nodded. “Three days may not seem like much,” she continued. “But those three days represent fewer wasted hours, fewer misplaced forms, fewer citizens forced to camp outside the approval office armed only with stale bread and questionable hope. And in a world where the gears of bureaucracy grind slowly, three days is the difference between despair and deliverance.” A smattering of applause followed. Even Bramblewick looked impressed.

After the speeches, the entertainment began. The highlight was the Troupe of Interpretive Clerks, who performed a dance reenactment of the Form 47-B Streamlining Initiative. Dressed in robes painted with bar graphs, they spun and leapt across the stage, symbolizing the reduction of redundant fields and the triumph of legibility over obscurity. “It’s beautiful,” whispered Felwin, tears streaming down his face. “I never thought I’d see box 12b expressed through the medium of dance.” Next came the Choir of Petitioners, who sang a ballad titled “Ode to the Shorter Queue.” Their harmonies rose over the crowd, extolling the virtue of standing in line for only four hours instead of five. By the final verse, even the most cynical bureaucrats were humming along.

Of course, no festival in Eldoria proceeded without incident. Midway through the festivities, the Guild of Dramatized Accountants unveiled their float: a gigantic abacus powered by minor illusion spells. Unfortunately, someone had misfiled the permission forms, and the enchantments went unchecked. The abacus multiplied itself, producing dozens of bouncing replicas that rolled through the crowd like oversized marbles. Citizens scattered, officials tripped over their robes, and the Choir of Petitioners was nearly crushed beneath a rogue bead the size of a tavern. “Contain it!” shouted Mia, snatching a quill from her belt. She scribbled an Emergency Containment Order onto the nearest parchment and thrust it skyward. The paper burst into blue light, freezing the bouncing abaci mid-roll. The crowd erupted in cheers. “An incremental win for public safety!” someone shouted.

Disaster averted, the festival continued with the Feast of Modest Portions. Instead of lavish banquets, the menu consisted of slightly improved rations: one extra ladle of soup, bread rolls that were almost but not quite fresh, and a cheese wheel that had been aged just long enough to be considered edible rather than experimental. The citizens accepted the food with the same polite resignation they gave everything else, though some seemed genuinely pleased at the notion of a slightly larger slice of pie.

As the sun set, fireworks were launched from the roof of the Records Hall. Each firework exploded into shapes of forms, quills, and rubber stamps. Children laughed and pointed at the glowing shapes, while adults quietly debated whether the budget allocated for fireworks should have gone toward more clerks. Still, for a brief moment, the sky itself seemed to celebrate the ministry’s tiny victory.

When the final firework faded, Mia stood on the dais, exhausted but proud. For all its absurdity, the Celebration of Incremental Wins had gone better than expected. There had been parades, speeches, interpretive dances, near-death experiences, and cheese. And beneath the layers of pomp and paperwork, Mia sensed something important: the people of Eldoria, for once, felt that their government’s endless grind had actually, however slightly, worked in their favor.

As the crowd dispersed, Felwin approached, eyes shining. “Do you think we’ll hold another celebration when the ATA drops to seventy?” Mia groaned, but she couldn’t help smiling. “Let’s survive the paperwork from this one first.”

And with that, the Festival of Incremental Wins came to a close—less a triumph, more a footnote, but in Eldoria, even a footnote was worth celebrating.