Thots on March Six of 2022

What’s it all for? What’s the purpose of existence? — I’m afraid the truth is boring; it’s that old adage: Life is but a dream. So, yes, it could be that nothing really matters (nobody can say for sure how important dreamed events are, or if they provoke consequences of any type); but I prefer to have PLEASANT dreams, and I feel confident that there’s nothing wrong with that.

So it happened one night that I was on a cruise ship with my billionaire father. We were standing at the soda fountain, eating ice cream cones. Mine was vanilla; his was blueberry.

“Give me my inheritance, NOW,” I said; “or I’m jumping off this boat.”

My father is a big fat man; he just laughed and said “You would never dare.”

So I leapt overboard and swam to the nearest peninsula. (Mermaids helped me.) I then took a cab to New York. 

Working hard as a busboy at a restaurant led me to eventually become the owner of all five boroughs: I first purchased Brooklyn and Manhattan; then, a little later, I was able to buy the Bronx, Queens, and Staten Island. 

At this point, I had to figure out what type of imprint I wanted to leave upon World History. For you only live once. “I need to get my act together,” I said to myself, “otherwise I’m going to end up like the rest of mankind.” 

So I ordered pyramids to be constructed in a place called Egypt. I also purchased France and bedded many women in Paris. All of the empires then fell into my possession, and I caused them to thrive. The people loved me because I resurrected Julius Caesar.

But, having landed at this point in my career, I reclined at a diner with my preacher-friend Ecclesiastes, and we both began to gripe about how being successful can also feel dissatisfying. Then the poet William Blake walked over to our table and we welcomed him, and he sat down with us and said: “Comrades, you’re operating your heavenly kingdoms all wrong. Perfection is not the answer. Remember what I told you: Improvement makes strait roads, but the crooked roads without Improvement are roads of Genius.”

So we all shook hands and left, after I paid the bill. I then made a huge investment in Albion and eventually purchased the entity outright. To this day, I own it. Or, him, rather.

Then I built a time-traveling machine and revisited the past: I went and sought out all my ex-girlfriends and admitted to each, at key moments (often heated): “I am wrong, and you are right.” This greatly improved matters, so that each relationship became fruitful and lived happily ever after. — I now clapped my hands and smiled, being proud of myself for having brought such goodness into the universe. 

Then, having amended the past, I decided to travel to the future: 

It chagrined me, however, to find that humankind had split into two distinct tribes: a lower class and an upper class. So I lured these groups toward each other and tried to teach them LOVE. I gathered the have-nots together with the haves and addressed them as one, saying: “Dear children, SHARE!” 

And the haves answered back: “But your speech saddens us members of the opulent class, because sharing would require that we wealthy ones relinquish control of portions of our riches; whereas the impoverished class is happified by your words, since, if your plan is implemented, then they, the poor, will no longer live in a state of want.”

I thought about this point for a while. Then I replied: “It sounds like you’re unwilling to help out your siblings on the earth — could it be that you’re just plain selfish?”

And the top class answered as one, and said: “No, we DESERVE to keep our abundance — even if our wealth is so vast that we could never spend it all — and the poor DESERVE to remain destitute.”

Now that use of the word “deserve” really shook me up: It swept me off my feet and took me for a spin. “Sheesh,” I remarked to myself, “that’s a perspective that’s hard to challenge. Who am I to say that these folks, by the fact of their affluence, weren’t implicitly granted a right to abuse their fellow-beings?” — So ultimately I agreed that the aboveground class has a better point than the one I was trying to make: “Carry on,” I said, “as you are. Don’t bother to share.”

It was also a little easier to side with the rich because I myself own all five boroughs of New York.

Then, overnight, it kept raining while the temperature dropped below zero degrees Celsius; thus we woke to find the landscape covered with snowflakes, yet underneath all that snow was a sheet of deadly ice. So, when people stepped outside, they slipped.

Automobiles were attempting to drive on these icy roads, and they were swerving in circles and falling off the nearby cliff and exploding in fire. That’s how the rivers of lava formed on either side of our city’s street — it’s not actually molten rock that’s flowing there; it’s a combination of blown-up car parts and human casualties.

So I finished changing into my business suit and hitched a ride to the office. Upon entering the room where the board members were waiting, I took my place at the front of the table and said: 

“I think that I don’t want to be here more than all of you don’t want to be here. What I’m trying to say is that I like existence less than anyone.”

There was silence. Then a voice said: “Was that supposed to be funny? Are you delivering one of those speeches that starts with a joke?”

I looked at this board member crossly and answered: “No.”

Then this board member said: “Ah, well, then, if your statements were sincere, I’d like to challenge them.”

This board member now stood up tall. We both unsheathed our swords; and the fight began. I thrusted first at his right side, but he lifted his shield so that it blocked my charge. Then he tried to cut off my left arm, but I lifted my own shield so that it blocked his attempt. Finally I stabbed him in the midsection and pushed the blade of my weapon thru his belly until the hilt reached his navel. 

The board member whom I had bested was compelled to admit, at this point, that he was spraying blood everywhere: it was a shameful display — he hung his head and asked to be excused from the meeting, so as to wipe off the gore from his business suit and stitch up his wounds, if possible, lest he die from loss of life-force. I patted him on the back and said: 

“Go, brother. Clean thyself and return; for I am about to read aloud the latest sales figures, and you will be interested to know that our corporation is doing very well in certain areas, despite floundering in other areas.”

Then I went to one of the circles in Dante’s Purgatory and met Samuel Beckett, and I asked him what he meant by writing his trilogy of novels which starts with MOLLOY, goes on to MALONE DIES, then ends with THE UNNAMEABLE. 

He answered: “If I knew what I meant, then it wouldn’t have been worth writing.” And I hugged him in friendship.

Then I hitched a ride back to Hollywood and started starring in movies again. I made a whole bunch of really good films, in the pre-code days. I thank you kindly for preserving them. 

Now Officer Gold pulled up on the scene in his black-&-white police cruiser. “I’m worried about you, Bry,” he said; “you’re hanging out with too many starlets, on the set of these motion pictures. I’m afraid you’re going to lose your moral compass.”

So I thanked Officer Gold and agreed to quit my job as a Leading Man and become a ride-along cop partner instead. 

Officer Gold then drove us to Texas, where the Main Police Station was located. We had a meeting with the Commissioner and he talked some sense into me: 

“Jesus, Bryan, you’re all over the map. Get yourself together. Join the Force. Do something right, for a change.”

So I accepted the advances of the Police Force of USA Texas. I allowed them to pin a badge on my uniform’s lapel. They furnished me with Police Boots and then shaved my hair short. Yet then my hair kept growing back overnight, like the biblical character Samson, so they had to keep re-shaving it. This process became a cruelly unusual encumbrance on the Police Force’s beautician, so, in a rare instance of compromise, the Commissioner allowed me to be the only Officer of the USA Texas Police Squad to sport a slightly longer hairstyle. This is how I became known as “The Cool Cop”. 

Now Officer Gold and I, Bryan Ray, climb into our motor coach. We flip the siren on, tilt our heads out of the windows to make sure our cherry is flashing; then we begin to drive down the road. While speeding toward the next crime scene, I get out and make sure that our paddy wagon is hooked up securely to our trailer hitch. (A paddy wagon is an important accessory because it is used to transport prisoners.)

So we show up outside of the Big Box Store that sells everything from clothing to home appliances. Officer Gold climbs out of his driver-side window, and I follow suit. We enter the building with our firearms at the ready.

A temptress greets us. We shake her off. Shoppers of various sizes get in our way, so we gently remind them that WE are the official enforcers of politeness, and THEY are mere yokels. They apologize while bowing deeply and beg our forgiveness, while we pet them.

Suddenly everything takes a turn for the worse, but Officer Gold and I save the day. (My name is Officer Bryan Ray, the famous author.) Then we celebrate by dining at an Australian-themed restaurant. 

“These are good ribs,” I say. “They are smoked, grilled, and brushed with a tangy barbecue sauce.”

“Yes, they are,” nods Officer Gold; “I completely agree.”