Tragedies to Comedies

What's the worst thing that's happened to you? If answering that question is an arduous task, it's probably not that bad, or you've had an absurdly fucked up life. If it's the latter, you have stories to tell. But you really shouldn't. People wouldn't believe them. But you have my condolences. In any event, I saw some people last night that could probably relate.

Lying there flipping through hundreds of banal channels. A nun trying to sell--whatever. Are you serious? Click. A blonde madman seizing over a piece of bullshit exercise equipment. Click. An octogenarian and a rotisserie machine that simultaneously cooks multiple chickens. Like chicken, do ya gramps? Go easy on the Grecian Formula, homey. Click. An ab roller. The credulity of the general public has no limits. Click. A man with eyes abjectly devoid of emotion staring at me. His face heavily tattooed with what I learned are gang tattoos. Hold on a second. I put the remote down.

A documentary about prison gangs in Africa. New inmates were arriving. The interviewer asked the formidable gang member, "What's going to happen to them?"

"Some will be raped, some will be stabbed," he said with all the aplomb of acknowledging today is Friday. He went on to discuss life inside prison. He chillingly recounted raping his first man at the age of 10. That's right, 10. Other gang members held a rival member down and let a 10-year-old rape him. He smiled wistfully, chuckled and said, "Can you imagine?"

The interviewer asked, "Are you serious?"

A baleful stare, "Do you doubt that it happens?"

A stammering, "No. I don't."

"Then don't ask such questions. You're not as safe as you might think," wryly smiling.

Suddenly my life tragedies seem like comedies. Imagine the lives of the new inmates. An unrelenting psychopath stalking your manhood and life. If you're lucky enough not to have a late night visitor, imagine lying in your cell and listening to the dissonant, horrific sounds filling the air.

And earlier in the day I was off the deep end pissed because the dry cleaners shrunk a pair of my linen pants. That's hilarious in an embarrassing, pathetic sort of way. I ain't making it up.