Roy

Roy

My ears ring; the technical term is tinnitus.  If I am in total quiet, I can hear whistling coming from my ears.  And yes, it is annoying.  That is why I sleep with a television on.  The TV’s sound drowns out the noise coming from my ears, and all is well with the world.

I have been doing this, sleeping with the television on, for as long as I can remember.  Believe it or not, I have a story (more than one); dozing off and on with the TV blaring in the background can lead to some unexpected scenarios.

Sometime in the early 2000s, I was struggling to get to sleep like I did every night.  Rarely was I on an expedited path; most times, my trip to sleepy land proved problematic.  As I contemplated my existence, looking up at my blurry ceiling, I found myself constantly interrupted by a talking meatball.  My vision isn’t stellar, so it took me days to figure out that, along with the meatball, there was an annoying milkshake and a sentient bag of fries along for the ride.  The show was, of course, Aqua Teen Hunger Force.

I will admit that it took me months to understand what was going on.  The only reason I found the show was because it was on Adult Swim.  At that time, Futurama was on that network.  After Fry and Zoidberg did their thing, the Aqua Teens would take over.  Initially, I was totally confused by what I was hearing.  As you might have guessed, the show has become one of my all-time favorites.

In the years since the premiere of ATHF, I have been exposed to several other shows that I am glad crossed my path.  Samurai Jack is fantastic; the last season, which recently aired, is transcendent.  Pure brilliance.  I will stack those last ten episodes against anything else I have ever seen, including The Wire, Game of Thrones, and Breaking Bad.

So…here we are.  Hearing Meatwad drone on about something stupid (that is usually what he did) got me hooked on Adult Swim television shows.  And, of course, that leads me to Rick and Morty, an Adult Swim show that is worthy of some space in my blog.  More than that, it is one of the best shows I have ever seen.  I know a guy who stumbled upon Rick and Morty.  The first episode he saw was Pickle Rick, one of the best 22 minutes in television history.  You guessed it, he got hooked just as I did when I saw the pilot episode.  From that day forward, it is always a good day when a new Rick and Morty episode is airing.

Now that the lede has been sufficiently buried and the (maybe not so necessary) setup is in place, I can get to Roy, a video game that resides at Blips and Chitz, a Dave and Busters type establishment that exists in Rick and Morty’s reality.

“Roy, a life well lived” is a video game that both Rick and Morty play.  The person playing takes over the life of Roy Parsons and leads him down a path that they choose.  When Morty played the game, Roy got cancer, beat the disease, and then went back to work at the carpet store.  Of course, the character in the video game was acting at Morty’s behest.  This did not sit well with Rick and he let Morty know…

“You beat cancer and went back to work at the carpet store?  Boo. … that’s the difference between you and me, Morty.  I never go back to the carpet store.”

And that is what this essay is about, going back to the carpet store.  Would you take your last chemo treatment and then head back to the carpet store?  I like to think that all of us would say no way; after an ordeal like that, it is time to do all the things on our respective bucket lists.  It is time to take our second chances and do something bold with them.  That is what you would say, right?

Well, imagine for a moment that you received something like a cancer diagnosis.  What if the prognosis was ugly and the treatment was worse.  After such an ordeal, most of us would like to think we wouldn’t go back to the mundane, that we wouldn’t set foot in the carpet store again.  Of course, there are a few problems with this line of thinking.

As one of my friends said, “Yeah, I wouldn’t want to go back to the carpet store, but I have to eat.” He has a point, doesn’t he?  What if you have a career and a family that depends on you to keep bringing those paychecks home?  What are you going to do then?  We all know what you are going to do; you are going back to the carpet store.  You are going to take a deep breath, straighten your hair, and walk through the front door straight toward the Berber display.

Depressed yet?  I am writing this essay because old Killy McGee (thank you, Homer Simpson) has tried to take me out twice in the last five years.  Came real close the last time; blood clots traveled to my lungs and closed off 90% of my airways.  As a doctor told me, “Well…if those airways are blocked, you simply drop dead.”   Known for understatement, this doctor remains an oracle of sorts; people come from all around…(you get the idea).

The question now becomes a relatively simple one.  Do I go back to my version of the carpet store, or do I sell all my stuff and head for parts unknown?  In my case, those mysterious destinations aren’t going anywhere; I can catch up with them down the road.  For now, I am needed right here.

I do, though, have deep concerns.  I am worried about these novels that are mocking me from the cloud where they are now residing.  They need to be finished; they have to be finished.  I hate to think of the consequences if I am blindsided by something awful before getting them all done.  It is hard for me to think of anything worse.  If I don’t get them completed, in many ways, (the most fundamental ways), my existence will have been a failure.  Strong words, but I believe what I just wrote.

Rick is lucky; he doesn’t have to go back to the carpet store.  That is not how he was written.  His character was created to be one that would never go back to the drudgery of everyday life.  He would never seriously consider it because he can’t; to do so would go against his nature.  For the rest of us, living in the thick muck, there are carpet stores all around.  You can try to avoid them, but you do so at your own risk and to the detriment of those surrounding you.

Maybe one day, future generations will be living in a world where the curious can explore, painters can paint, musicians can master their instruments, and writers can spend their lives writing.  The world that I live in is not that one.  In the world I experience, it appears that the answer to every question, every single one, is money.  That is why virtually no one can be a full-time poet; that job does not generate enough income so that such a person could support themselves.   The same goes for artists of all types.  Passion has to be paid for, and we all know where the money comes from; it comes from the carpet store.