I Must Have Laughter Or I Must Cease To Live
I work in the humor and cartooning business. Even today, when someone laughs due to something "I did", I fell a twinge of second or third grade guilt. "Why can't you focus on your math Ricky? Laughter will get you nowhere in life. Laugh will" said a very good teacher with no vision, Ms. Stickland. I no longer blame people with "no vision". I simply ask them to please get out of my way so they don't look silly; as arrogant as that sounds and I know it does. By age fifty six, I know that people, at least the general populace my or may not think like me, but they may never express for fear of embarrassed. I was born unfiltered and will few inhibitions. That was inherited from my maternal side. My paternal side was straight-laced with shirts that had no wrinkles and politically never went against the drain.
So why do I work at home and why do I love to make people laugh? It didn't start out that way. When I was twenty eight, a lifetime ago, I was sure I would take the world by storm as a standup comic so I moved to NYC and began working clubs. I was not too bad as an emcee but I was not driven enough to be on Letterman, which was "the next level" from clubs. I was too busy helping new comics learn their skills. I was a fairly good impressionist, and received accolades from that skill, which I learned from my roomie, Patrick Weathers, a best childhood friend, who I grew up with in rural Ms. and later became a featured player with SNL.
Years went by and I more or less gave up on the comedy though I still irritate my friends and wife with my impersonations of Johnny Cash, Floyd The Barber, Ronald Reagan, GWH Bush, Bob Dylan, Cat Stevens, Pat Robertson, and numerous others.
But I decided that was not the best venue to make the majority of the world laugh. Back around 1997, when I first launched my offbeat cartoon, I tried to get it syndicated to no avail. The newspapers were looking for "family-oriented" cartoons. I could hear the cartoon editors laughing at me. I even wrote NYC agents once and though usually received back form letters, I received a personal one that said, "That's all I need is another failed cartoonist". That was around 1998.
By 2005, my cartoon was Google #1 ranked and MSN #1 ranked in 2008 and has remained so every since as have my gifts. The ranking is fun, but the emails and autograph requests from around the world, makes me realize, I am grateful and fortunate to have achieved my dreams.
So why do I work at home and why do I love to make people laugh? It didn't start out that way. When I was twenty eight, a lifetime ago, I was sure I would take the world by storm as a standup comic so I moved to NYC and began working clubs. I was not too bad as an emcee but I was not driven enough to be on Letterman, which was "the next level" from clubs. I was too busy helping new comics learn their skills. I was a fairly good impressionist, and received accolades from that skill, which I learned from my roomie, Patrick Weathers, a best childhood friend, who I grew up with in rural Ms. and later became a featured player with SNL.
Years went by and I more or less gave up on the comedy though I still irritate my friends and wife with my impersonations of Johnny Cash, Floyd The Barber, Ronald Reagan, GWH Bush, Bob Dylan, Cat Stevens, Pat Robertson, and numerous others.
But I decided that was not the best venue to make the majority of the world laugh. Back around 1997, when I first launched my offbeat cartoon, I tried to get it syndicated to no avail. The newspapers were looking for "family-oriented" cartoons. I could hear the cartoon editors laughing at me. I even wrote NYC agents once and though usually received back form letters, I received a personal one that said, "That's all I need is another failed cartoonist". That was around 1998.
By 2005, my cartoon was Google #1 ranked and MSN #1 ranked in 2008 and has remained so every since as have my gifts. The ranking is fun, but the emails and autograph requests from around the world, makes me realize, I am grateful and fortunate to have achieved my dreams.