breaking the fourth wall; going directly to the bathroom.

It’s the laughter that killed ya, didn’t it?  Comedians who created dark, biting social satire that actually made us laugh our asses outside and cry our hearts out inside, comedians who made an audience realize ‘damn man, that was exactly what was going on inside my head and I was always afraid to actually say it, this guy has the guts to think what all of us are thinking, and say it better on stage!’ ; comedians who got ridiculed by a previous generation only to be acclaimed in the next. These guys are dying an awful frequent lot nowadays, aren’t they? Comedians who revived what good ol’ jolly comedy is all about, laughing at each other’s stories, and laughing like crazy at each other’s mistakes. And a knowledge that probably the only truth that can be learnt is never to take ourselves too seriously at any time. These guys are blowing out like life-sized candles in the wind, and I am talking about pretty strong wind: in the last decade alone, Bill Hicks died, followed by Mitch Hedberg and George Carlin, some of the legends who made us realize it was okay to laugh at each other once again. Lenny Bruce died a while back, and his black-hearted satire is more notorious than legendary. John Belushi died at 33. Andrew Dice Clay is not dead yet, but he stands like a dying old man telling the same jokes he used to tell audiences twenty years ago.You want to look at comedians who died early, and you don’t even have to think twice about how good they actually were. It’s like people who we wouldn’t want that much keep accumulating and living on, adding to our collective misery.

What the fuck’s going on? It’s like hicks, carlin and hedberg are getting better comedy gigs in heaven or something. And they are going to heaven, yeah, i didn’t just say it because it was sounding pro-religion.. We are the ones who are going to hell. We stood there and listened to Hicks ranting on about drugs, religion and violence and how everything’s just a ride, and he came on to the stage every night trying to make us believe in something, something we were afraid of believing in ourselves, yet we knew it was true all along. And then they died.

And we fucked ourselves up anyway.

Mitch Hedberg must be coming up to God and saying, “ Man, listen. I was so afraid of talking to people that I used to go on stage wearing my shades and even turning my back to the audience. I am really, really hoping you guys will be better. Because if you are not, goddamn it, I will have to kill myself again.”

Imagine this: God welcomes Hicks, Hedberg and Carlin to heaven and says, cmon in, guys, I have got a surprise for you.

And Hicks is thinking, I get to go to heaven because I said I didnt believe in religion? Was this, like, the actual truth we spent looking for all our lives?

And God takes them around, telling them how Jesus wanted to start out as a stand-up comedian. “He was trying to give a good gig to people who had nothing to live for, except their wives, their children and their goats. Something that could make them realize themselves. People just took Jesus more seriously. And now we walk around hanging his crosses on our chests.” Hicks used to say, you think Jesus would love looking at our crosses if he ever came back? He died on the friggin’ thing! “

So Hicks asks God about the other religions.

And God says all of them go out bowling together on Tuesday nights. Jesus, Vishnu, Krishna and Mohammed. And Homer Simpson. They laugh at each other’s jokes , and watch reruns of Saturday Night Live, the John Belushi and the Christopher Walken parts especially. And we look down from time to time, and we keep telling each other, ‘ you know, one of us should go down there and tell them we are really good friends down here, we even appear in each other’s epics sometimes’ , but they know we will never learn. Not until someone good dies again.