WHERE DO CARTOON CHARACTERS COME FROM?
Where do cartoon characters come from? Our heads. We’ve been storing up images for cartoons since we were in diapers — weird relatives, high school heartthrobs, snooty co-workers, and all the weird dates we ever had. We’re all cartoon characters just waiting for a pencil and a joke.
Who’s that cartoon character?
My silliest, goofiest, and definitely most awkward characters are me.
We are our best characters because we know all the things we can make fun of — like the times we blundered, said something stupid, or tripped over our own feet. And those things are funny.
When you were a kid, did you ever have a terrific idea — that wasn’t. I did. And it brought on my worse day in the third grade. I got sent to the principal’s office just for carving my name in the school’s newly poured cement sidewalk. Wasn’t that what wet cement was for? And I never learned how they found out.
Losing my first job was sad, but losing it in the middle of my second day? Pitiful. There is a cartoon character in that story and she is desperately in need of chocolate.
And who hasn’t been that clown? If you’re going to fall on your face, the trick is to do it in style and in front of as many people as possible — like on stage in front of your whole town. Picture this — it was the night of the annual Dogwood Trail Pageant. A dozen mostly graceful seventeen year old girls were on stage for the big finale. Then, in the middle of the dance routine, crash! One of the girls fell flat on her face. And a cartoon character was born.
— when he swears we’re out of mustard because it’s hidden behind the mayo.
And when he lays down the law! We will have NO DOGS ON THE FURNITURE! EVER!
Nobody intimidates her – especially not some young whipper snapper patrolman.
A modern day city sidewalk with people rushing around, staring at their phones, and talking out loud to what looks like nobody. You can imagine her reaction.
Even better, plop her onto a nude beach.
Then the other drivers and pedestrians are the cartoon characters. And if they know what’s good for them, they’re afraid — very afraid.
The crabby neighbor — Mrs. Grey was a mean, stick-thin woman with tightly permed gray hair and a menacing frown. She hated kids.
You should be in reform school,” was the appropriate punishment for any kid who ran, skipped, laughed, or worse, drew chalk hopscotch games on the sidewalk. But now I get the last word. I conttrol what she looks like. So, Mrs. Grey. This is you…
Or maybe this…
Help! It’s a fly invasion. And I don’t mean three or four flies. I mean a hundred — or at least seven. How do they get in with every door and window closed? But there they are in her kitchen, taunting, buzzing around, touching down on food. And always just out of reach.
What can she do? Grab a rolled up newspaper and give chase. But the nasty flies are cagy. One sits still until she is right up on it, then it zips away, lands on her just-baked cake, and sneers at her.
The bottom line — Cartoon characters r US
We’re where cartoon characters come from — us and our experiences with weird relatives, crabby neighbors, all the weird dates we ever had, and our own blunders. We’re all cartoon characters just waiting for a pencil and a joke.
To read the whole story of how I was fired from my first job, go to: https://ruthibirch.com/my-first-job-frazzle-fizzle-flop/
And if you want more laughs, check out https://ruthibirch.com/life-in-the-funny-paper/
Ruthi
September 2024
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