The Nature of History

3 weeks ago 11

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic. Each week, I post my Sunday Bizarro comic, a short essay, and then the past week’s Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics written and drawn by my partner Wayno, whose weekly blog post I highly recommend.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

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Hysteria is natural in the course of history. We humans are a rascally species of apes and with our big brains and opposable thumbs, we’re experts at finding new ways to get into trouble. It seems there’s always something to be alarmed about, and if there’s nothing scary happening at the moment, there will be soon.

We can handle that in several ways. We can worry all the time—which ruins all of the perfectly good days until the next bad day finally arrives, and leaves us no better off when it does. 

We can prepare neurotically and incessantly—but we never know exactly what we’re preparing for so there’s the chance we’re wrong, which makes us worry all the more and ruin more good days.

We can relax and enjoy today, trusting that we’ll be able to handle whatever happens if or when it does. With this option, statistics are definitely on your side.

Two things are irrefutable: The overwhelming majority of humans throughout history have been covered in dung when it hit the fan and handled it just fine (which is why there are so damn many of us!), and 100% of us die in the end anyway. 

I hope you’ll join me in enjoying today. We can start with a few chuckles from Wayno’s Bizarro cartoons from the week!

But first: If you enjoy my creative writing, I invite you to subscribe to my weekly newsletter, The Naked Cartoonist. The most recent article is titled “Never Bring Your Car to a Quantum Mechanic.” If you like it, please recommend it to your friends. If you hate it, recommend it to your enemies.

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