Planet of Loneliness

By J.D. Finch

(Huge's Response to McSweeney's Contributor Ronnie Cordova's World Of Hurt, Dec. 4, 2003)

When I was a boy I was always "too big". You know the type - literature and popular entertainment has made much of the likes of me. Most recent example - "Shrek". A very early example - Gulliver. In between there was Billy Crystal's "My Giant" and of course "The Princess Bride", with poor lonely André The Giant playing, guess what? A giant!

Then there are the fictional large and lonely of the animal kingdom, unreal, albeit needful of your pity. I would include King Kong, as well as his spin-off, Mighty Joe Young, as the kind of people (though they are not really "people", but realistic, hairy simian-homunculi enlarged to widescreen, terrifying proportions), that are cinematic pathos-mongers and usually good for at least a tissue or two, depending upon who is directing the mongering.

This is all by way of saying that in looking over contributor Ronnie Cordova's "World Of Hurt" I was forced to the conclusion that he really missed out on having a great friend in his big bully: And that bully would be me.

I'll be honest here; while Ronnie may have been truthful in concluding his tale with the statement that he'd gone looking for me after our "hurt tour", we never hooked up again.

When I read his story you can imagine how I felt - I was shocked when I realized I'd bullied him into true platonic feelings. And that he could have such feelings for me sent me reeling. (And when someone my size goes reeling there is damage: I currently need a new TV, a set of eight Waterford Crystal wine glasses and a twenty-five gallon aquarium.)

But it fits the giant/pathos profile, doesn't it? People like me ARE big. We FEEL big. Everything about us is BIG, even our unseen emotions. If I started a band, it wouldn't be called "They Might Be Giants". It would be "These Guys Are Definitely Giant and So Is Everything About Them Including Their Emotions."

I now know a cruel trick of fate had separated me from Ronnie. But when I moved with my family to another town, and by necessity another school district, something inside made me seek out as many new Ronnies as I could find to sit on.

When I found them they always had his face. But believe me when I tell you that within my behemoth's heart I knew it wasn't the same. Once I even found myself on the verge of pummeling one of my sittees for no apparent reason, so angry was I that he wasn't my true wimpy companion of earlier days.

There were a number of years - "the lost bully weekend" I call that dark time - where I was so low that I would even exercise my irresistible power by sitting on inanimate objects. "I'm going to show you..." I'd say to an unresponsive rock: It can't simper like a coward. Nor can a mound of topsoil cry for its mommy.

But Ronnie should be aware that after seeing all the world's pain I learned valuable lessons and ultimately changed my name. And so, I am now known to the world as Tony Robbins.

While I once delighted in making the lives of the Ronnie Cordovas of the world miserable, I now have as my goal the total rehabilitation of all of them - all who have been sat on. I propose a cosmic healing of every single one of us sitters and sittees, so we might eventually join hands and sing, as earlier generations sang in pain and hope, "we shall overcome".

Excuse me, but suddenly I am personally overcome and must call my friend Ronnie and tell him of my great plan. And in the spirit of healing and reaching out to another hurting human being, he is, after all, on my speed dial.

"Hello Ronnie? This is Tony Robbins. What? Oh, of course, I mean, this is 'Huge'. What? I don't have to say anything? You understand? That's wonderful. Hold on and let me tell the folks."

He forgives me! We indeed have "overcome" on a very real and personal level!

"Ronnie, tell me.Tell us, because at this time of year I like to share good news with the multitudes, as it were. Where did you gain your great expansive sense of human forgiveness? Yes, yes. What? What? Did you say Doctor Phil?! Really! Ronnie, tell me something. Are you freakin' kidding me!?!"

"No?! Why, you miserable little wuss. Bar your windows, Poindexter and hide in the basement. You heard me. What? You got it. That's right, HUGE IS BACK!!!


(Planet of Loneliness was originally published at somewhat.org, Dec., 2003)