Beuford

I had recently attended a play at Aquinas by the name of Lobster Alice. It was possibly the best play I have ever seen in my life, a story about Salvador Dali set during the time that he was at Disney, creating some whacky animation which, sadly, I STILL have not seen. One of the props used during the play was a number of bright red lobsters which were scattered around the set, delightfully random little buggers, lobsters that I fell in love with the moment I saw them. I decided that I must have one, so naturally, I sulked around after the show attempting to goad my fellow playgoer, Kyla, into asking the director if I could have one. Given that we are both probably equally lacking in the whole ‘social graces’ thingy, it was only a marvelous generosity(coupled with some masterful sulking on my part, mind you. I kicked the ground pitifully and stared at a windowsill for some obscene amount of time, making comments about how strange a shade of yellow that the paint was, and what poor craftsmanship on the aluminum guide, and please oh please would she get me a lobster. I will never admit to not being childish and immature.) on her part that she would talk to a stranger for me. And-success oh happy success- I walked away with a lobster to call my own. Well, I called him my own, and also I called him Beuford. I can’t possibly think of any better name for a rubber lobster than Beuford.

Now, both being me and coming away from a play about a surrealist artist, I was already well primed for absurdity, and, man, there’s some good absurdity to be had. Think about this: No one would make life size rubber lobsters unless there was a market for it, correct? One cannot help but wonder who decided that hey, I bet I could make some serious bucks in the rubber lobster business. Do people really want these things that bad? There are machines, massive, noisy, violent machines who churn out naked rubber lobsters. There are rooms full of hopeless children who will spend their entire lives painting eyeballs on rubber lobsters. There are warehouses full of rubber lobsters. There are boats and trucks who will bring these rubber lobsters all over the world. What is the point? Is a rubber lobster supposed to be a child’s toy(or perhaps a toy of another sort...), or an educational tool, or some sort of decoration, or do they rely on a large amount of income from peculiar plays? This, my friends, is a vision of absurdity. What would happen if all the resources that went into making incomprehensibly useless junk were to instead be put to work in a way that would feed and clothe and educate the parts of the world whose people spend their life making our junk?

Well, capitalism would be destroyed, democracy would splinter, and the earth would probably explode. At least, I’m pretty sure about that. It’s what I’m told.

In conclusion, I sure do love my rubber lobster Beuford a lot, and everyone should have one.