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Drawing conclusions Can You Make the Jaw a Little Firmer?By Rick Horowitz
Sometimes -- not often, but sometimes -- sentences and paragraphs just don't do it for me. That's when I think in cartoons. If every comedian, deep down, wants to play Hamlet, maybe every columnist has a secret urge to be a cartoonist. An editorial cartoonist. Of course, this would be easier if I had even the slightest trace of artistic ability. But I figure I have something even better: your imagination. So here are the three cartoons I would sketch today. Cartoon No. 1: This one is set at the water's edge. It's big water -- an ocean, say, or the Gulf of Mexico. There are only two characters (I'm trying to keep things simple for you): a lifeguard in his lifeguard chair, and a woman in the water. And painted on the back of the lifeguard's chair -- you can make it a little taller, more like a tower -- are the letters "FEMA." Anyway: In this cartoon of ours, the lifeguard is sitting in his lifeguard chair, at the water's edge, but he's not looking at the water; he's filing his nails. The woman, meanwhile, is bobbing like a bottle in the pounding surf and she's waving desperately for the lifeguard's attention. "Helfffff!" she's shouting. "Helfffff!" And the lifeguard has a perfectly blank expression on his face, and one of those thought balloons above his head, and he's saying to himself, "Nope -- still doesn't have it quite right." That's the first one -- nice work! Here's the next one. Cartoon No. 2: This one's an indoor cartoon. It's set in the Oval Office, but you don't have to do the whole presidential seal on the carpet or anything -- maybe you can just have a flagpole behind the desk, so people can tell. Or put the Washington Monument outside the window -- real cartoonists always put the Washington Monument outside the window when they want you to know it's the Oval Office. That also saves you the trouble of having to come up with a good likeness of President Bush. The real cartoonists can all do it -- a good likeness, I mean, or (even better) an entertaining caricature. You can try if you want to, but don't wear yourself out; as long as he's vaguely recognizable, that's all we need. The president, just sitting at his desk in the Oval Office. Maybe he's reading. Or staring into space. If you need to sharpen your pencil, I'll wait. Ready? Now, I'll give you the optional part first. You know how some cartoonists like to put a lot of detail into their cartoons, lots of labels and throwaway jokes and such? If you want to do that, fine -- put one of your basic in-box/out-box things sitting on the corner of the desk. Only this one would have three trays, not just two. There'd be "In" and "Out," the normal way, with not too much stuff in either of them. But then there'd be a third box, which would be totally overflowing, and we'd call it "Delegate." But that's only if you want to. It's not the main joke. Here's what I do need, though: A small sign on the president's desk that says "The buck stops here." Except that the way we'll do it in this cartoon, there'll be more to the sign than that. I'll need you to tape kind of a long black paper tail to the sign -- it doesn't have to look neat or anything, the tape can be showing. (In fact, the more hand-made it looks, the better.) And at the very top of the tail, where it's pasted onto the sign, we'll have the letter "t," and then the bottom of the "t" becomes the rest of the tail, which dangles to the floor and across the floor and right out the window, and then -- here's the only hard part -- can you make it split into five or six arrow points, pointing every which way? "The buck stops t here." That's the second one. Here's the last one -- it'll be our masterpiece. Cartoon No. 3: You don't have to draw any people in this one. Just a building -- the White House. And not even the whole White House. Just the top couple of feet of the White House, just enough that it's recognizable. The rest of the building is under water. It's under water, and all these strange and unspeakable shapes are floating by. (If you're the labeling type, you can stick "Iraq" on one of the shapes, and "Katrina" on another one, and maybe "Gas Prices" or something. But don't overdo it.) So you've got the White House, and all the water, and the shapes. That's it. No thought balloons. No signs on a desk. Just a caption at the top of the cartoon: "In Over His Head." Do I have to draw a picture for you? Posted 9/6/05. For
artistic prose, click to "Rick's" twice every week!
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Rick Horowitz
