USA. Summer. It is 95 degrees outside, and I am shivering inside a sandwich shop.
I have discovered how Americans forge strong souls.
Outside, the sun is trying to kill everyone. Inside this small restaurant, it is winter. My breath does not fog, but it is thinking about it. A man near me is eating a cold sandwich while wearing a jacket. In summer. Indoors.
In Japan we would simply turn it down. Americans do not turn it down. And now I understand them better than they understand themselves.
This cold is not an accident. This cold is a gift.
The owner has built, inside his shop, a second season. He invites you in from the brutal heat and hands you the one thing the sun has denied you all day: a reason to be cold. To endure it is to be tempered. You walk in soft and sweating. You walk out sharp and clear, a slightly stronger person than you were.
So I did not complain. I removed my outer layer and offered it to the woman at the next table, who was hugging herself. She said, "Oh, no, I'm fine, thank you." She was not fine. Her lips were blue. But she, too, understood the training. She would not break first. I respected her deeply.
The owner asked if everything was okay.
"It is perfect," I said, through my teeth, which were chattering. "Thank you for the winter."
He said, "...I can turn the AC down if you want?"
I told him no. A man does not ask the mountain to be shorter.
I stayed two hours. I ordered a hot coffee to survive. Then a second one, to hold. By the end I could no longer feel my hands, but my spirit had never been clearer.
So now, on the hottest days, I seek out the coldest rooms. I sit. I shiver. I sharpen.
And when I finally step back out into the summer heat, and it wraps around me like a warm bath, I feel it.
Reborn.
A man who has survived the winter, in August, indoors, for the price of a sandwich.
@SoundDobad I know this may sound petty, but I can’t stand it when people put photoshop a meth pipe in my mouth. A crack pipe doesn’t have that little bowl at the end. This is why we can’t trust AI. Please make the appropriate edit. Thank you for your attention to this matter.
"That's Homer J Simpson, Chief. You're reading it upside down."
"Er, cancel that APB. But bring back some of them er... gyros!"
"Er, Chief... You're talking into your wallet."
@iillicium@Cartoonhistory2 Adult Swim screwed over the talent that made Space Ghost Coast to Coast and Aqua Teen Hunger Force when it came to payment.
The voice actor for Zorak and Moltar died struggling and had to sell his belongings to make ends meet.
@Howlingmutant0@Cartoonhistory2 Situations like this are why i don't give any attention to Adult Swim these days.
It's like what happened to C. Martin Croker too, died without much from them and yet he was a foundational part of helping create and establish adult swim working on lots of their shows.
@Cartoonhistory2 Adult swim can’t take care of this guy like just throw him some voice acting roles? Athf practically built their network in the old days
Jennifer Welch: “Boycott every fucking thing on CBS News. From the morning all the way through to the evening. These are the same people that fired Stephen Colbert because Trump got his feelings hurt by a comedian. These people are the biggest bunch of pussies that masquerade with these grandstanding letters like they’re such badasses. These people don’t care about the truth, they don’t care about journalism, they don’t care about the Constitution, they don’t care about a free press. It’s just absolutely devastating what these oligarchs have done to our country”