This Is a Book (33 page)
Authors: Demetri Martin
Tags: #Humor, #Form, #General, #American, #Literary Criticism, #Essays, #Jokes & Riddles, #American wit and humor
While therapy didn’t cure me, it did help. I got pretty good at saying other things instead of “goodbye,” like “I’m going over there now” or “I am not going to stay here anymore.” I learned that if I make an announcement about the next thing I’m going to do, that works quite well (i.e., “I am now going to get into this taxi” or “I’m going to go into that bathroom now and take a dump”).
Part of the problem is that I just can’t read situations that well. If we’re saying goodbye to each other, I don’t know if we should hug or kiss on the cheek, or just hold legs. I end up guessing. So far I’ve been wrong every time that I’ve guessed “hold legs.”
My friend John is so good at goodbyes. He can say anything and it sounds right, like “Cheerio” or “Peace” or “I’ll see you in Hell.” That guy is prolific at goodbyes. Not me. I probably couldn’t even say goodbye to someone who was falling off a cliff. The best I could do is shrug and make a face like, “Well, what can you do about cliffs?”
It’s not all bad though. When I want to seem distant, not being able to say goodbye works well for me. One time I broke up with this girl and she said, “Goodbye.” I didn’t say anything. Then she said, “Aren’t you going to say anything?” I said, “No U-turns.” She walked away, thinking that I said something deep. But I was just reading a nearby sign out loud.
People sometimes ask me what I’m going to say when it comes time to die. I honestly don’t know. I’ll probably go “Ughhh” and make believe that I died. And then, after everyone leaves, I’ll really die. But I bet by then our society will have robots that can help you say goodbye, or there will be some sort of self-puppeting thing you can hook up to yourself to do it for you.
Hey, look! What’s that behind you?
The End.
Front Cov
er Image
Megaphone
Ne
w Year’s Party
Titl
es
My Ba
nd
Pali
ndromes for Specific Occasions
Optimist, Pessimist, Contortionist
Honors
& Awards (for Which I Would Qualify)
Fort
une Cookies
A Christmas Carol (the Deleted Scene)
Fruit Ve
ndor (Diary Excerpts)
A Cappella Group Freak Accidents
A
Crossword Puzzle
Produ
cts
A P
icture (1,000 Words)
Epigrams, Fragments & Light Verse
Hu
man Cannonball Occupational Hazards
Painted
Faces
Some Meanings
Goreburg and Spatz
Confessions of a White Guy with Dreadlocks
Results
of Your Personality Test
Excerpts from My Often-True Autobiography
About
the Author
Dem
etri Martin is the author of THIS IS A BOOK BY DEMETRI MARTIN. He is currently working on his next book. He lives somewhere in America.
*
Nothing yet. This is his first book.
1
NOTE: This turned out to be the final Zing.
Copyright © 2011 by Demetri Martin
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Grand Central Publishing
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First eBook Edition: April 2011
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ISBN: 978-1-609-41876-2
