AFTER AMASSING A MODEST BUT  notable following on YouTube for my no-budget one-man comedy skits, I received a handwritten letter from Lorne Michaels. The paper was handcrafted, the penmanship small and ornate. I had to squint with almost painful intensity to read it and I could hardly believe my eyes when I was able to make out what it said. Lorne was a fan of my skits. He said that in dark times like these, scrappy, hopeful comedy was exactly what the world needed. I was too un-practiced, too rough around the edges for SNL, but Lorne was implementing an SNL developmental pre-show which would air the next day called Sunday Afternoon Delay, or SAD. I became one of the Not Yet Ready for Not Yet Ready for Primetime Players. Me and my fellow SAD castmates were to load the bases so the sluggers on the SNL cast could go out and hit a grand slam. Lorne was a big baseball guy, Red Sox fan but you didn’t hear that from me. Warm ‘em up, don’t burn ‘em out, he’d say, so when I pitched to Lorne, I pitched center steady. No curves or knuckleballs, just polite chuckleballs. I’d go out and do some mediocre impression of some guy who was in the news that week and would be out the next. But we loaded the bases, we did our job. The SNL cast struck out every time. Lorne and I were eating in catering and Lorne was opening up his club sandwich with the delicacy of a surgeon, wiping and dabbing the mayonnaise off with an NBC-branded napkin because he had this mental block where mayonnaise reminded him too much of semen and he’d just start gagging. But he didn’t want to make a “no creamy white foods” rule because he didn’t think that’d be fair to everyone else. He was that kind of guy. Anyways, he was soaking up the mayonnaise and Marcello Hernandez walked in after bombing this skit where he’s the long-lost Mexican half-brother of the Jonas Brothers and Lorne turned red faster than a Humboldt squid and he grabbed Marcello by the neck and just started shaking him, screaming YOU CAN’T EVEN HIT THE BALL! THE BALL WAS ON THE TEE AND YOU CAN’T EVEN HIT THE BALL! HOW ARE WE SUPPOSED TO WIN THE SERIES WITH SWINGS LIKE THAT!? Me and my fellow SADmates, we were scared out of our wits. But we were sympathetic to Lorne: we all took comedy very seriously. And Marcello should’ve had that one, it really was on the tee. I was futzing around the halls of Studio 8H a few days later and an assistant passed me a note, on handcrafted decorative paper with minuscule lettering. I nearly gave myself an aneurysm trying to read it but it said, Meet me in the boiler room. Come alone. Also, bring me coffee. You know how I like it (no creamer, no soy milk, five sugar <3). I wove my way through the labyrinthine hallways and corridors, made my way to the boiler room, to Lorne. The room was dark but I could see Lorne’s silhouette beckoning beside a barrel or some vat. Come, he whispered fatherly, bring me that bean juice. I walked gingerly toward Daddy Lorne and as I went to hand over his cuppa joe, he dropped to a knee and drove his shoulder into my hip. He hoisted me up and dunked me headfirst into the vat. He shook me like he was trying to dry a towel, but the towel was in a salty bath. After a couple grueling minutes, he relented. I didn’t know what to say but Lorne said, I’ve been waiting for someone like you. Harvesting the tears of the sketch writers for a moment like this. You have been reborn… as Jokeman! Only you can save comedy. He moved towards the back wall, fumbling around for an indent. He smashed the divot with his wrinkled mitt. The wall rotated ninety degrees, revealing a hi-tech hero’s lair. There was a suit crafted from the hard, bloodied Australian Buloke paddles Laugh Factory regulars used to beat the open mic’ers with. A cape stitched together from crumpled parchment upon which many a rejected sketch was written. A suspicious-looking pod in the corner. I donned the suit and cape, I took up the mantle, I was now Not Yet Ready for Primetime. Something had changed. My comedian’s soul had corroded and blackened. On my first SNL, Steve Buscemi hosted, and we did a Fargo skit. He was Steve Buscemi as Carl Showalter. Sarah Squirm was Frances McDormand as Marge Gunderson. I was Jokeman as Peter Stormare as Gaear Grimsrud. When Jokeman as Peter Stormare as Gaear Grimsrud put Steve Buscemi as Steve Buscemi as Carl Showalter through an actual woodchipper playing a woodchipper, the audience laughed and laughed, showered in red, until they could taste the iron. Then they grew quiet. Sarah Squirm as Frances McDormand as Marge Gunderson broke character and into hysterics. Lorne Michaels bonked Jokeman with an Australian Baloke paddle. When Jokeman awoke, he was only half-awoke, lying in the pod. On his chest was a third note, but it wasn’t hard to read. It said I’m so sorry, Jokeman. These are dark times. And I don’t think we need dark jokes in these dark times. Someday, there will be less death and then death will be funny again. Until then, I must freeze you, until the times are good. •



Travis Shosa (they/them) is a writer from Spring, TX. Their writing is featured in Stanchion, Maudlin House, HAD, Bending Genres, BRUISER, Burial Magazine, and lots of other cool places. They have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. They run Dodo Eraser, a lit mag and reading series.

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