a-monster-in-the-closet

A ten-panel comic. A young boy runs to his bald, glasses-wearing dad, shouting that there's a monster in his closet. The dad looks and says there's no monster, it's just Death (a small cloaked Grim Reaper figure standing in the dark closet). The boy says "So..." while the dad launches into a cheerful speech: Death isn't your enemy, he's why we write poetry, love passionately, and live each day with zest; if it weren't for your mother and I unconsciously imagining Death you'd never have been born; all the nice things I do are because of the specter of Death. The Reaper agrees, "Exactly!" The boy asks what Death is actually doing there tonight. The Reaper cheerfully explains he's encouraging the dad to stay up until 4am working so he'll get a raise and his grandchildren won't pity him in old age. The dad says he likes to think he enjoys his work. The Reaper commands "Then get to it!" and the dad replies, "Yes, master." Votey: a sketchy drawing of a tired man with glasses and stubble, eyes closed, thinking "Time to draw more comics." — the cartoonist himself caught in the same death-driven work compulsion.