Back in the 60’s it was fun to load up the car (and sometimes the trunk) with friends on a hot summer night and go to the drive-in. Situated right off the Santa Ana Freeway, the La Mirada Drive-In was barely a mile away from Glenn High School, was easy to access via a little traveled frontage road that ran beside the freeway, and admission was only $1.75 for an entire car-load. They showed many great movies there, but I mainly went for the jokes.
Phillip told the best jokes. He knew them all, and at intermission he would sit back in the driver’s seat of his 55 Chevy, and rattle them off, one after another. I can’t remember all of his jokes, and I was never good at retelling them either, but I listened attentively and was probably his biggest fan, I’m sure. He knew all the latest escapades of Little Johnny and little Susie, and the travelling salesman, but my favorites were the more imaginative jokes where some guy wanted to become a monk, or a priest. I don’t know if Phillip actually wrote any of his material, or what his sources were, but his ability to learn them all and perform them without repetition was nothing short of uncanny.
He would always direct each joke to my older brother, saying “Eddie, did you hear the one about…” but Eddie’s answer was always “No,” because his jokes were always somehow new, even if they were an old classic. Phillip had a way of re-telling and re-working even stale old jokes, to make them fresh and vibrant again.
So Eddie, did you hear the one about the guy who wanted to become a monk? No? Ok, so this guy goes out to a monastery and knocks on the big wooden door. “What do you want?” a voice asks, through the crack in the door. “I want to become a monk,” he says. “You’ll have to talk to the head monk…” the man replies. “Come in.”
“It’s not easy to become a monk,” the head monk says, leading him into the office. “You’ll have to meditate a long time, and take a vow of silence and that means you won’t be able to speak to anyone for 30 years.” “That’s Ok by me,” the man replies.
“All righty then,” the head monk says. “Just follow Brother John there, and he’ll get you squared away.”
So ten years goes by, and the head monk calls the man into his office for his first review. “Well, Brother,” he says, “How do you like being a monk?”
“My food is cold,” the man replies, and walks out.
After ten more years, he calls the man into his office again, and asks him, “Well, it’s been twenty years, now how do you like being a monk?”
“My room is cold,” is all the man says, and walks out.
Finally, after ten more years the head monk calls the man into his office one last time, and asks him, “Well, it’s been thirty years. Do you still want to be a monk?”
“I quit,” the man said.
“Well, I’m not surprised to hear that,” the head monk replied, shaking his head. “Since you’ve been here, all you’ve done is complain.”
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