Let me introduce you to Ricky… Ricky Rat.
Ricky and I go way back. All the way back to when I realized that I was someone special. Not someone that rides the special bus, just someone special.
When I was having my crisis of consciences with the debate about my identity, my alter ego decided that I needed a well-meaning friend that is also special. I took many, many sleepless nights of self-meditation. Then, I stumbled on a copy of The Secret. You know, that book Oprah was always pushing about putting something out in the universe and it can come back to you. I knew there was something about this discovery. It was even signed: “You get one and you get one and you get one… The Big O.”
With that, I created my own little one-member séances with candles and incense. Reading each page out loud, then ripping the page from the book and consuming it in the fire from the candle. Once I figured out I should remove the battery from the smoke detector in the hallway, things really started to move faster.
That’s when Ricky arrived. Not through the door, not through the window, not even through the cracks in the baseboard. No—he materialized like a bad smell in a taxicab: suddenly, completely, and with no return policy.
At first, I thought I was hallucinating from all the paraffin fumes and scorched paperback glue. But Ricky was real enough. He had that unmistakable musk of cheap carnival rat-suit fur and an attitude that made me wonder if he’d been moonlighting for the DMV. He looked at me, showed his teeth, and said, “You finally called. So what’s the plan, Chicken?”
From that moment on, Ricky Rat wasn’t just my companion. He was my living reminder that even the worst ideas—especially the worst ideas—have a way of sticking around once you invite them in.
We spent long nights tackling the universe’s greatest riddles: why every fast-food ice cream machine is always broken, why politicians keep blaming the weather, and why every “limited edition” cereal tastes like damp cardboard. Ricky never had answers, but he had the nerve to bite someone until they made one up.
Finally, after weeks of spiritual bonding and questionable snack choices, Ricky leaned in close, gnawing at my sleeve like it was a leftover corn dog. He whispered:
“The secret isn’t what you put into the universe, Chicken… it’s what you can sneak out while nobody’s looking.”
That’s when I realized Ricky wasn’t my spirit guide at all.
He was my accomplice.