In all of our lives, there are some inevitable looming tragedies that must be faced: the death of a parent, the end of childhood, and, of course, the end of our Presidential terms. Well, Mr. George W. Bush is facing such a trauma, and there's no question it's going to be rough. After all, of the 42 ex-Presidents of the United States, only four are still alive. That's over a ninety percent mortality rate. That’s worse than 'Nam. And without a doubt, the hardest part of an ex-Presidency is the first hundred days. That period when the country is abuzz over your replacement, yet the office is still so fresh in your mind that you sometimes awake in the middle of the night demanding to speak to the Russian Premiere, or absent-mindedly threaten to have the CIA kill an annoying neighbor before realizing your error and breaking down in a crying jag right there in the jam aisle. But Mr. Carter’s laughable shortcomings aside, Bush’s recent purchase of a new home in Preston Hollow, Texas, signals the beginning of his grappling with the demon Obscurity. And because I hate to see a man kicked while he’s down, I’ve decided to put together this little primer to help him through the transition. Will this save us all the heartache of waking one morning to find a senile G.W. running naked through the streets of Dallas? We can only pray.

Coping With Cancellation: A Presidential Primer

Fish vs. Pond: People are judged on a relative scale. When you were the President, the citizenry of the United States (or at least 29% of them) granted you the use of all of their collective balls (and, for the sake of sexual equality, let’s say ovaries). This left you with huge, swinging ovary testicles that you could fluff and sit on and show off basically anywhere you went. Your balls were so stuffed with ovaries that you had to have guys in black suits and plastic wires in their ears with you at all times. Well, like the aged tend to do, your balls have shrunk. The important thing is to display them in their best light, like how holding a ping-pong ball next to a Monopoly house makes the ping-pong ball look huge by comparison. So let’s look at which neighbors your importance is likely to be measured against.