I can't help but read the thought bubble, again and again.
Now where could my pipe be?
Now where could my pipe be?
It is a profound question.
Why am I here? What is my purpose? It is reflection and self-examination here. It is facing the dust, the misery of a cold, careless universe. You can feel the weight of it.
But where could my pipe be?
One imagines the author, Jim Davis, nearly teetering on the edge of insanity... his rationality, his lucidity, hovering over the void... and he seeks the truth.
You can see it in the line quality of the drawings; the thoughtful, controlled outlines mixed with the... occasional, chaotic scribbles that lurk in the shadows of Garfield's dark stripes.
It's almost as if Garfield is chaos himself.
Yes. He is the embodiment of chaos, disorder, hatred, fear... Thievery, death, destruction, desolation!
These are the things Garfield represents; HE stole the pipe, HE sits with his back to Jon, Garfield... Garfield! This chaos cat, Garfield has turned his back on everything, everyone!
One recalls the great existential forces in literature... Camus' Meursalt, Kafka's Gregor Samsa, or Sartre's Antoine Roquentin. Garfield the Cat sees the hopelessness of life, which...ah, yes...
This is why Jim Davis has chosen smoking. It represents a recklessness, a... a disregard for what some would define as the beauty of life. Garfield may die from the nicotine, he may not... He defies life; he sits defiant, saying nothing, but looking as if he could say: "Then let me die... it does not matter."

It does not matter.