Editor’s note: The following is a reprint of Will Fargo’s Bogus Advice. Will is pulling a Rip Van Winkle somewhere in the Butterfly Sanctuary in Pacific Grove and can’t be disturbed. Please, don’t go looking for him. You’ll disturb his beard.

Dear Will,
I don’t get what the big deal with Groundhog Day is. What’s so great about a groundhog, anyway? Why don’t they have Giraffe Day? A giraffe is way better than a groundhog.

Signed,
Wet Blanket… in PG

Dear Wet Blanket… in PG,
Oh yeah, you’re missing something, PG. In fact, you’re missing everything! Groundhog Day is huge! It’s totally hip!

Did you say Hallmark, PG? What, are you some kind of Wonder Bread victim or something? You can’t look to the mainstream for this one. It’s still way too cool.

You have to look to the symbolism, PG. Groundhog Day is all about the Shadow. And about not being a hamster anymore.

You see, a groundhog is nothing but a grown-up hamster, who used to live in a cage and spin his little wheel like some psycho maniac all day while blasting out the William Tell Overture over and over again without a clue.

But then one day something sparked him and he decided to make a break for it. And so he started digging. And he kept digging and digging even though he didn’t really know why he was digging.

It was just this spark of an impulse that was telling him, in a distant inner voice, that this was going to be the most important jailbreak of his life!
And so he dug some more and he dug some more and eventually all that digging made him bigger and stronger and more powerful and after awhile he started looking more like a beaver than a hamster.

Although beavers don’t dig, they swim, and I know that, PG. But swimming is really just another form of digging, but it’s in the water not the ground.

Anyway, eventually he found his way to the surface outside his cage and that’s where it starts to get heavy. Because that’s when he confronts his own shadow and all hell breaks loose!! It scares the crap out of him and then he hears some other inner voice (fear, PG) say, “dive, dive, dive!!”
And so he frantically bolts back into the ground! And he swims and digs down, down, down into the deep, dark depths of the underground in a breathless panic!

And then he stops, PG. And he thinks. And he thinks and thinks. And he’s shaking, PG. Oh yeah, he’s shaking like a little lone dried-up leaf on an old dead tree who just saw Ichabod Crane fly by on his giraffe holding his own head on a silver platter!!

And you know why he was shaking, PG? I’ll tell you why. Because what he saw in that one short glimpse of his own groundhog shadow was enough to scare his poor little land beaver soul nearly to death!!

But it’s all good, PG, because now he’s forced to do what he never had the guts to do before: face his own shadow.

It’s not gonna be easy though, PG. No, it’s gonna take a lot more shaking and a lot more deep digging and thinking (at least six weeks’ worth, PG) before he’ll be able to come to grips with the fact that it was his own shadow that scared him so much, and no one else’s.

But after that, PG, he’s gonna change. Oh yeah, he’s gonna change for the better and let go of all his old silly hamsterish ways of the constant William Tell lopsided hero crap he’d been trumpeting all day every day while zippin’ and zappin’ on his little silver wheel trying to impress all the other hamsters.

And then he’ll finally realize who he really was all the time. Robin Hood!!

That’s right. You see Robin Hood is the perfect blend of the shadow and the hero, PG. Think about it. Is he good, or is he bad? You tell me. Is he Peter Pan or Captain Hook? Little Red Riding Hood or the Big Bad Wolf?

He’s neither, PG. And neither is a groundhog after six weeks in the hole (Hades, PG). He’s both. And he’s way better than any stupid giraffe.

So the moral of the story goes like this: If you refuse to see your own shadow for what it is, and you think springtime with Bambi is just around the corner, then you’re in denial. And you’ll never become a complete groundhog. You’ll always be a hamster who thinks he’s a beaver.

So that’s what the big deal is with Groundhog Day, PG. What, did you think I didn’t know the inside scoop?

Thanks for writing, PG. Now please… be a stranger.

Will…I WILL GO FAR!!!…Fargo