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“Love is a grave mental disease.”- Plato; So there’s this guy who spends his days in an open grave, waiting to die. I know. I know. It’s a metaphor for a life in useless middle management in the fast food service industry, you’re thinking. No. Basanta Roy lost his wife back in the 1990s. About six years ago, he dug a grave next to hers and sort of crawled in.

Talk about co-dependency issues.

Things like this only happen in Texas or India. In this case, the Lone Star State’s beleaguered PR Department can breathe a sigh of relief. Roy lives in a village in the eastern state of Jharkhand, India.

Well. Actually, he lives in a grave outside the village. Roy spends his days napping and pulling weeds in his subterranean townhouse. Poor guy’s depressed and has been waiting to die for more than a decade.

Did I mention Roy’s 103?

So many questions. So few answers.

It rains a lot in India. Does Roy sleep in his little rectangular abode during the monsoon season? Maybe he does and Fate being the cruel mistress it is, the grave fills up with water and he floats to the surface, muttering and sputtering.

Is it a regular grave or has he made some improvements? Little wall unit of CD shelves? A breakfast nook? Carpeting? Are there HOAs in Jharkhand to check and see if the centenarian has the right kind of shrubbery or too many pets?

I’d be scared of tigers.

Of course, if you’re depressed and lying with your hands behind you head all day in a grave, maybe tigers are the least of your worries. Can you have a hobby while you’re waiting to die? Does he play in a pinochle foursome on Wednesdays or go to the store? Does he golf, and, if so, where does he store his clubs?

I read that people have been hiking for miles just to see poor Roy.

That can be depressing in itself because as a regular shut-in, you have something into which to shut yourself. You can draw the blinds, bolt the doors and hide under the covers. Roy’s lying there and here comes all these curious faces, peeking over the edge of his property line, and, probably worse, standing on his wife’s remains next patch

of dicondra over.

Sure gives a whole new meaning to a senior citizen yelling: “Hey you kids! Get off my lawn!”

John Boston has earned 119 major awards for writing stuff. Besides The Mighty West Ranch Beacon, his work appears in the prestigious thebostonreport.net just about every darn day. His commentaries represent his own opinions and not necessarily the views of any organization he may be affiliated with or those of the West Ranch Beacon. Read Boston’s daily blog, his Daily English Muffins, the Adventures of Job Hunter and more of John Boston’s award-winning commentary on thebostonreport.net