LAUGHTER
I have started a weird habit.
Every night after I finish my work, I have been doing the strangest thing. With the last bit of energy I have left from the day, I find my phone and open Pandora. I turn on the “Comedy Radio” and I listen and laugh on my way up the stairs to my room. I laugh and laugh myself to sleep. I charge my phone at night but the outlet is at the foot of my bed, so I sleep with my head at the bottom of the bed near my phone where my feet usually would go, just so I can hear the comedians better. Pandora has a sleep timer, so it turns off after 30 minutes. I usually don’t stay awake until the end.
I laugh at the strangest things when I’m tired. I laugh at John Pinette singing a parody of “Over the Rainbow,” but in this case it is “Over the Buffet” at the Wizard of Oz buffet in Las Vegas; I laugh at Brian Regan’s hyperboles and weird impersonations, especially when he mocks the customer who has a hair in her salad when he replies, “Well, there are no prizes or anything;” I laugh at Ellen DeGeneres when she calls God, God sneezes, and Ellen says, “God bless you...oh, well bless yourself!”; I laugh at Chonda Pierce when she says that men love NASCAR where they drive in circles, which is proof that they give bad directions; I laugh at Steven Wright and his infamous one-liners like “Some people are afraid of heights, but I’m afraid of widths.”
These comedy routines bring my days to a close in a lighter and happier way, instead of ending them with my face in a textbook. Listening to comedy has also made me look at the world differently. Everything can be picked apart, criticized, and made ironic. With humor, you can make light of any situation. Reality can be twisted and re-stated to be more positive, and comedians are paid to do that. I have started writing a few jokes, and it is harder than it seems. The key is taking an everyday thing that everyone knows, and juxtaposing it. Jim Gaffigan does this with ease: “I didn’t work out today. So, that makes it three...decades.” Wouldn’t every day be more enjoyable if it was full of laughter?
As Jerry Seinfeld says, “Comedians are just surviving. So asking me what my favorite “Seinfeld” episode is, is like asking me to choose my favorite breath of air...whichever takes me to the next one.”Â
