Why is it Important to be Amused?

Timing is the duct tape of comedy        
Laughter is the duct tape of friendship                            
love is the duct tape of family.       Susan R. Grout [1995]

Carpe them diems each day as a sage said

As I've previously mentioned, I feel that it's imperative to find something amusing every day. This is generally the first homework assignment I gave to my clients: be aware and amused. When I'm amused with life, it becomes more delightful with the emphasis on the "lightful". 

This delight can happen in unexpected ways, like the day I was working with a particularly difficult and depressed man. As occasionally happens, I started to join him in the downward, hopeless spiral, my mood affected by him. All of a sudden I noticed something was irritating me and I didn't know what. I happened to glance down at my leg. There, before my eyes, was a bulge under my black tights near my calf. I realized- to my horror-  a pair of underpants was lodged there. Unfortunately, I didn't notice as I dressed in the dark that morning. I could hardly contain myself and considered going to the bathroom to take them out. I certainly wasn't going to point out the bulge to my client figuring he just wouldn't understand. So I crossed my legs, hiding my carelessness. Happily the session was almost over. Also thank goodness the next client was a young woman. When I told her the story, the darkness, the underpants in the tights, she started laughing and then I joined her until tears rolled down our faces. I haven't forgotten how joyful our session was and that incident still amuses me.

The exception to the rule: someone who is both inherently and intentionally funny.

Something I've realized: there are intentionally funny people and inherently funny people.

Dad always made my Mom laugh, a laudable trait in a man

I come from a long line of funny people, some intentionally funny like my Dad who had a built in audience at home and his restaurant. He delighted in making his customers [and us] laugh. All my life I believed that his humor was unstudied and effortless. It was only after he died that we found, secreted in his desk, the little slips of paper encased in a rubber band, with hundred of jokes on them. Made us all cry but then laugh heartily at his closely guarded secret. Granted he was a naturally funny person and his timing was impeccable, but it was by no means effortless.

My Grandma Florence was one of those unintentionally funny people. One time she decided to transfer all her money from one bank to the one nearer her new home at my parents. I remember that day, she came into the house from the bus with a grocery bag filled with $88,000-- all the money she had in the world. In a paper bag! On the bus! When we pointed out to her that perhaps this wasn't the safest idea she ever had, she just held her nose and laughed and laughed. The thought!

Of course the most amusing of all in my book are little children. A favorite story concerns my son Zach and his cousin Naomi. They were about six years old playing out on the back porch with 'action figures'. Zach, in a rough voice holding his action figure says, "I'll kick your ass!" Naomi answers, "die for your sins." Ah, yes, different cultures. We who overheard this fell against the wall, out of sight, holding our sides.

My mother, bless her soul, was also an unintentionally funny person. I had been writing and submitting poetry for quite awhile and finally I decided to put together a little album of my poems and gave them to her for her 80th birthday. She thanked me profusely and never said another thing about them. Then at 89 years, we were playing Scrabble and talking about books as usual and she said, "poetry, I don't get it." Really struck me funny. So many people think these things but as my sister Trisha says, "if she thinks it she says it, no filter..."

More on funny stuff in another post, right now to amuse myself I'm going for a bike ride, the sun is shining and as my wise sister Sally says, "carpe them diems."

 You can have fun virtually anywhere.

susansmagicfeather 2014 copyright Susan R. Grout all rights reserved                       .