Learning to laugh in 2020

^{Cat photos and silly memes have kept me from officially losing it this year. I feel this poor guy.}

I may have picked the wrong year to start a humor blog.

To be clear, I’ve never intended to call myself a comic, but I certainly thought my writing would never take itself too seriously. Like a turtle, I retreat into a shell of funny when life doesn’t make sense. It’s a defense mechanism for sure, but it’s also the only thing that feels natural when nothing else does.

I’m pretty sure that the year 2020 falls directly into the doesn’t make sense category.

And so here I find myself, flailing around, trying to figure out where my cat memes and words of the absurd find their place in a world that grows more serious by the day. I’ve read back over the last several weeks of this blog and realized I was finding less and less to laugh about. Sometimes, it didn’t even sound like ME.

Mostly, I was just processing. I was processing all the chaos, fear, hatred, love, damnation, forgiveness, isolation, frustration, grief and hope – just like everyone else. The events that have unfolded over the last several months have been slowly chipping away at my chipper exterior.

So that’s why I’ve been uncharacteristically quiet for a few weeks. I haven’t felt like laughing much at all. I’ve felt even less like writing. Instead, I’ve spent these days praying, listening, and hopefully, learning.

Learning to accept why you wear a mask, or why you don’t.

Learning to see racism in uncomfortable, familiar places.

Learning to challenge myself to challenge the status quo.

Learning to see people instead of politics and hashtags.

Learning to smile when sadness creeps in.

I’m still humbly seeking to learn all these things and more every day, but saying them out loud is a great place to start.

That’s the beautiful thing about writing. Even though the rules of writing give us structure, it’s breaking the rules that gives us all the feelings. When we can unleash a passion from within that brings someone to action, to tears, or even to fits of laughter, that’s powerful stuff. When we purpose to use it wisely, that’s the good stuff.

Thank YOU friends for listening, learning AND laughing with me.