The Gift of Laughter

The most wasted of all days is the one without laughter.  

- e.e. cummings -

This was my Grandmother's favorite quote, and one she lived by each and every day.  She always had fun with whatever she was doing, and shared her laughter and love of life with all of us in her family.  She taught us all that a little laughter in every day was what made life bearable in the worst of times, and joyful in the best of times.  She always had some sort of funny thing to tell you about when you'd see her.  Through the years, it was some of those funny times that are some of my fondest memories.

Grandmother and I had a running joke that lasted more years than I can remember.  One of us would start it off by asking the other, "Have you told anybody yet?"  The other person would respond with, "Good heavens, no. Have you?"  (This whole conversation was carried on in the most serious of voices, no laughing... that was the rule.)  Then we'd begin the usual exchange of things like, "I saw someone the other day that wanted to know, but I wouldn't tell them."  Or, "I started to tell somebody yesterday, then thought better of it. Some things are best not known, ya know?" This would go on for up to 10 minutes or so sometimes.  Everyone around us would be looking at us like we knew some big secret, but it was never anything at all.  There was no secret.  Just us pretending that there was, and everyone around us wanting in on it.  If someone asked us what we were talking about (and they often did), we'd look at each other with a twinkle in our eyes, and decide between us that we just couldn't tell, not right now anyway.... maybe tomorrow... or next week.  It was always so much fun, and we'd collapse in a pile of giggles before it was over.  It wasn’t until after she passed that I finally told Mom that there really wasn’t anything that we weren’t telling.... there was no big secret.  It was just us two, having fun with an inside joke.

Then there were the “laughing fits” that she and I would get into once in awhile.  It could be just about anything that set us off initially, and then it would become a case of laughing at how hard we were laughing, and wiping tears, and snorting, and then laughing again because it was all so funny.  There would be a pause as we tried to gather our senses, then we’d glance at each other and collapse in laughter again.  Usually by the end of it, we were both breathless, with eyes full of laughing-tears, and had forgotten just what it was that set us off in the first place. 

She loved to play practical jokes on people too.  She had this story she'd tell about a little bunny.  I can't remember the way the story went, but she'd have this cotton ball hidden in the palm of her hand with a little bit of water in it.  By the end of the story, that hand of hers was in your hand, demonstrating something about the story, and she'd squeeze the cotton ball to make you think the rabbit (or was it a frog... hmm?) had "wet" your hand. 

Her practical jokes became something of a family tradition that as time went on, and as cousins began to grow up, she'd receive some of the funniest gifts at the family's Christmas gathering.  One year, some of the cousins made her a "coat of arms".  No, it wasn't the family crest, it was literally a coat, with a whole buncha arms sewn onto it (3 or 4 on each side).  She got the biggest laugh out of all the joke-presents that were given to her over the years, but her favorite jokes were the ones she'd play on other people. 

Oh, her practical jokes were harmless (mostly), and everyone would end up laughing when the joke was revealed.  She had a friend with whom she used to swap aprons every year, each making the other an apron each year.  One year, she must have forgotten to put a pocket on the apron she made and was jokingly reprimanded about such an oversight because the next year she made an apron that had so many pockets on it, it was hilarious... and each one was labeled with fabric paint letters.  There was a pocket for a spool of thread, one for a Kleenex, one for a toothpick, one for a thimble, one for lost buttons... There must have been over a dozen pockets on that apron.  When her friend passed away, the family gave the apron back to Grandmother as a keepsake.  Mom now owns that apron.  It’s become one of many symbols we have of Grandmother’s love of laughter.

The Apron Grandmother Made With All The Pockets

 Laughter was Grandmother's greatest gift to our family.  She taught it to her kids, who taught it to their kids, and now we teach it to our kids, who are teaching it to theirs.  It's an inheritance that is self-perpetuating.  When all us cousins were growing up together, every family gathering would become a contest to see who could “out funny” the other one.  Kids will make a contest of anything... and for us, it was who could be the funniest. 

Laughter was what got us through the difficult days that always comes with a life fully lived.  It's what makes our family gatherings always something to look forward to.  I'd go so far as to say it's the glue that has held our family together through the years, and made "home" a place worth coming back to. 

Grandmother - in her clown outfit,
dressed for Fall Festival/Halloween

The last time I got to see Grandmother before she passed, we were sitting and talking (probably laughing about something.... ("Nope, I haven't told anybody yet, have you?"), and I asked her what she would have been, had life been such that she could have picked a career of some sort instead of being a housewife on a farm all her life.  (I wasn’t inferring that life on a farm wasn’t a viable career, but when she was growing up, she didn’t have a choice... and I had wondered what she would have chosen if life had been more like it was when I grew up.)  She thought a second, then beamed a smile, and, with that mischievous twinkle in her eye, said, "A circus clown!!".  Her answer caught me by surprise, but it didn't take but a few moments before I beamed a smile, laughed, and said, "Yea, I can see that!".  She was a clown to us Grandkids, and one we loved dearly.

When I look back over my life, both as a kid and as an adult, and try to find a common thread weaving through all of it, holding things together in the tough times, enhancing the good times even all the more, I see laughter... not the type of laughter that is mean and self-seeking, but the kind of laughter that is all-encompassing... the kind of laughter that lifts people up, not puts them down.  Grandmother was a “glass half full” sort of person... and I’ve spent a lifetime trying to follow in her footsteps.  It’s as simple as deciding to look at Life differently.  Sure, there were (and will be) days when the only thing I can think of to be happy about is the very fact that I was able to wake up and get out of bed all on my own again that day.  There are days when even that doesn’t seem like such a blessing.  But it is... it always is.  It’s through the storms in Life that we learn our biggest lessons... it’s unfortunate that it has to be that way, but we humans are a hard-headed lot, so it takes knocking us down to get our attention sometimes.  When you can get to the point that you look at the storm and ask, “What is the lesson in this one?”, you have won, my friends... that’s the entire point of it all.