L is for...

L is for...laughing, language

I've been wanting to do a post on language for a long time. I've even started one. I'm really interested in how language evolves especially when I read British or Australian blogs and wonder what the hell they're talking about. I recognize the words, they are English, but the meaning totally escapes me. Well, maybe not totally.

Anyway this is not about that.

L is for laughing.

We like to laugh around here. It makes life so much easier. I can say that cause I have personal experience to the contrary. There were a lot of years around here when no one ever laughed. Somewhere along the way, with help, we made a paradigm shift. Not that we don't still have the occasional moment, but that's all it is, an occasional moment.

Anyway.

Laughing is good for you. It makes you feel better, boosts your immune system and helps you rid yourself of stress. People who laugh easily are less likely to have a heart attack. Plus it gives your internals and muscles a good workout and it's way more fun than getting on the exercise bike.

We all like to be around people who make us laugh, the person with the quick and easy quip. Marc's like that. You can generally kiss any conversation goodbye when he comes around because it will turn into a joke fest. One day, after a three day art show, the gallery manager came up to me to tell me how funny Marc is.

“It must be so much fun living with him”, she said to me.

Oh, yeah. It's a laugh riot.

But I get mine in too. And it's important to be able to laugh at yourself.

Laughing is something we all do in the same language. A smile is a bridge across cultures, something we all understand without words.

But laughter has a way of popping out inappropriately as well. When we see something terrible, we are just as likely to bust out with a laugh than with a cry. At least I am.

One summer, my brother and I wanted to go water skiing but the bay was too choppy so our father crossed the bay to one of the coastal bayous. My brother was skiing and he crossed the wake just as our father started a u-turn. He was going pretty fast and the turn had the effect of slingshotting my brother around and slammed him into the bank. His momentum when he hit the bank flipped him up in a cartwheel, arms and legs akimbo, and flung him further inland.

I laughed.

It was funny. I couldn't help it.

My father was not amused. He yelled at me for laughing and was convinced he had killed his only son. As it turned out, my brother wasn't hurt except for a bruise or two, but the memory of seeing him spinning in the air still makes me laugh to this day.

Laughter is contagious.

I had a yoga instructor once who would have us laugh for one minute. Laying flat on our backs on our mats, she would say, 'start laughing'.

'Start laughing?'

Seriously?

Ok. Ha ha. Hee hee. And before we knew it the whole class was laughing genuinely at the absurdity of it all.

The thing is, we don't really need to know what is so funny when we are around someone who is laughing. Eventually, it will infect us too.

Live well, laugh loud and often.