So I Was Wrong, But I Learn

I went to my parents' house tonight for dinner and got into a fight with my mom. So intense was this fight that I did not eat my dinner. So Jewish is my mother that, while in the middle of the fight, she still took my serving and placed it in a container for me to take home and have later. So stupid and pointless was the fight that, for all the screaming and yelling, I cannot now tell you exactly what started it or what it was about. I do know the only accurate way to phrase the evening's events is to say “I got into a fight with my mother” and not “my mother and I fought.” It did start with me. Of that, I am positive.

Yes, F-bombs were dropped on both sides, but mostly by me. I tend to use profanity quite a bit when mad. It is not that “profanity is the sign of a weak mind” in my opinion, but rather there are certain feelings that only those words can convey. I generally do not curse very often in real life any more, so when those words flow freely, it means I am quite upset and emotional.

One thing my mom said to me has stuck with me. She said I had no sense of humor. Could she be right? I am a rather funny person for the most part, so I always assumed I did have a sense of humor and, more than that, a good one. I can usually make people laugh at will and I have been told I tell great stories. That would seem like I had a sense of humor.

“You are funny when it is you telling the joke. You cannot see the humor when it is directed towards you.”

It got me thinking: why am I funny? I am not asking this to “toot my own horn” or to brag. I don't find myself all that funny to be honest, but that could be due to my already know the endings to most of my stories. I say I am funny based on reactions I have always got from other people. Some even asking me where I perform usually, but why am I funny? Why do I have this need to make people laugh if it is true and I have no sense of humor?

It was on my drive home from my parents' house, after the “I'm sorry” and the hugs, that I remembered something I told someone in fifth grade I think it was. I said something to the effect of “they are going to laugh at me anyway, so at least I can control what it is they laugh at.” So I was funny. My quick wit came about as a self defense mechanism. I learned the quickest way to stop kids from making fun of you is to make fun of yourself better than they could. Think of the bar scene from “Roxanne” with Steve Martin (a big influence).

Here is the scene.


So anyway, my point is that my mom is right. The only thing worse than a person with no sense of humor is a person without one who doesn't know it. Now I know it. I could have worse self defenses, like hitting or something, but being funny does not mean you have a sense of humor. I really need to work on it. I know I used to have one.

Basically, I am sorry mom.