A traveling comic coming to town this weekend...

[Spookwriter]

... and doing a few shows. Yes, I'll be in the crowd.

A part of me wants to be that man, that comic. But
the sane part of me knows better than getting on a
one-man stage.

It can't be easy.

My wife, my daughter, I keep then tore up with my
antics. (Have I ever mentioned the time I lost my
invisible tuba?) And my daughters friends...at times
I think they come more to see me than her.

And they say that I should put my stuff together and
do a show. I did one inprompt show once. It was at a
friends wedding...the bride needed more time to think
about getting married and I just holding the crowd. It had
a happy ending, and she did get married about an hour
late. But I was sweating.

I've never thought as myself as funny enough. For me, it's
all in the moment. Spontaneous. If I have to practice the
line or do it more than a few times, it loses it's humor.

My wife let me go to Wal Mart with her the other day. We
ran into an old friend. We had some catching up to do.

And... I was off.

We were in that wide isle just behind the registers. And
before it was over, there was a small crowd of people
listening. Buggies parked everywhere.

The manager actually came over and broke it up.

But it was FUN. The most fun I've had in a long time.
Nothing planned, nothing practiced. But the people were
laughing. I mean laughing HARD. One lady stopped me
later and told me she almost peed her pants.

And now I don't even remember what jokes or lines I used.
Some of them, sure. But not all of them.

And that is my greatest fear of being a comic...that I would
get on stage and have nothing to say. I've always told my
wife that deep inside I'm really a very shy person. She doesn't
believe me.

Spook...who has trouble talking to strangers.

 

[gryeyes]

I think I have an inkling of what you may be feeling. Eh. Perhaps. <I><*waggling a hand*></I>

Real life is FUNNY. There are those of us who just see it, even in the mundane moments.

I also admire those who can demonstrate it, deliberately.

 

[Bunnylady]

Y'know, I'm reminded of a couple of lines from Billy Joel's song My Life, ". . . . Closed the shop, sold the house, bought a ticket to the west coast, Now he gives them a stand-up routine in L.A."

Entertaining people is fun. When you connect with an audience, and they really enjoy what you're doing - that's a high that is almost like a drug. Of course, the opposite is also true - when the audience doesn't think the comic's material is funny? Well, there's a reason comics refer to that as "dying." Most entertainers, be they singers, dancers, whatever, don't eat for a good while before they go onstage - their nerves won't let them.

The funny thing about comedy, is that an awful lot of it is about pain. It might seem like a bad day when even the clowns cry, but nobody knows more about crying than a clown. A famous comic once said, "Comedy is pain turned outward." People can identify with the feeling, and laughing at it robs it of its sting.

As an example - I know you aren't big on cats, Spook, but though my cat's a pain, I'm not turning her out; I'm turning her into a joke. I mean, even non-cat people know that cats have claws and they can scratch, but referring to this cat as the "Scimitars of Death" usually elicits a chuckle or at least a smile. She's a weird cat, but she's not really mean; she just wants attention, and she reaches out and paws at me in an attempt to get it (OK, my husband does that too, but at least he doesn't have claws!) Actually, we have a couple of cats that do that. With all the claws coming at me from every which way at unpredictable moments, sometimes I feel like I live in a mad slasher movie.

Sorry to say, the invisible tuba had slipped my mind. So you still haven't found it? I think one of the horses over at the barn saw it last night. Can't say I blame him for spooking - I'll bet he's never seen an invisible tuba before. Though why anybody would bring an invisible tuba to a barn is beyond me . . . .