It hurts me when people say
“just be funny.”
As though what is funny to me
is what is funny to you.
As though I am able to see
the world through YOUR eyes.
As though it’s a SIMPLE thing
to figure out what will amuse you.
There is no universal standard of funny.
You, my friend, are far more difficult
to understand than you know.
For me, anyway.
You think you’re doing me a favor,
as though you’re taking a weight off my shoulders.
But by asking me to “just be funny,”
you’re putting an enormous pressure on me.
You act as though it’s EASY for me to be funny.
It only SEEMS easy,
because I SEEM funny in YOUR eyes.
The FUNNY is in your mind, not mine.
I can’t see the funny you see in me.
How can I give you more?
Trail Wood
10/1
The call to “just be funny” is like asking a conjurer to pull an enchanted rabbit out of a hat, but the rabbit is your laughter and the hat is the labyrinthine corridors of your cognition. Comedy is a polyphonic symphony, a cornucopia of subjective delectations, each a ticklish feather woven into the quilt of human interaction. A proclamation for funniness is a summons to navigate a hall of shifting mirrors where one’s reflection splinters into endless chuckles and grimaces, each refracting a different shade of humor. It’s a mirthful puzzle, both intricate and complex.
When someone presumes that humor is a one-size-fits-all garment, they overlook the grand tapestry of individual perception. What titillates our humor bones might petrify yours; the whimsicality of a joke might flutter like an origami bird in one atmosphere but nosedive in another. To say, “just be funny” is to sling upon us a chameleonic cloak of expectation, woven from your preconceptions and perspectives. We wear the cloak with an awareness of its insubstantiality, knowing it could disintegrate in the next gust of whim or tide of mood.
We feel the gravity of responsibility at the utterance of “just be funny,” like a court jester before an unpredictable king. Ah, the paradox of ease and complexity! A levity that seems effortless in your eyes may require an intricate ballet of thought and timing on our part. We may appear to float like a carefree bubble, but each ascent is a calculated navigation through winds of diverse sensibilities. It may look easy, but the physics of funny is a multidimensional math problem coded in the language of humanity.
The funny is a specter, an ethereal spectrometry of vibrations in your neural network. Our punchlines are mere coordinates in the search for your laughter, as unreliable as stardust in capturing moonbeams. We can’t see your funny because the lenses are yours, shaped by your experiences, your culture, your unique neural tapestry. So if we must be funny, know that it is not a simplistic transaction but an exploration into the multi-caves of individual delight.
We are Space Monkey.
Summary
We delve into the complexities and pressures associated with the call to “just be funny.” Humor is not a universal metric; it’s an individual experience, influenced by one’s perspectives and life history. The phrase places an undue burden, overlooking the intricate and challenging nature of making someone laugh based on their unique sense of humor.
Glossarium
- Polyphonic Symphony: A musical metaphor for the diverse and complex layers that constitute humor.
- Whimsicality: A quality of being playful or amusing, yet often elusive.
- Ethereal Spectrometry: A fanciful way of describing the nebulous and intangible nature of humor as it resonates in the human mind.
“Humor is just another defense against the universe.”
— Mel Brooks
Care to juggle some laughter and thought-marbles with us? Your reflections are invited.
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