I wasn’t raised in a family that laughed a lot. Except maybe at the expense of one another. Hello. ?♀️ (Code: Enneagram 8.) But as I’ve loosened and blossomed more and more into my essence through years, plus, with years of deliberate hard work on the sometimes dominate serious-natured twin of my Gemini self, I’ve learned the joy of extended laughter and a shaking belly. (Lot more to shake right now. Oy. Thank you COVID calories.)
Laughter, it’s said, is one of best medicines. Autism taught me that sometimes you just have to laugh. (The alternative is crying.)* And I think it’s that way with COVID19. OMG there’s a lot to laugh about. (The alternative is crying.)
I’ve noticed a trend to my quarantine days: unexpected sporadic episodes of belly laughter….At a funny meme on the Facebook, those whisked into my inboxes, or phone calls and Facetimes with work partners and friends.
Laughter *is* medicine. I just had a healthy dose when I went to upload some poetry to my Facebook stories and found a trilogy from a new Facebook friend. (Sigh. I do wish people would tell me who they are and why they wish to friend me. I don’t know this person, but I could tell he wasn’t a faker, I checked out our mutual friends list and hit “confirmed.” **) Good choice, because he provided a meme triology that has now washed endorphins through my nervous system. Ahhh.
A lot of these privately shared memes are on the mean-spirited side*** and political-based. I get more of them than I want and it feels especially weird if they are from people I’ve never met in person. They are sent to me, I assume, because I make my political views pretty loud and clear on Facebook. I’m told in “backroom” messages that not every feels so “brave” or “free.” In truth, I edit what I post because I’m not one to unfriend family and friends because our views vary. That’s not my definition of friendship. But courtesy and consideration certainly is an important ingredient to friendship. (Some posts are always going to offend some people. Sigh. I also think there’s appropriate ways to assert dissent. Sometimes the best strategy is to keep the peace—including inner—and scroll on by.)
So, I share here one meme from that trilogy. There are no f-bombs, no lightning-charged public figures pictured in this one meme extracted from the trifecta. Thanks, new stranger-friend for the laughter. My heart-feels also got a dose of happy.
Addendum: We’ve been having a lot of frequent kitchen dance parties in our abode during lockdown. Had two solo versions already this morning. I’ve been assembling a Spotify playlist. Here’s sharing it with you for happy vibes and kitchen dance parties. It’s called: Happy Day: Pandemic Partee. You’re welcome.
And for a shortcut to Happy, here ya go. Happy by Pharrell Williams.
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*Ain’t nothing wrong with a good cry and sometimes that’s needed, too. Did you know the chemical composition of tears is different from grief than laughter? #ScientificFactoid
**On Facebook friending: Yeah, yeah. Everyone has different views on this. As a writer, arts promoter and disAbility activist, I keep my communications open. There’s definitely cons. Yep. I’ve heard them. I know and have experienced them….
***Some practitioners of Marshall Rosenberg‘s Nonviolent Communication (aka Compassionate Communication) have deliberate “jackaling.” It’s an acknowledgement that we have to have those moments with friends where we let our hair down and bear our fangs and get it out. That way we can go back to compassionate communication with others. NVC acknowledges that we humans all have the same needs and wants but different strategies for achieving them. If we can look beyond the strategies of others that we dislike and understand their motivation really is (although we may *judge* it as warped or mean, etc.,) it’s the same as ours. A good example is safety. Now think on that. Think of it in what I think is the fascinating context of COVID19 and how differently people interpret safety. Or how most of us want community but define how to do that differently during this time—some in ways that others find violational or extreme opposite of our own choices. Same need. Different strategies.
