It's okay to laugh

Jim and I loved to laugh together. the trendy plaque, live love laugh, really did fit our lives. We truly enjoyed laughing together. Our lives were richer for being able to laugh  together, at ourselves, at the world, at anything and sometimes everything, even cancer sometimes. 

Some of my earliest memories are of laughter. I remember hearing my uncles and dad outside laughing during family gatherings. I couldn't wait until I was old enough to hang out with them, to find out what was so funny they'd snort. For as long as she could my mother kept me from their jokes, not appreciating their sense of humor. Eventually, though, I was out in the front yard with 'the bothers', laughing  and snorting with them, I used to be embarrassed when something would make me laugh until I snorted, now it's just part of my charm, and a compliment to whoever made me laugh!

After Jim died I suppose I didn't feel much like laughing, after all I was a grieving widow. How could I laugh about anything? What could possibly be funny?  How can I ever find joy in anything? A few days after he died, my friend +Mary Thompson and I were planning songs for his service. We were scouring the internet, YouTube, iTunes, looking at lyrics, listening to songs that would fit Jim's taste in music and be appropriate for the occasion.  We found ourselves crying and laughing. It was just funny, some of the songs that we never thought of as being about death but they really did fit. It felt good to laugh, even if it was dark humor. 

It was hard to find joy in anything despite the occasional laughter when what would be called gallows humor did come in to play. But for the most part I really did think that joy was no longer part of my life. 

As months have passed, I have been able to find laughter again, occasional creeping in. Just a few weekends ago I was with my girlfriends and we got to the point where were laughing to the point of tears. it felt so good. We were wearing tiaras, sitting in a restaurant and just rolling with laughter and the pure joy of life. People around us were't even annoyed, they were caught up in our spirit.

I think people are afraid to have fun in front of someone who is grieving, but at the right time humor can really be the best medicine.

Heather Spohr writes for the Huffington Post about how she dealt with 'crappy things' with gallows humor in the face of her friend Jackie's terminal illness. "It was the kind of stuff most people would drop their jaws over, but it really helped us cope with everything life had thrown at us. One of the things we'd joke about is how there weren't any greeting cards for what we were going through. No one makes cards for cancer! So instead, we'd scratch out the slogans on store-bought cards and write in our own (inappropriate) words. It might have been strange, but I cherish those silly cards now that she's gone." 

(C)@emilymcdowell_ 

After her friend's death, Ms. Spohr discovered , Emily McDowell (whose work appears to the right), an artist, who among other things, creates empathy cards. Spohr writes, "They are mostly for cancer, but a few are non-specific. They are realistic, humorous, and so, so perfect. I laughed and cried when I read them, because Jackie would have loved all of them. I hate that I can't send her any of them. I miss her and her contagious laugh so much." Jim would have loved them, too!

I miss laughing with Jim. And I miss his laughter. I would love to hear his deep, rumbling laugh one more time. But he would not want me to stop laughing, finding joy and humor in the ordinary and ridiculous. I honor his love of life when I enjoy mine.

I am grateful at the occasional glimpses of joy, the moments I laugh until I cry, the times I snort.  They are as much a part of this journey as the tears and sadness.