That Ain't Funny

I came across this quote today: "Humor is emotional chaos remembered in tranquility." - James Thurber

It got me thinking about what is really funny and what is not. The next time you watch a real funny show on TV just put yourself in the position of the guy whose struggling to make ends meet or finish a project and had to deal with all kinds of happenings. Then it doesn't seem so funny. BUT, thank goodness we aren't wired that way. If we were we would go around with droopy faces and tears in our eyes. Wait, some people do that already. Do you reckon that's their problem, they can't think funny?

We got this old woman, Harriet Housetill, who walks around in black dresses like she is in mourning. Yesterday, I was in the library working and she came in and checked out some book that looked like it was filled with misfortune. The cover was gray with about a dozen black birds flying around a house that was caving in. I smiled and told her not to open the book inside the library and let them birds out. I said, "If you do you gonna have to clean up the mess."

"That ain't funny," she said.

I reckon she was right about that one, but I don't think I could have thought of anything that would make that old biddy crack a smile.

Tales of Harper, short stories and poems about the fictional town of Harper, Mississippi is available on Amazon Kindle