An Essay A Day For A Year
By Roe
Day 13, January 13, 2012
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Good morning to you! Good morning to you! You look like a monkey! And you smell like one too! Hee, Hee, Hee! I wish I could see your face! Could you take a picture of your monkey face and email it to me? That would be fun! I suppose if you were 5 and I did it singing you would giggle and laugh and we could maybe run around pretending to scratch our armpits making monkey noises. And then I would ask you, “so, what do monkeys smell like anyway?”
I did that to someone I know recently and they did not run around with me making monkey noises and scratching their armpits. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” was the answer I got, and they went back into their room. It caused me to wonder about why little kids and monkeys are fun and funny, and big monkeys and people are less fun and funny. Maybe it was my timing? So I tried the same song, but this time in the middle of the day, or in the middle of a movie at home. Well… same thing. The little monkeys about age 6 and under just sing right along and jump up to scratch arms with me, but the big monkeys repeat frequently with increasing intensity, “what the fuck is wrong with you?”
So here it is, and years ahead of the latest survey or scientific study: Big monkeys don’t laugh like little monkeys.
I saw a huge banner in a restaurant in South Africa recently that said: “work is love made visible”. I thought that maybe the owner just got back from a Buddhist retreat and wanted to inspire everyone. I carefully watched all the employees with matching uniforms serving everyone and their banner unanimously said: I can’t wait to get my minimum wage pay for serving rich people to make the Buddhist owner even richer and go home to my kids. I wished I would have had the courage to start singing my song right then and there: “good morning to you….” just to cheer up the workers supposedly making their love visible. So that gave me an idea!
I imagined a restaurant where all the poor people in South Africa come to eat free, and read my sign: “Laughing is Love made visible”. And I imagine calling my restaurant: “YOU LOOK LIKE A MONKEY AND YOU SMELL LIKE ONE TOO!” And me the owner and all the very highly paid workers run around making monkey sounds and scratching our armpits. I have shared my idea with many people from toddlers to old timers, and the results are the same: age 1-10 feel very positive about my business venture, ages 11 and up just reply: “what the fuck is wrong with you?”
I have traveled a decent part of the world, and when I see smiles and hear laughs I see and hear and feel love. The nice part is I don’t need a little phrase book with pictures of faces or a cd course for deciphering the look and sound of laughter. The sight and feeling of it is unanimously love. I once saw a mime in Paris who only posed in the most hilarious positions, and made the most ridiculous faces, including my scratching monkeys, all to recorded sounds of people hysterically laughing. There was a huge crowd all around him of people all smiling and laughing. Many, many people were actually hiding and spying on him and the others, actually embarrassed at the spectacle of the very funny mime and all his silly antics. And one by one people walked up, curious: “what the fuck is wrong with these people?”, and of course began to smile and laugh too, some to tears.
Laughing is love made visible. I imagine running around in that Buddhist sanctuary where the restaurant guy probably got his work mantra with my Paris mime guy. (you’ll have to find your own since my guy is permanently booked). I imagine taking him to world summits and front line battlefields, I imagine taking him to funerals and wards of dying cancer patients. I imagine taking him to meet all the people who looked at me and my monkey song like I was some kind of fool. I even imagine taking him to your house and sneaking into your bedroom and watching your face as you awake to laughing people and watching my mime pose for you. I know, I know: “what the fuck are you doing in here?” But I dare you not to smile or laugh, or…… to show your love. (I’ll just hide in case it doesn’t work).
I want it written in the disciplinary code of all parents’ handbooks, the disciplinary code of all prisons, and the operational handbook for all weapons and nuke silos to read: Before finally acting or firing, call Roe and his mime guy from Paris. I imagine all of us running around laughing until we are in tears, and I imagine even making the funny, smelly monkeys envious. I also imagine us all laughing before we unload our unhappiness upon each other for a new idea. I imagine us showing our feelings with the same expressions and sounds globally recognized by all funny monkeys, aka humans, as love.
So here is to you out there fellow funny laughing person (I’m afraid it might be too early in this brand new philosophy of mine to call you a monkey), laughs to you, laughs to those you laugh at, and laughs to those that laugh at you. (Don’t tell anyone that laughs are love made visible or we might get all embarrassed by loving each other).
OK, OK, I’ll take a risk and be brave: May you spend your life as happy as a funny monkey! And even embarrassed: I may not know you, but I funny monkey laugh you.
Laugh you tomorrow. Hee Hee Hee
www.dear-roe-the-muse.com
yourpersonalmuse@gmx.com
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