Dry October

I don't know why it didn't occur to me sooner: 


I'm not going to tell any more jokes.
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I don't know exactly when I started trying to be funny.


But I am a deflector.  Such a deflector, I might as well wear forearm pads, like that Superhero in that movie you watched.


My shields are made out of humor.  They are made out of jokes.  They are made out of off-hand comments, and intentionally-incorrect pronunciations, and beat-you-to-the-finish-line jabs.


My shields are up at all times.  At work, at parties, at funerals.  On dates, at home, at school.  On the basketball court.


Everywhere.  I don't take them off. 


I have spent my entire adult life -- and far back into the wilderness and forest of adolescence and childhood --


My entire LIFE --


wearing my humor shields.
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So, for the month of October,


I'm taking them off.


It's September 30, as I type.


Tomorrow is a new month.  A month in which I will not wear my shields.


I don't know what will happen.  But whatever awaits me, I will not make a joke out of it.  I will deflect from the seriousness of my life.  From the gravity of whatever is on its way.


I am scared.  But my relief is already towering over my fear.


I get to just...experience.  I don't have to churn out one-liners on the couch with Vanessa, like my mouth is some sort of shitty twitter account with one frustrated follower.


I can just focus on growing up.
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This was the post I was hoping I would get to, when I started to feel disenchanted with the parts of myself I found, while I was doing comedy full-time.


The mirror was not a pretty picture.  And I didn't see a viable way to get out.  I felt like I'd be the same person when I retired, as I was when I got my first ever gig.
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I intend to document.