Blue Jeans & Jelly Beans
I'm on a mission. I'm looking for a kind of high, like the climber who attempts the highest mountain, or the music lover who finds the best recording of Beethoven's Ninth.
I'm after a really good laugh.
Now I do laugh when I'm happy, or when one of the kids does something darling. I've even been known, in my more transcendent moments, to laugh at myself.
But it's come to my attention that I rarely laugh really hard. I'm talking about the kind of laughter where I turn red and tears run out of my eyes. I'm talking about laughing so hard it's embarrassing.
I love laughing that way. It makes me feel full of well-being afterwards, like a good cry. All my insides feel massaged.
My problem is that I hardly ever do.
I read about Norman Cousins years ago, the man who fought off cancer with laughter. He rented videos of the Three Stooges and Groucho Marx, split his sides laughing, and improved his health (after tacking his sides back together).
I could never do that. The Three Stooges leave me absolutely unmoved. Groucho I admire, but I only smile gently as I admire the black-and-white cinematography.
I like Garrison Keillor, but his humor is like bread dough - very slowly rising. I'm looking for something more like champagne - heady and sparkling.
I went back to the archives of acclaimed humorists. I tried reading James Thurber, but he merely left me wistful and bemused. I checked out S.J. Perelman, but he just sounded sardonic.
A few weeks ago, in search of a good laugh, I rented the movie "There's Something About Mary." "It's a little stupid," my friends said, "but it's really funny." I can put up with stupid, I thought, if I get to laugh really hard.
I put up with stupid, all right, but didn't laugh once.
Maybe it lost something in the translation to a small screen, or maybe it would have been funnier after a beer or two, but it didn't work for me.
When have I ever laughed really hard? A tape of Robin Williams, at Carnegie Hall in his standup days, did it for me once.
Also, I used to watch one hilarious TV show called "Whose Line is it Anyway?" It was a British comedy/improv/game show that ran on KQED late Monday nights for a while, and it cracked me up.
The extreme intelligence and erudition of the actors, the pressure they were under, and their total willingness to make fools of themselves, had me laughing so hard I was sliding off the sofa and gasping for breath.
(That show has been copied on American TV and dumbed down considerably. I watch it when I'm desperate.)
My problem is that when I want to see or read something really funny, I can't find it. It's starting to depress me.
What I like is intelligence. The frighteningly brilliant Williams and the lightning-quick British actors on "WLIIA?" somehow got to my funny bone like no one else. And perhaps that quality is not in demand in the entertainment industry these days.
Maybe I can find some genius-level comedians and form a sort of "humor trust" to create my kind of comedy show. Or maybe I can endow a foundation to encourage authors whose work is guaranteed to make the reader roll on the floor laughing.
Think of it. Their output would be on doctors, prescriptions everywhere. "Take two of these a day, and watch this video every night before bed."
I, for one, would have vastly improved health.
Passarelli, mother of three, is a full-time mom, which may explain why she wants a good laugh so much.