Rant #2,661: It's a Laugh

I had a little fun on Saturday.
 
I wanted to prove a point as to how programmed we are to read things in a certain way, so I put up a post on Facebook to prove my point … and have some fun in the process.
 
Here is the exact post that I put up on Saturday, and honestly, I was still laughing about it through Sunday and now into Monday:
 
“When the time comes, I support 100 percent mandatory vacations and if people refuse, they should be forced.”
 
Yup, that’s exactly what I put up, and some people got enraged:
 
“Omg we’re living in Nazi Germany.”
 
“I truly hope you are being sarcastic.”
 
“100% Disagree with you on this one Larry/”
 
“That is a ridiculous statement.”
 
And my response to these people was the following:
 
“Reread what I said. Gotcha!”
 
Now, anyone reading what I wrote out there, please reread what I wrote.
 
Notice what I actually said, not what your mind—programmed by the past year—thinks I said:
 
“When the time comes, I support 100 percent mandatory vacations and if people refuse, they should be forced.”
 
Do you get it yet?
 
I said “vacations,” not “vaccinations,” but people read it the former way even though I wrote it in the latter way.
 
It was put up in harmless fun, not to make people look silly, but to generate a few laughs.
 
Once most people got it, they were fine with it.
 
Some people actually got it at the first read, but most didn’t, and they let me have it, but the fact of the matter is that I put up a thought that most people would actually agree with, in particular after what we all have gone through since the pandemic hit more than a year ago.
 
Here is what I later said about the matter:
 
“I would never make that statement with the other word being used. Laugh! We need more smiles today.”
 
And later, I said the following:
 
“Remember people, I have made my living as a professional writer for decades. I know what a vaccination is, and I know what a vacation is. Two different things, but we are being conditioned in a certain way. Me just having fun at a time when we need some laughs.”
 
When most people got it, they laughed too.
 
Others believe that getting the shot is such a hot-button issue that you really can’t make light of it, even in the benign way that I did.
 
But I think I was successful in getting people to read and then laugh about it.
 
Heck, it has happened to me many times on Facebook and elsewhere.
 
My brain programs a word or phrase in the way that it does based on what it expects to see and process, but when I reread the word or phrase, I see what is actually being said.
 
We have all done it, and some people did it here.
 
I wasn’t trying to make fun of anyone, I just wanted to put smiles on peoples’ faces, and I think I did just that for most of those who responded.
 
I think that one of the problems that the world faces today is that we have forgotten how to laugh, and most importantly, we have forgotten how to laugh at ourselves.
 
People are so afraid at upsetting others by what they say, even if it is funny.

We are too overly sensitive about things.
 
I am not talking about something that could put people over the edge; I am talking about jokes that point out that we, as humans, have foibles that if handled in a humorous way, are actually funny.
 
I mean, in today’s world, a person who you laugh at for slipping on a banana peel and falling flat on their keister wouldn’t laugh with you at what they did, they would probably accuse you of putting the banana peel there so they would fall, and the person wouldn’t be laughing, but would be suing you.
 
We have to lighten up, and yes, even though we have all been through the ringer during the past year, things are getting better.
 
Many of us have a choice about whether to mask up or not, and I do believe that pretty much everyone who wants the shot, for whatever reason, has gotten it, so a good portion of the country is inoculated, but if you don’t want to get the shot, that is fine with me.
 
And things are opening up, and things are lightening up, to a certain degree.
 
Maybe my sense of humor is warped, I don’t know, and maybe I do need a vacation myself, but whatever the case, I had a good laugh this weekend, and when others saw their own human foibles in misreading what I wrote, most of them laughed to.
 
Remember, I do believe that the ability to laugh can help to cure just about whatever ails you, so if you had a chuckle at my little joke, that was my aim.
 
And my aim was also to have us laugh together, as human beings, rather than being at each others’ throats as many of us have been since early last year.
 
Again, we can battle this thing and win out over it, but we have to do it together.
 
Let’s laugh, and laugh some more, and I guarantee it will make the world a better place to live in … even with the mess we are in.
 
“Two elephants were sitting in the tub.
 
One said, “No soap,” and the other said:
 
“No soap, radio.”
 
<Chuckle, chuckle, chuckle.>