A few weeks ago, I showed one of my closest friends the stand-up routine I performed in high school. He told me that it teleported him back to those days when we would spend minutes or hours talking about pop culture figures, relationship issues, and nostalgic withdrawal. It had the same effect on me. Other than the muttering, the stuttering, the joke premises that didn't work, the only other thing I thought about was the laughter made by people I haven't seen in a year. If I was a more sensible man, I would make the effort to communicate with each and every one of the members of the audience again. The following is a stand-up routine I wrote for the 2nd coffeehouse event we had at our school, technically a charity event, and I was the only "comedian" performing. I was originally going to talk about love in excruciating detail comparing it to a bike chain and a sledgehammer; I worked on the premise for two months until I reconsidered the whole routine, a week before the performance. As I was on stage, I remembered how I once kicked a chair when the audience wasn't laughing. I made sure not to make that mistake again. The overall theme was how I was confessing to everyone how I was no longer funny, treating it like a medical condition with symptoms such as not being able to hear the punchline, and laughing at unfunny things. I kinda wished I took advantage of trying not to be funny and saying ironic statements regarding my "epiphany". It was very painful to listen to this again, understanding that the idea of becoming a comedian was an elusive fantasy that I had the chance to try, at least once. (Words in parenthesis are actions.) [Words in brackets are from the original routine/edited for clarity.]
(walk up to mic, grunt exasperatedly) Hello, everybody. It's nice to see you all. You look very nice and pretty, I guess. I have, um, a tale to tell you all. It's [like] a tapeworm: stringy, flexible, and possibly life-threatening. It’s, um, not really the easiest thing I have ever admitted to anybody. It’s probably less simple than when my brother told me that he was going to be a baseball star, a [testosterone-fueled] baseball star and I told him I was going to be a writer, and then he told me the reality of a writer is basically ten years of making sure that you can, you know, get something published in a magazine of some sort; and my hopes and dreams were crushed that day.
I’m no longer funny. (audience will disagree or agree; expect both) I know what you're saying. It’s not possible. It, it’s not even conceivable. And yet it is. Oh, yes it is. I saw the signs, they were as clear and present as a teacher’s pet, you know who usually sits at the front row holding a polished red apple or a building on fire. Only I didn’t tell the student to swallow his apple or get a fire extinguisher. I just let them be. See, senior year hasn't been one of the worst years; It's actually been one of the most relaxing, enjoyable of all the [academic] years I've yet experienced and nothing like the holy grail of all years that surpasses all other years. I don't even know where that, okay, there's the whole "We're leaving. We'll never see you guys again." Isn't that a little depressing, though? I mean, "I'm never going to see you again. I'm going to have a different life. I'm gonna go have some kids. I don't feel like ever talking to you ever again. I'm going go associate myself with people, who are more impressive than you." Okay, fine, in that case, senior year is a wonderful year. But actually, I've been having a lot of interesting conversations with a lot of people, mostly about falling. We really like to talk about the drop. We enjoy talking about people who suffer from the drop. People in general, people in the quad, me falling, Kramer from Seinfeld falling, have you seen this guy? This guy has the most amazing falling I've ever seen. It's almost as if he's on a frictionless floor that just defies all reality. It's amazing, a masterpiece of falling. So, if you want a good example of falling that isn't embarrassing, that's more of a [performance art piece], go, go see Kramer. He's pretty good at that.
It's actually been one of the more easier years. Times have been much easier, believe it or not. All those nightmares of seniors (older students) ripping their hairs out over all the stress were greatly exaggerated. We lost most of it during junior year. And the rest [working] on college aps. Recently, someone asked me if I was working on my applications this weekend and I stared at her for a few more seconds. A, applications? Applications? Does anyone say applications? Does anyone have enough patience TO SAY applications? The process [itself] is long, hard, you know, almost completely stressful and that's for the little bittest of hair. You know how hair is all over the place, it's on certain parts of the body that can't really be exposed at this moment? That would be the time period where you RIP those hairs OUT because there's no other kind of pleasure than getting those hairs, the invisible hairs, ripped-out! I mean, why [would] we ever need an elongated term like applications to remind us of the long, hard work that we just slave over only to receive a letter, only to wait patiently for a letter written by someone we don’t even know. It makes no sense to me. It makes no sense to me how paper can make someone's life-Like this! (takes out routine from your pocket) This (slap the sheet) piece of paper! It's made me suffer for the past two months! Paper. It's deadly. That's why there's paper cuts. That's why people complain about paper cuts because paper cuts-are deadly! We have to watch out for those.
Well anyway, senior year's been wonderful; I've had a chance to analyze a lot of things: movies, paintings, mental states, it’s all been very relaxing and easygoing. And I've actually had the opportunity to listen to many jokes, a lot of, a lot of really great jokes. Some very little knock-knock jokes, very little, 'orange you glad I said banana' kind of jokes. They've been very great, consistent jokes that are really masterful, even though the humor itself is more spontaneous than anything else. It's not exactly like a [registered] joke that someone's planned a long time for. It's more like one of those jokes that come out of nowhere, it's like popcorn popping. The joke is this little, tiny ball of kernel that just (POPS). It's almost amazing. However, there has been one crucial element to the joke that's omitted. The punch line. The thing is that I can see the punchline every time someone makes a joke, I can see [it] very clearly; it's out there in the distance. It waves to me and I wave back. (wave to the crowd) It has that moment like in those movies where there's an expectant smile, that really long face that's just full of emotions. "(in a high pitched voice, somewhat breath-taken) OH! Where have you been all my life?! I've been waiting for you for such a long time." And all I can say is, "Me too!" And I'm not the only one, I mean of course I'm not the only one who's listening to the joke; there's a lot of other people behind me in the crowd who are also waving. They're holding signs and back-up jokes to keep the joke alive. However, suddenly as someone tells the joke, "Knock knock. Who's there? Orange. Orange who? O-" (mouth out the rest of the joke). (sarcastically monotone) HAHAHAHAHAHA! Their mouths become mute. I hear nothing. I hear no vocal chords. There's nothing going on there, and I can't help but tell them, "Wait, say that again? Can you say that again? I couldn't hear that one. Could you say it again?" But, you know, people get so caught up in that one little moment. They don't even care about what you're thinking, about you missing the joke. You know, it's the strangest thing. Don't you wish you had a pen near you and you made sure that if someone could write down the joke, you could laugh at it; but it's a depressing thing, it's not even the same person telling the joke. It's basically someone's writing the joke on a piece of paper and you go back to your bed and you read it and you're crying and laughing at the same time. "(blubbering miserably) This is so-funny!" It's really depressing. But it's happened so many times since that I [don't really care.] "Oh, there goes another one of those jokes. Words spoken by sophisticates. (I made that word up, by the way.) Those people who think there's so much more comical than me. You know, another one just comes and goes."
However, and we always go back to the 'however', don't we? The 'however' changes the meaning of life because suddenly you hear someone talking about Luke Skywalker being Darth Vader's son. [Then,] they say, "However…" "However what? Tha, that's it." "However, it's also possible that he's a transvestite." However, recently, I was on the bus. It's a good bus, very good bus seats, comfortable. It's enjoyable looking out the window and seeing the road [shift] into different forms. No one's ever really looked at the road before and I don't see why. It's amazing, it's a part of our history. We see the flatness of the road and then the cracks, and then we see the more damaged cracks and then the flatness. It's amazing. There's yellow, there's white, and there's green. Sometimes, there's red. When there's red, I actually get kind of concerned; I don't think I want to look at the road anymore if I see red. In any case, I'm on the bus and there's some sophomores telling a joke and I listened attentively because there's nothing else to listen to; my MP3 player's broken. It was one of the most disturbing, horrific, ghastly, [most disgusting] jokes I’ve ever heard in my life. And it was funny. Immediately, I decided to receive medical attention. I was kicked out of the hospital the [following] day. Apparently, they thought it was all in my head. Like all of THIS (draw an imaginary circle around your face) isn't already in my head.
Well, it has been a loss, no longer being funny. [Life happens. I’ve decided to accept the inevitable with my head up high, see the advantages of no longer being the life of the party, family, etc. I make comments, after all being funny doesn’t necessarily mean you can’t talk, it’s just that instead of laughing, people look at me with concern. This is not funny. This whole thing is not funny. See how far it’s gone? In any case, I’ve decided that it’s too much pressure trying to be funny, too many obstacles to cross. If you’re a funny guy like I used to be, you know exactly what I’m talking about. You know? (point to eyes) These things? The eyes are the funny person’s most dangerous obstacle. In a venue like this, eyes can double an audience. When the funny person makes a joke, it’s not the face he looks at, it’s the eyes, those blank, obtuse, globby, rounded things that observe your every move.] It seems that I'm out of time. Well, if you want to hear more about it, just talk to me and I'll tell you all about not being funny. Thank you very much, everybody. (walk offstage. Frown.)
