To have a place to express yourself without the pressure of an audience is truly a blessing.  Spoken expression in silence is mocked, but written expression in silence is more than celebrated:  it is encouraged, marketed and awarded, even monetized. 

Sometimes, the soul just needs a place to spit out the words that encircle it, without fear of immediate feedback and the self-censorship that comes with that.  Sometimes I need to just express what is in my brain so I can put the spinning words in order and make the sentences complete themselves.  Thinking is good, but often too abstract.  Not enough rules and no one to enforce them up in the brain  Fragments and run ons attach to feelings and logic is left to run behind in a futile attempt to catch up to the swirling, encircling, tail-chasing that is a brain with OCD.  Magical thinking, my psychiatrist calls it.  Looping, I call it.  Exhausting, it is.  Yoda, I am not.  

 Delving for meaning in a rush of circling words, phrases and thoughts is a dangerous fishing expedition.  It is like looking for a grounding feeling while examining modern art:  you may find it, you may not, and who knows if it is even there to find in the first place?  Sometimes, you just need a simple blank canvas, a few primary colors and a series of solid strokes that represent something you can actually recognize.  You need solid ground for a base of support before you can navigate the swirls and eddys and psychodelics and nuances and hidden meanings. 

And what I’m saying is that in my brain, my feet are often without purchase.   So a blank screen with a keyboard is often the place I can chase these thoughts down, grab a few and throw them through the processor of motor cortex to keyboard to screen so that I can then read them with some sense of stability.

Writing is to the brain as crying is to the soul: sometimes, you just have to let the toxins out, let the river breech its banks, let the mess be made visible so that you have at least a place to start in your repairs. 

I’ve come full circle.  At first, I couldn’t bear to watch Rebecca Black’s “Friday” because I thought, “Here is this sweet teen that everyone is making fun of and I don’t want to be a part of that”.  Then I watched it, but only with half the screen showing.  Then I watched it for real and I’ve probably contributed a good 50 views to the 12 million+ views  the video has gotten so far.  I checked out the other Ark videos and I have to say…I feel pretty protective of these girls.  And I am calling them girls intentionally, because with the exception of Ariana Dvornik—who appears to be at least in her late teens or early 20s—these are children.  Their parents paid some money to get them a video, they got all dressed up and made up, they got a custom made song (the lyrics of which we will not discuss) and got to shoot a video.  And that is exactly what we are seeing.  The girls seem sweet and the songs are simple and really, what else are we expecting? 

It’s a bit refreshing to see a 13 year old dressing like a 13 year old and singing about something that is actually appropriate for a 13 year old to be thinking about. 

I’ve started following Rebecca Black on twitter and she seems to be a sweet young girl.  I think the people telling her she should die should really take a minute and realize they are talking to a kid who sang a song they didn’t like.  If there is any anger, it should be at Ark Music Factory, for publishing these things and putting these girls out there like this.  Maybe their parents are protecting them and agreed to all of this ahead of time.  I hope so. 

So to the “Butterflies” girl and the “Crush” girl and all the other girls (especially Ariana, who in my mind is the most talented of the group), just try to enjoy the ride and don’t let the haters get you down. 

Also, today is Thursday, which means tomorrow is Fried Egg.  I mean Friday.

Now that we know my eyes and my blood vessels are doing what they are supposed to do, I’m headed to the ENT in the morning.  I can’t imagine that is a fun job:  looking up people’s noses and down their throats and into their ears all day, every day.  Like most people, I spend my life avoiding looking in those places.  There isn’t anything there I want to find, if you know what I mean. 

I guess I’ll brush my teeth extra well before I go — because I’m an awesome and caring person like that.

I realize the planet is over-populated.  I could not care less.  I am tired leaking water from my eyes and holding my stomach with my arms because yet another person has left.  Some I’ve known personally:  patients I’ve treated in the past; some, I knew only online; some, I knew only through their work.  As a fan of comedy, this last category has been slimming down at a rate entirely too fast for me to handle. 

There is a connection formed when a comedian makes you laugh.  They don’t know you and you don’t really know them. But you’ve given them enough of your trust to lower your walls a bit:  to allow them in a bit further than you would ever think of letting a complete stranger enter.  And from that brief encounter, you form a strange connection.  It is not personal, but at the same time, it is so very personal.  A comedian engages your mind, tickles your funnybone, and if they are good at what they do, they touch your heart and speak to your soul.  Richard Pryor is a perfect example.  For me, of course, Gracie Allen is another.

I’ve always felt rather protective of people that can make me laugh.  When I was diagnosed with intracranial hypertension and faced the real possibility that I could have a brain tumor, and could be losing my vision and my hearing, I made it out to the parking lot and closed my car door and sat their trembling in the silence.  I was alone and I was more terrified than I have ever been in my life.  After I gathered my composure, I turned on the car and a few moments later, I heard a familiar voice.  It was Al Yankovic.  I had played the CD on my way to what I thought would be a routine eye doctor appointment 6 long hours before. I heard his voice:  familiar, friendly and funny.  And although I did not laugh, and although I did not even smile, I felt that other connection—the one to my heart and soul—and I felt less alone.   This man I’ve never met was, symbolically, “there for me” in one of my most terrifying moments. It brought me back down from my panic, just enough for me to start being able to start saying to myself, “Ok, it will probably be ok.  Just take it a moment at a time” after having essentially been in a numb panic all morning.  And the reason it helped to calm me was that special bond comedians have with their audience.  A famous newscaster, a favorite pop-singer:  these would have certainly brought the familiarity, but not the  connection.  For the most part, we just don’t let strangers into our hearts the way we allow comedians in.

I think a lot of people have used comedy to help them through tough times.  And so, when a comedian seems to be having a tough time, it hits us as fans a bit more personally than it probably should.  Why, for example, did I cry real tears for Greg Giraldo, when I have never met him?  Was it the loss of his humor?  Or was it reading the pain and anger in the tributes and tweets from his fellow comedians? 

I remember feeling this way when Jim Henson died.  Fred Rogers was a difficult one as well.  They shared their talents and I let them in because I was a child and their methods of humor and learning worked for me.  When Richard Pryor died, I could only think of all he had shared of his life with total strangers like me.  How much I knew about him.  How I respected his honesty and his strength.

Comedy is so centered around pain:  briefly taking it away from the audience while it is a nearly constantly dweller in the performers.  I think when someone who has taken away your pain feels pain, it triggers something protective in you. 

George Carlin was quoted to have said that he felt like he had had a relationship with each of his audiences. That they actually did know each other. 

I am sitting here and thinking of all the funny people I care about and how much I hope they stay well.  I want them well, selfishly for myself, but also because I think they deserve to be well for all the joy they’ve brought to others. 

Greg.  Greg Giraldo was playing on Rhapsody when I decided to try to dig out of my apartment.  I was faced with what was quite literally an insurmountable task and later I did have to get some help to complete it.   But I can still see his face, standing in the river, holding up the American flag, as I started to pick up one thing at a time. 

Reading the tweets from Michael Ian Black, Jim Gaffigan, Louis C.K., Sarah Silverman, Daniel Tosh, and so many other comedians that I respect and enjoy has been both comforting and saddening.  I’m guessing it was therapeutic for them to write.  I’m guessing I thought it would be therapeutic if I tried to write down what I was feeling, too.  I’m not sure it has made any sense.  But I know that my point is, for entirely selfish reasons:  if you bring joy into the lives of others, please be kind to yourself.  We probably don’t let you know how much we trust you with our burdens and how we count on you to temporarily lift them and how grateful we are to have a few hours of joy.  But we should and we do and we are.  And we thank you.

Greg, man, I hope that you are in peace now.  I am so sorry you were sick.  Thank you for the joy you shared. 

To everyone else:  stop dying.