Laughter is the best Medicine

It isn’t always easy to make people laugh. Some people can do it without even trying. Others can’t seem to get the punch line right. Laughter makes us feel good about ourselves and some see it as a gift to others. The ability to make someone laugh and make them feel happy for a short time feels great. However, one of the bigger things I have learned in my life is you have to learn to laugh at yourself. Not as a way to make fun of yourself, but as a way of accepting your past mistakes. For me, I have quite a lot of laughable stories, but one that really humbles me is the time I did cartwheels down the stairs.

Yes a poor choice on my part for sure and yes it may not be as I stated but it certainly gets attention. I was outside one summer day and my whole family had come over, for we had just moved to Litchfield and they wanted to see the new house. My mother was giving a tour of the house and I was constantly surrounded by my family commenting on the new house. My mother finished with the tour and then began looking for my siblings. I knew they were outside, so I went right for the upstairs where I had the highest view. I walked onto the porch and called to my siblings tellings them that they were wanted in the house. Then, just like how many great legends ended, I was taken out by a mighty a beast on swift wings. A large bee, not less the a inch or two long and at least a couple ounces heavy. The mighty creature has a stinger as powerful as a tack and buzz as loud as a cell phone on vibrate. This beast at at me with all the speed of a slightly faster then normal bee. I took a step back and realized that the stairs were a lot closer to me then I had once thought. In that moment I was sent flying backwards, seeing a pattern of sky and ground as I rolled my way down the stairs. After my head hit the concrete step at the bottom, I stood up and stumbled into the house. It was at that moment my cousin had just finished telling my family how he looked out the window and witnessed me doing cartwheels on the stairs outside.

I walked back into the house and was greeted with a combination of are you alright’s from my aunts and mother and a roar of laughter coming from my cousins and uncles. Years later my family still tell this story from time to time and I’ve finally be able to see that it was pretty funny. When that story is told, it makes my whole family smile and laugh. While the joke is on me, it feels good knowing it make my family happy. It’s not always easy making people laugh, but sometimes you need to just learn to laugh at your own mistakes.
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