Inappropriate Behavior: Writing material in the absurdities of life

When I was young, I would laugh at all the wrong times.  It got to be very embarrassing.  For instance, when a friend told me another friend had died, my response was to smile. Not the kind of reaction you might have expected.   My inappropriate smiling and laughter  wasn't usually  about such  extreme situations,  but I was  really uncomfortable.    I remember a friend  trying to explain my behavior to someone else, “Oh  she always does that. She doesn't mean it.”

It seems like many artists and writers  look at  life through a lens that is just slightly askew.    While there are many things in life that we can control, our emotional reactions are generally not included, at least not until we learn to suppress and control ourselves.  That's another story for a different day. However,  some emotional responses like crying and laughing, if they are from our innermost being,  occur spontaneously even if we have tried to suppress our feelings..  What makes us laugh or cry depends upon some pretty mysterious  and inexplicable natural responses.    I do not even pretend to know or understand why I laugh why I do not cry very much.  What I do understand  and what I am writing about today is just how much some things strike me as both absurd and funny.  

If I were to look into this further  or maybe go into therapy for the next 20 years, I might discover that there is some deep dark  reason that I tend to laugh when others cry.  Perhaps laughter is another form of tears, who knows.  I cry often enough to know that I definitely feel differently when I am crying than  when I am laughing.    Laughing and crying are not  the same  for me.    

How did I get on the subject of crying and laughing, well I will tell you.  Like many of my friends and fellow writers I while away at least a few minutes every day perusing Facebook's  stream of messages.    Once in a while I find something that really tickles my fancy.  Today was one of those days.  I can count them on one hand, the days that is, when something makes me laugh so hard.    Today's comic relief came in the form of a photograph of Glenda,  the Good Witch dressed in her pink fairy gown,  crown on her head and a magic wand in her hand, saying:    "You know dear,  Karma's  only a bitch when you are."     It struck me as so funny and touched me in such a way that I was reminded of  other times when laughter at the absurdity of life, and particularly my own, was just something I had to laugh about.  

Writers and artists spend a lot of time searching.  We search for inspiration.  We search for the right words.  We search for the right frame or the right colors or the right mediums to express ourselves.    Often times we struggle for months and years, day after day on projects which we hope will ring true  both to ourselves and to those for whom we create our work.    Today I was reminded that just below the surface,  waiting to come forward,  are feelings connected to thoughts and thoughts  connected to images that promise to connect us through our work to others.    

Many of us are full of ideas.  Some of those ideas will just pass away and never manifest into anything.   Other ideas will be developed and will turn into some expression or other.  Maybe we will call it a poem or a masterpiece.  Perhaps it will come out in some design or solution, in some invention or product, but whatever we choose to do consciously, I think we are graced with something more valuable than all the best ideas in the world. We are each given the gift of spontaneity, laughter, humor, and lightness of being.  Even in and after the most depressing or morally degrading experiences, despite the horrors and suffering we might have experienced or witnessed,   we have within us the seeds of release, relief, and healing.

 Today  after I saw the photograph of  Glenda the Good Witch with her witty comment, other experiences flooded into my memory. I was reminded of other times when I'd felt so good.  I recall being tickled with the Taco Bell Chihuahuas.    In case you are not familiar with  the Taco Bell  Chihuahuas,  they were an advertising gimmick used by Taco Bell in the late 1980s and early 1990s.   They were  not very politically correct but they were sure cute.  Those toys were closest to  a  dog that I was going to get.  They each talked a little bit,  required no cleanup or feeding, and were small enough to put in my purse.    At the time, I was living in Claremont, working at the Claremont colleges, and living through one of the most upsetting and depressing times of my life.    My husband had been caught up in the early stages of what has now become a protracted and seemingly never-ending set of wars in the Middle East.    I had had a miscarriage, had just lost my Mother, had been suffering through a long separation from my husband, was trying to raise my  college-aged daughter  and help her through her struggles. I had just lost one job and was starting a new job.   In the middle of all this, my husband's country was invaded while he was there and a whole new cycle of sorrow, not knowing, and feeling incapable of helping anyone, including myself, began.   

Needless to say it was during that  time when anything that could go wrong did go, or so it seemed.    It was during that time that the  Taco Bell Chihauhaus came into my life.  I laughed, for the first time in ages, and felt emotions move within me after a long period of time of holding myself together and trying to deal with life and maintain my relationships, do my job, and keep my sanity. What I found was that in order to do any of those things, particularly the sanity bit, I had to lose it!  And maybe that's it.  It may be that in order to take steps forward or move on or find our way or discover the truth, we have to just let go.  We have to let go of thinking we understand what is going on in life.  We have to let go of holding on for dear life thinking as we seem to be losing  control of  our lives. We  will all fall apart.  Our lives will fall apart  despite what we do or do not do.  

For that is the nature of life.  Life is dynamic.  Our work is dynamic.  What brings us joy and pleasure and fulfillment at one point changes and requires that we move on,  move over,  and get out of our own way later on.   Finding ourselves in the blinding  'aha' moments or epiphanies that some like St. Paul or the Prophets of old experienced, may be one way we figure out life.  Getting lost or sidetracked maybe another.  Losing everything that matters or suffering  through extreme  boredom and meaninglessness may be another way. But do not be surprised if your inspiration and vision of the future does not also come to you in some absurd and silly way.  

The great Thomas Merton talked about finding enlightenment in the streets of the city in Asia where he saw  the wind pick up a plastic bag and swirl it in an eddy of air currents.  Gautauma, in his search for meaning and enlightenment,  found his enlightenment  at the end of the search, exhausted and probably a little disappointed,  sitting under a tree one night.   Christ Jesus had his share of trials, and probably wondered at the end if anyone had heard what he had to say. I don't think he got paid for his gig either. I do not pretend to speak for Gautama the Buddha or Jesus or in fact anyone else. However,  I do know something about searching and finding. Answers are always before and around us.   We however are not necessarily receptive, ready,  or willing to receive and understand what is right before us.    In my case, I am often not ready or able to even ask the questions I want answered let one alone receive answers.    When the time is right, not only will the teacher appear  in some form or another (maybe even the mirror),  but also the way will open from within or you will have no doubt or fear  what the next step is to be.

 A few years ago in San Francisco when my doctor and Soul Friend, Dr. Taylor Rabbetz  was helping me with some healing and health issues, he was doing some work on my Soaz muscle.    This muscle is in the hip region and is a crucial part of connecting the upper and lower body.  For those who sit a lot like writers, this muscle sometimes does not get the right kind of exercise or movement. Like all parts of our body,  our muscles retain memory and store the sum total of our experiences and emotional responses in them.    If you have ever had acupuncture, acupressure, chiropractic or other body work, you are aware of how one part of the body is inherently connected to other parts.  And our emotional body, psychological body, spiritual body, ethereal body,  and all aspects of our physical body interact and are affected by one another.    We are also strongly affected by all elements of the people we are involved with and their healed and unhealed bodies.    Another reason to use discernment, discretion and common sense when developing relationships and dealing with people.

Well to get back to the table where I was being warned by Dr. Rabbetz  that "You might and probably will have  a  deep emotional response to the work being done."  He warned me that often patients are affected by this work that they cry from deep seated pain, grief, and other emotions.     I tried to prepare myself for that mentally,  and  and hoped that it would help in whatever I needed to experience.  What actually happened was that I began laughing.  I laughed and laughed and laughed.  I could not stop myself.    Another one of those inappropriate responses, but believe me when I tell you it made me feel great.  Another one of those responses to life's pain, grief, and trauma that was just slightly off from the norm.

Whatever it takes for us to write, to create art, to dedicate our lives to living fully, artistically, freely, happily, I say we embrace the way we most naturally receive love, inspiration, and the determination so authentic and divinely inspired lives.  

One Pigeon Said to Another Pigeon....                                                                                        by Catherine Al-Meten, 2012

If we do see life slightly askew, so be it.   If we think we have nothing to offer or that we are just repeating what others have already done, we need to look a little closer.  We need to appreciate  the idiosyncrasies, the quirky gifts, and that just slightly out of whack way we look at and approach life.  We need to stop trying to be so normal and just allow ourselves to be who we are.  Channel the drama of your life into your work and your art.  As Julia Cameron says keep it on the canvas or in the script or between the book covers.   As I told my granddaughter Lola, “life is like a big juicy ripe peach  meant for us to bite into,  savour and let the juice of it run down our chin."   We already know life has its ups and downs.  We already understand some things are a struggle.  What we do not always know is that we are always capable of being surprised in  very wonderfully pleasant and happy ways.  Expect the unexpected.  Savour each moment,  and let the laughter arise from within.    And if you're not sure about what life is like, stand on your head or tilt it at an angle, and look at it from a different side...literally and metaphorically speaking.