Humor is the best medicine

Humor may be the best medicine after all. At least that is what the former editor of the Saturday Review believed. You may remember that, following a serious heart attack and being hospitalized at UCLA, Norman Cousins decided to contrive his own remedy. He took massive doses of vitamin C and watched the antics of the Marx Brothers. Although he was given little chance of surviving he was with us for ten years following his first heart attack. He found that ten minutes of genuine belly laugh would give him at least two hours of pain-free sleep. This "joyous discovery" led to an adjunct professorship in the university's School of Medicine.
         Humor is not only fun, but physically helpful as well. And it takes many forms, all the way from shaggy dogs stories that test one's patience to the quick witticism that catches you unawares. Since it is free, why don't we use it more for the aches and pains of body and soul? I think it's because natural disposition heads the other direction. That's not to say that normal life doesn't have its happy moments, but simply that it's all too human to be overly serious. We tend to trudge through the day when we'd get there in a better mood if we'd try skipping.
         And this takes a decision – the decision that today will be far brighter if I decide that it will. Our approach to the day inevitably determines how the day will be. And my today is going to start with some of the silliness (and remember, the Marx brothers were silly) in which I indulge from time to time. I may have to apologize for it, but I happen to like the antics of 
         Steve Martin. His observation that, "First the doctor told me the good news: I was going to have a disease named after me," still brings a smile. 
         Mark Twain confessed, "There is nothing so annoying as to have two people go right on talking when you're interrupting.? 
         Al McGuire wondered why "kamikaze pilots wore helmets" and 
         Mark Russell supported the scientific theory that "the rings of Saturn are composed entirely of lost airline luggage."
 
If you haven't stopped reading by now you'll probably identify with
 
         The man who confessed that he was "such an ugly kid that when he played in the sandbox the cat kept trying to cover him up:'
 
Have a great week!