Show Me the Funny

So Tina Fey and Amy Poehler hosted the Golden Globes last night, and they were funny.  Totally underutilized but very funny.  And not just funny to those with ladyparts, but, I daresay, to everyone.  Well, except Tommy Lee Jones.  Tommy Lee Jones, we learned at the Globes, seems to have no sense of humor whatsoever, leaving me to wonder if, when he and Al Gore were roommates back at Harvard, he made Al Gore look like the funny one.  Now that's an accomplishment.  But I digress.

I confess that, way, way back in college, I once expressed the opinion, out loud even, "I don't think women are as funny as men."  Shocking, right?  Thankfully the male friend to whom I expressed this ill-informed and downright incorrect opinion didn't agree, but replied, "That's because you haven't met you."

Aww, thanks.  And deep, right?  You can really read a lot into that.   But being 18, I didn't.  I think I probably just poured another beer.

But what I realized in that moment, and in countless moments after, is that, of course I thought I was funny.  I mean, show me the rare person who thinks he/she has no sense of humor - even when they don't.  And I knew plenty of funny women in my real life - family, friends, coworkers.  Where I wasn't really seeing them was on tv or in the movies, and we all know that being funny is like a tree falling in the woods -- if someone is funny but not on television or in the movies, does it really count? 

Sure they were there but generally in support of a male lead like Jerry Seinfeld, who, of course, as the star of the show, was allowed to be funnier.  Better, smarter people than me have done analysis of the portrayal of women and girls in pop culture so I'm not even going to go there - it's too deep a subject.  But what fascinates me is the external validation that 18 year old me needed that women were funny.   Working for a youth development organization, I can't overestimate the importance of role models - kids need to see people who look like them doing well, succeeding, it makes you think that if they can do it, so can you.

But still, it blows my mind that I couldn't just think about the women I knew who made me laugh on a regular basis and KNOW with every fiber of my being that women were and are funny, or even, really just using common sense, even thinking what the heck gender had to do with funny?  I needed pop culture to tell me, to show me, put a blinking neon arrow over Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Chelsea Handler, Kathy Griffin, Ellen, etc. reading "Funny."  I guess that's also cutting to the heart of comedy - it's not funny unless someone outside of the person telling the joke laughs. 

You know, like that tree that fell in the woods earlier.  At least I think it fell.  I wasn't there, someone told me.

Which is why I was really pulling for Tina and Amy.  I know they're funny from countless hours of watching both of them perform but I was holding my breath to see how they'd do.  Don't blow it, ladies.  The fate of your gender is riding on you.  Because everyone knows that every time Jerry Seinfeld makes a bad joke, male comedians are sent off to the bread line.  And it took years for male actors to carry a movie after Eddie Murphy's one, two, ten unfunny movies.  Right?

What did Tina and Amy have to prove?  Pretty much everything.   What did they actually succeed in proving?  Not that women are funny, but that Tina and Amy are funny.  Because women aren't funny, and neither are men.  But Melissa and Chelsea and Kathy certainly are.  Ray and Eddie and Will?  Also funny.  And so is Lynn, as a matter of fact. 

But not you, Anne Hathaway, sit down already; we've heard enough out of you.

(Just to be clear, when I say Lynn, I mean me, and not Lynn Swann, who may or may not be funny.  I asked Tommy Lee Jones, but he's not a credible source on the matter, and Al Gore says he needs to do do some more quantitative research and see some more pie charts of data before he can decide.)

This is 39 3/4...

I've yet to see Judd Apatow's "new" film THIS IS 40, but, in keeping with my personality, that doesn't stop me from forming an opinion of it.  And that opinion, again, having not seen the movie, is that I bet I'll like it (I tend to like his stuff, going back to "Freaks and Geeks") but I'll walk away thinking, "No, THEY are 40.  I am nothing like THEM."  These people are married and live in the suburbs and have children and cars and look a lot like Paul Rudd and Leslie Mann.

Well, except that I'll actually BE 40 in a little over two months.  Okay, from the time of this writing, 81 days.  But who's counting?

Oddly, I don't really feel a lot of anxiety about turning 40, probably because I feel anxiety every day of my life about every single thing.  What's one more thing to worry about?  In the words of Laura Bennett from season 3 of Project Runway, "Just throw another one on the pile."  Now Laura was talking about her kids, but since I don't have kids yet, my worries are like my children:  each one is special to me in its own way, but, unlike most mothers, I'll admit I have my favorite.  Like they say with kids, having one is like none, but having two is like ten.  Although I bet the parents of any number between one and ten children would debate that statement mightily, theoretically I agree, once you have two, what's the difference?  Pile 'em on.

I think I don't feel anxiety because it's no secret that the things that I wish weren't true about my life are true every day and not just on my birthday.   And maybe it's maturity but I no longer feel competitive or jealous about what my friends and neighbors are doing.  I wish them well, and sometimes I even feel happy for them.  Go figure.  I realized, more recently than I'd care to admit, that there's not a direct correlation between someone having gotten or done something and my lack of something.  Your promotion doesn't mean I can't find my dream job.  Your wedding has nothing to do with me being single.  And your baby isn't the reason I'm pushing a cat in a stroller and not a baby.  There's plenty to go around.  Just as important, I realized that whether or not I achieve the things I'd like in life, above all, contentment, has nothing to do with anyone else and everything to do with me.  Boring, I know.  It's so much more entertaining to blame other people.

I remember being younger and thinking about what 40 would look like for me.  The year 2013.  It seemed so alien and far away.  I mean, out of the 20th century and everything.  Would we wear actual clothes?  Would Champion sweatshirts and rubber bracelets still be in style?  Could I wear my cuffed jeans and Stan Smiths?  Would every home have a hot tub in the future?  Will I be married to Rick Springfield?

So many questions then, and yet, now, so few answers.  Never predicted that one.

I thought that at some point between, I don't know, 14 and 40, I would have figured it out.  Whatever "it" is.  But I actually feel less knowledgeable now.  What is it they say?  Old enough to know what you don't know?  I remember coming home from my first job at age 13, and announcing, "I know everything there is to know about working."  Except I worked there for several more years and was still learning right up to the day I left.  And I still have no idea.

In many ways, I feel younger now than I ever did.  I think I was born 40.  I've always worried a lot under the guise of thinking.  It was only a matter of time until I reached an age where my worrying and thinking could be put to productive use in the workforce, calling it "management." 

A young me, assuming a worrying position.  There are many.

"Management" in action, sporting a Snuggie.

Except now that I am actually 40 39 and 3/4, I feel like I'm 25.   When I go to online dating sites and they suggest I search up to age 45, I'm like, No way!  I'm not dating some old dude.  What is he going to pick me up in his Jazzy?   Do we have to be home by 8 to watch his programs on CBS?  And forget my favorite restaurants -  he'll be watching his diabeetus Wilford Brimley-style.  No thank you.  I am not dating some old person.

Apparently, somewhere along the way, I didn't get the memo that I'm not 25 but 40 39 and 3/4.  Even still, I don't want to date a 25 year old either.  I don't want to hang out at raves in converted warehouses in Williamsburg, or, honestly, pretty much anywhere in Williamsburg (well, except the Brooklyn Bowl).  I don't have that kind of wardrobe; I don't own a single hoodie or an ironic t-shirt.  And I want to be in bed at midnight, not going out at midnight.  I have a job.  I have to bring home the bacon and convert that bacon into food that arrives hot at my door through one click of the interwebs.  I am an adult responsible for supporting myself, my cat, and the Turkish restaurant.

As much as I feel 25, and as much as I like to think I'm not getting older, I know that the young people look at me and think differently.  How do I know that?  Well, for starters they call me "Ma'am."  And on the rare occasion I get carded, it's done with a "Sorry, ma'am, it's our company policy" versus any real thinking that I might be 20 years old.  But when I look at my peers -- those who I grew up with and went to college with -- they look the same as ever to me.  I'd like to say when I look at them they look 18, but I think what they really look like is love.  Through my hazy lens of warm feelings, they just look like love to me.  Now, if you're wondering what this looks like, it's similar to how Barbra Streisand and Barbara Walters appear on camera.

I'm actually excited to be 40, and you know, catch up to the age I've always felt.  I'm grateful to be feeling better and better and I feel like I have a little perspective on things.  As much as I worry, I know that, for better or for worse, this too shall pass, and I also know that tomorrow isn't guaranteed.  Seriously, getting older is SO much better than the alternative.

Now, my words don't mean that tears won't be shed.  I will feel entitled to my midlife crisis/breakdown just like everyone else come March.  I will certainly have doubts and wonder WTF happened to my life, but overall, things don't look so bad at 39 3/4.  Dare I say they even look a little promising?  Is this odd, vaguely nauseous feeling happiness?  I have no idea.

It's okay if the young people think I'm ancient and that they smile a little when they see me singing along to the Maroon 5 and the Ke$ha.  I know better.  They still need old folks like me because they don't know how to interact with other humans in person or talk on the telephone.  Someday when someone says to them, "I'm sorry, but who is this Taylor Swift you refer to?" they'll be just as horrified as I was when a girl at work didn't know who Kenny Rogers was.

And they'll think that, when they're 40, they'll have it all together.  That they'll have all the answers.  And they'll be, like, so wrong.  They will never, ever, ever have all the answers, and I mean, ever.  Like, never.

This is 40 on the left; this is 400 on the right.

He's no Rick Springfield, but he'll do.

This is also 40.  Notice marked drop in maturity level from child photo.