CONTENTS
CONTENTS
Chapter 3
How I became a comic...Warning - There's a Bait & Switch
*please do not read if you are easily offended or disturbed
Let’s start with the funny part of this one, because it's going to get very, very heavy. And I should warn you, if you are easily offended or sensitive to personal information, please please STOP reading now.
Ever since I can remember, my absolute favorite thing to do in the world has been to make people laugh. I know I said in my previous blog that I let "food be my medicine," but I do believe laughter is in the top 3 things to keep me healthy! In Junior High school, I considered it my mission to be the joke teller, coming up with inappropriate doozies that my teachers had no idea how to handle. Though I was a straight A student, I spent a lot of time in detention, the longest being when I said the girl who volunteered to erase the board just wanted to shake her ass in front of the classroom. As I went on into high school, my propensity to weave comedy - usually with a sexual undertone - into the classroom and even in my assignments grew strong. I was voted "Class Clown" as a Senior, even though I was also the very nerdy, over achieving valedictorian. The photo that my male counterpart and I submitted for the yearbook was so inappropriate that it was omitted from the “Senior Most” page where we will forever go down in history as Class Clown: Kate & Craig, photo not available. To be fair to the Principal, it was me sitting on the toilet, legs spread up in the air (pants on) making a face like I am taking a giant shit as Craig stood beside me, handing me a massive wad of toilet paper. Mind you, this predates unisex bathrooms, so we were pretty ahead of our time.
As I advanced in to college, I recall being also the clown of my sorority writing raunchy poems for hell night and parody songs for our events. I was asked on several occasions into adulthood to MC events - taking the role at a colleague’s 50th birthday where I roasted her before I even knew what roasts were. I became very interested in comedy and became a regular guest at the Funny Bone in Columbus, Ohio. I will never forget how I once started dating a comic after he tried to heckle me in the front row and I zinged back so quickly. He was so fucking hot - completely my type - doing a very standard bit on how men think about sex every few seconds, points at me and says, “but how often do you think about sex?” Without a pause, I said, “pretty much constantly since YOU walked out on stage.” The audience roared and he found me after the show...for..um... drinks.
I had the chance much later to MC my Best Friend's wedding where I proceeded to tell a story about how she and I used to wish we could meet a guy to date similar to each other and could be like how we are together. We had joked about one of us having a sex change, but couldn’t decide who since she was taller and should be the guy, but had way bigger and better tits. Yeah, I said that at a wedding reception, pretty much moments after I disclosed that though I dated her nephew, I fantasize about her niece and implied that the groom, bride and I had a threesome when I suggested we three live happily ever after. Because this family knows and loves me, I not only got away with it, but they LOVED it. I got a bit of an addiction to the mic and began speaking at company events, always weaving humor in my presentations. It was usually at my own expense, like the time I had a wardrobe malfunction with a coconut bra that slid down to my belly button and sighed into the mic without thinking, “Is that how my tits are going to look at 60?”
Flash forward to a move to San Francisco where a few of my teammates begged me to try stand up after I had them all laughing in the office or at events, usually at my own expense, despite my being the highest ranking employee there. At around the same time, I had gone to a comedy club to watch the “Get Mortified” show; as I was leaving, I made eye contact with a very sexy bouncer. We started loosely dating (use your imagination) but were around each other enough for him to comment on my humor, imploring that I start writing down my jokes. A few weeks later, I attended a “Moth” National Podcast Story Slam having no idea that the show I was attending on the theme of DIVORCE was a sort of open mic event. After much prompting from my friend, I dropped my name in the hat thinking I would never be picked and I better not be because I only had ONE punchline on Divorce. Of course, I was drawn second and proceeded to tell the most inappropriate and sex-laden divorce story of the night. The adrenaline was so high and as people laughed, I felt almost a euphoria, a sort of energy that ripped through me knowing people were laughing with me, not at me. If you read blog one, Diary of a Sappy Teen, you know I was teased quite a bit in school and never had the power of when and why people laughed at me, but this was different. This gave me the power to either be funny and get laughs or, it’s actually a failure if people don’t laugh. Imagine that. So, I sent the video from that night to that “boyfriend” I had and he loved it. He shared it with his team and they signed me up to do a show the very next week. I was so nervous and to make matters worse, I told everyone I knew in San Francisco and most of them came, I sold the most seats, so I had to go last on my first actual stand up set. I wouldn’t say I killed, but I got some great laughs and learned a lot from that show, applied those learnings to the next and the next until I felt almost comfortable up there.
San Francisco venues: Public Works, Neck of the Woods, and The Milk Bar
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That one joke..
Feeling comfortable generating laughter about things that are generally funny gave me an idea…. I needed something new to test, so I found some courage down in the depths and told the following joke on the heels of a self deprecating joke about my lifelong weight issues:
“I was talking to my therapist about my childhood...And we’re $7,000 in at this point… and I ask ‘so, where did this weight issue come from?’ We dug down into my history and we came up with two possibilities: either I was trying to make myself less attractive to that dirty uncle or the cookies he was using to lure me worked really fucking well.”
The deep groan of disgust in the audience was not only as rewarding as laughter, but the entire experience was cathartic. I sent the recording to some friends, one of whom wrote back, “OMG ,dirty uncle!!! So bad but so funny” And I said, “yeah, that was very therapeutic for me after all these years.” She replied in shock, “Holy shit, that’s not a joke? I feel so bad laughing…” For me, it’s not only OK that she laughed. I needed her to. Granted, growing up with a pedophile living with your family excluding only the few short years he was imprisoned for the offense is not a laughing matter. Having to see him at the dinner table at holidays years later, with the rest of the family acting as though it’s totally cool that a man who molests children should be in charge of dessert was absolute torture. Having said that, not being able to take all of its power away - his power - would be worse.
To clear up any concerns, the man is now dead - has been for years… And, some of the family did not know exactly what he did, to whom, because we were all afraid our respective Dads or Brothers would murder him and we would ruin the family… So I can forgive the adults in the situation who were ignorant versus those who were delusional - and this is an important part of the process. For anyone (maybe 1 in 3 or 4) who does not know what it’s like to be sexually abused as a child, there is a very strange self blame to it. Like, how did I not say something or do something, fight back or get away. And then, I meet a five year old and think, OK, that’s not fair that I am looking at this like an adult projecting back into my childhood my current day brain power, awareness and decision making capacity.
When I came to these terms that what happened was not my fault, finally at age 24, I drove to his house, knocked on his door and sat in his living room with an epic stare down. I said, “I would like for you to apologize to me.” He replied, “For what?” I simply replied, “You know why you need to apologize, though I will never understand why you did what you did.” He looked back at me with dead eyes - empty heartless eyes - and said in the most shaky and fearful yet defensive tone, “I don’t know what you are talking about and I don’t need to sit here and listen to this in my own home.” I stood up, squared up to him as a confident young woman and said, “Thank you for that; I just needed to see that you are weak and that you are crazy and that you are miserable and alone. I forgive you because whatever must have happened to you to drive what you did to me and your own grandkids must have been dreadful.I am sorry for you, so you don’t even need to be sorry for me.”
I walked out and within a few weeks, for the first time, I was able to forgive myself and release being a victim. It may have taken a lot of courage to do that, sure. Was I proud of myself, maybe a little. But what makes me feel strongest about this is that - because I have shared this story with people when I could see they had the same behaviours I had until I let go - I have helped many women and men talk about childhood sexual abuse and actually DEAL WITH IT. Family secrets are toxic and unfortunately can be repeated for generations, so I beg of you…. If you are/were abused or suspect someone is being abused, please don’t keep it secret out of embarrassment or disbelief. You may save a future victim and you also just may save yourself.
As a stand up comic, I make the excuse for myself that my humor is so sexually inappropriate because that’s been my experience since the age of 5…. Sexually inappropriate. The good news is that I don’t feel its power anymore and all joking aside, no longer use it as an excuse for my shitty relationships with men. For that, I totally just blame the said man. (OK, gentlemen readers, that was only a joke…) In closing, my final distasteful joke I shall tell on the topic had come up one night when I was giving myself a pedicure on the side of the bed one night. My ex-husband looked over and asked, “What do you call that tool you are using on your feet? A pedi-file?” I replied, “Yes, I love to be in bed with my pedi-file! It’s a whole new brand - when you get one, you register it online so everyone in a 3 mile radius knows there is a pedi-file in the neighborhood. Get it?” #notamused
WHO IS MY FAVORITE COMIC?
My all time favorite Comedian is Jim Gaffigan - most simply because his content is 100% clean, almost purely observational about things that are so funny that I had not even considered to make jokes about, and because of his very matter of fact delivery. I have seen him live twice and both times, I was so impressed. I have worked on my bits to be a bit less risque but he's got a gift that I do not.
In context for THIS BLOG, I should also site that Dave Chappelle does a bit on this topic that truly made me laugh and feel a bit normal. He has been slammed by critics for being offensive in this latest special, as maybe I am for making a joke about my own circumstance which may hurt other sexual abuse victims' feelings. I can only share how I have dealt with it and hope that finding a way through it - regaining my power - is understandable, helpful, and not in any way insensitive nor offensive.
"There is a thin line that separates laughter and pain, comedy and tragedy, humor and hurt." -Erma Bombeck
Self Talk Highlights
1. There are things in life we cannot control (other people, their behaviors, mother nature, etc.) and there are things we can control, most obviously, our reaction to the things we cannot. I cannot control the minds of pedophiles nor even come close understanding why my Uncle did what he did. And, as a child, I could not control that this happened to me. What I can control, as an adult, is how I process and accept what happened, discontinue promoting my own behaviours of being a victim, and help other people grapple with their own abuse, even if that's just to let them say it out loud and never talk about it again. Comedy has been my way to deal with the rough parts of my life as laughing feels so much better than crying or self loathing. Like I said, I gave MYSELF the power back.
2. There are things in life that are SCARY AS FUCK but I have to tell you my scariest moments have been my most rewarding. I read a book once called Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway and I seem to use that quote as self talk when something makes my ankles queasy - that's my placement of fear for some reason - my ankles - maybe my Achilles Heel.
Being a comic is in general very scary - and telling that joke on stage was scariest thing I have EVER done. Posting this blog about it, even scarier yet. But - so many people have told me, "I have always wanted to try stand up," but they haven't done it out of fear. If you want to try stand up - I encourage you to do so, even if it's just once. It's completely nerve wracking, but SO worth it.
As well, many people I know have been abused and have not dealt with it. If you are too afraid to talk to someone you know, you can reach out to RAINN, or you are 100% welcome to talk to me. You may email me from the Contact Me page of my blog. I hope that this post does not elicit undue sympathy or awkward feelings about my history, but I am willing to take the risk nkowling the first step to fostering positive change is to drive awareness of the issue and that there are resources available to get help.
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