ON BREAKING; or, HOW TO REALLY APPRECIATE THE CAROL BURNETT SHOW

i had the greatest laugh of my life tonight. colleen quit her service job of five years, and a group of us went out to celebrate. at her request, the table took turns telling stories of its worst job experiences. we started with our most memorable, only to remember as the night went on the real gems of our careers. the second and third rounds remembered our best stories, and at one point during i had that greatest laugh.

that greatest laugh. it's the greatest because it reminds you of having had such great laughs in the past, moments that you only recall when you're given cause to wonder if in fact tonight you really haven't ever laughed so hard before. and you laugh hard. the light is good, and you're in amazing company -- the conversation flows like it doesn't always... and the light is good...and someone's taking pictures -- and you love laughing so hard because you've never before thought to step back and think that you're stepping back to acknowledge that maybe you've never laughed so hard in your life. it's the greatest laugh because you wonder if perhaps it isn't, and you wonder so because you're in such great company that you wonder why you've never been given cause to wonder before, and you wonder whether it's just because you're laughing so hard that you just want this laugh to be the greatest. and so it is.

the muscles in my torso hurt from it. my face hurt from trying to keep it in. (we're all getting on in time, and no one wants it to show.) "twatters," and being fired by your own father and the two days you worked that one job because you needed to make rent and unfortunately saw the worst of a friend as a result: a friend that's here to celebrate and from whom you never want to see the same ugly resignation again.

the retellings, though, they're funny. the retellings are why we tell stories. someone's taking pictures because it's funny, and because, boy, these drinks are strong. the house music is a late 90s mix, and you think about the u2 song, the song (or the other one) that typifies that feeling of our old naivety, the lust for manhattan or wherever, when those places seemed like the beacons of making it. the romance and the beautifully easy struggle. then we stoke our little fire in a hope that we've all unequivocally stated at some point that portland is really the place of now that new york or wherever was in the nineties. and now, the house, and the relationship...and the failed relationship...are all as laudatory as they are lamentable. that's what we love; or, for better or for worse, that's what we share, and so we laugh.

whatever story in particular isn't worth retelling. it was the company, or the light or the "these drinks are strong." it's only happening here, we think and say, so take heart and everything like that. but it's happening everywhere, and the story's not worth retelling because you have stories of your own to fill in the blanks and to help recall having that great laugh.

carol burnett. that show. i loved it as a child, but also remember being impressed at such a frighteningly formidable presence. she came up tonight, as much of a red herring reference-in-passing of tonight's conversation as she is now in my narrative of the evening. carol burnett could laugh. that wasn't even how she came up, but i'll let it make sense that way. what a woman. i wonder if i've ever laughed so hard as i laughed tonight because i remember knowing how hard other people have laughed. it's for us, too. so thanks, and congratulations, colleen.

before the end of the night, i got to recommend aoibheann sweeney's novel to a new friend after introducing it through a diatribe on the recent success of fiction describing queer adolescents that hasn't, thankfully, succumbed to the dead horse of the old coming out story. we've gotten that far. that was probably most of the company's experience, and it's nice to see it in mass market print, however belated. i'd gifted the book to colleen a couple of years earlier, if only because it's fun to post things to friends in the same city. like ms. carol burnett, the evening was otherwise untied to ms. sweeney, and i had no other telling motivation for the recommendation. we laughed. it was a happy commiseration.

god damn. you write things like that and wonder if you aren't the belated one. i'm getting old. tonight, at least, like i said, the light was good.