What Makes Me Laugh
By G David Schwartz


Asked what makes me laugh I deny the ability to say, “Your face!”
I also deny saying the conglomerate heights of Groucho Marx.
It is something in the middle which causes laughter.
I do not laugh at anything which causes anyone any pain
The Three Stooges, curly (the bald one) Larry and Moe do not make me laugh (any more).
They did have an element of what seems essential to cause laughter: surprise… and shock
What truly makes me laugh, these days is wordplay. It is no longer the gross unusual but it is still shock value. And I think I laugh so as not to feel insulted and cry.
Laughter, I have heard it said, is the best medicine. I think that is really so true because you exercise your heart, become stronger in the surprises which life throws your way.


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G. David Schwartz - the former president of Seedhouse, the online interfaith committee. Schwartz is the author of A Jewish Appraisal of Dialogue. Currently a volunteer at Drake Hospital in Cincinnati, Schwartz continues to write. His new book, Midrash and Working Out Of The Book is now in stores or can be ordered.