The Enormity of the Smallness of the Monster
One warm summer evening when I was very
young I was awakened by a repetitive
tap..tap..tap..tap..
sound in my bedroom. I forced myself to lay very quiet in my bed and imagined
what the monster was that was making that sound. I recall as the tapping
continued that it seemed to be getting closer and closer to me. When I became
sufficiently terrified I leapt from my bed and ran to my parent's bedroom. Once
I had explained that there was a monster in my room, my mother took me by the
hand and led me back to see what it was. Turning on the ceiling light we both
were able to see the monster. Hanging on a clothes hook next to the bedroom
door was a hanger covered with a thin tissue paper. An open bedroom window was
bringing a soft breeze into the room which caused the paper-covered hanger to
blow gently back and forth. It tapped lightly (with the light on!) against the
door frame. The monster was
gone.
That childhood experience was recalled the first time I heard John Lennon's recording of "Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy)", a song written for his son, Sean. Lennon sings, "Close your eyes, Have no Fear, The monster's gone, He's on the run." We all have similar monsters in our memories of childhood and each of them ends in the same manner with the discovery that the "monster" was very small and was in no way capable of harming us.
Are not the "monsters" we encounter in adulthood also very small? In his passionate memoir of healing, Anatomy of an Illness as Perceived by the Patient, Dr. Norman Cousins recounts how when diagnosed with a fatal disease he began watching Marx Brothers movies to encourage laughter. he read joke books and laughed repeatedly throughout the day. He literally laughed his illness sway. Norman asked himself, "Is it possible that love, hope, faith, laughter, confidence, and the will to live have therapeutic value?" I read recently that fear destroys your immune system, if this is true, then laughter must surely support it.
One of the things we cherish from the illness which devastated Diana's father was his sense of humor throughout the ordeal. Ray always seemed to find something to laugh at in each new phase of his cancer's attack upon his body. One example exemplifies his attitude toward the cancer. He wanted to take Diana's mother to Kansas City so that she could have a "shopping spree" and a change of pace from the constant care she was giving him. As he was unable to drive he ask if we would take them. He took us to a new restaurant on the Plaza and then set Diana and her mother upon their rounds of the Plaza stores. As Ray and I were walking together we passed a personal care products store names "The Body Shop". He said to me with a chuckle, "I need to go in there, I need a few extra body parts." In the face of a destructive terminal disease, he chose to laugh, as he so often did until he slipped into a coma and quietly departed this life.
Laughter destroys the monsters in our lives. Something Wicked This Way Comes is Ray Bradbury's "must read" classic of fantasy fiction which has never lost its magic and power in my mind. In his novel a carnival comes to town one strange October night. Two boys from the town where the carnival arrives learn that it plays upon the wishes and dreams of those who are drawn to it. The carnival gains control over them, twisting them, trapping them by their very dreams. These boys discover the secret power that they possess which will free them. That power is their laughter. They look evil in its face and they laugh at it. They destroy the "power" of the monster. What they discovered, of course, is that that which we all believe to be a monster in our life, whether that is another person bent upon hurting us with his evil, a devastating illness, or a product of our mind, is simply a rat eager to scurry for cover at the sound that it most dreads, our laughter. Recognize the monster for what he or it is and then have a good laugh!
The monster's gone, He's on the run.
(Written January, 2002)
That childhood experience was recalled the first time I heard John Lennon's recording of "Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy)", a song written for his son, Sean. Lennon sings, "Close your eyes, Have no Fear, The monster's gone, He's on the run." We all have similar monsters in our memories of childhood and each of them ends in the same manner with the discovery that the "monster" was very small and was in no way capable of harming us.
Are not the "monsters" we encounter in adulthood also very small? In his passionate memoir of healing, Anatomy of an Illness as Perceived by the Patient, Dr. Norman Cousins recounts how when diagnosed with a fatal disease he began watching Marx Brothers movies to encourage laughter. he read joke books and laughed repeatedly throughout the day. He literally laughed his illness sway. Norman asked himself, "Is it possible that love, hope, faith, laughter, confidence, and the will to live have therapeutic value?" I read recently that fear destroys your immune system, if this is true, then laughter must surely support it.
One of the things we cherish from the illness which devastated Diana's father was his sense of humor throughout the ordeal. Ray always seemed to find something to laugh at in each new phase of his cancer's attack upon his body. One example exemplifies his attitude toward the cancer. He wanted to take Diana's mother to Kansas City so that she could have a "shopping spree" and a change of pace from the constant care she was giving him. As he was unable to drive he ask if we would take them. He took us to a new restaurant on the Plaza and then set Diana and her mother upon their rounds of the Plaza stores. As Ray and I were walking together we passed a personal care products store names "The Body Shop". He said to me with a chuckle, "I need to go in there, I need a few extra body parts." In the face of a destructive terminal disease, he chose to laugh, as he so often did until he slipped into a coma and quietly departed this life.
Laughter destroys the monsters in our lives. Something Wicked This Way Comes is Ray Bradbury's "must read" classic of fantasy fiction which has never lost its magic and power in my mind. In his novel a carnival comes to town one strange October night. Two boys from the town where the carnival arrives learn that it plays upon the wishes and dreams of those who are drawn to it. The carnival gains control over them, twisting them, trapping them by their very dreams. These boys discover the secret power that they possess which will free them. That power is their laughter. They look evil in its face and they laugh at it. They destroy the "power" of the monster. What they discovered, of course, is that that which we all believe to be a monster in our life, whether that is another person bent upon hurting us with his evil, a devastating illness, or a product of our mind, is simply a rat eager to scurry for cover at the sound that it most dreads, our laughter. Recognize the monster for what he or it is and then have a good laugh!
The monster's gone, He's on the run.
(Written January, 2002)
Posted: Fri - January 20, 2006 at 02:57 PM
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"Chance favors only the prepared mind." - Louis Pasteur
"Art arises from basic needs-a strong need to express and celebrate our everyday events.
In a museum most people spend less than twenty seconds looking at a work of art."
"Art arises from basic needs-a strong need to express and celebrate our everyday events.
In a museum most people spend less than twenty seconds looking at a work of art."
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Published On: Jan 20, 2006 02:57 PM
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Published On: Jan 20, 2006 02:57 PM