The Simple Jokes of Life

Originally Posted Saturday, July 19, 2014

Q almost said something very clever on his blog today: "Spiritual discovery" for an aesthete consists mainly in rediscovering the simple jokes in life. . . .

Yes, the simplest jokes are the best, especially when they are personal.  I've lost my sense of humor about myself lately.  I've been considering myself too closely and seriously.  Nothing good will come from that.  I fall short in every false comparison I make which, of course, leads to no little dissatisfaction and then to the black hole.  You know that black hole.  Oscar Wilde was an aesthete, wasn't he?  And then. . . oh, what a dark hole that became.  I mean the depression, not his buddy's behind.  But one led to the other and poor Oscar never recovered. 

But when he was good, there was none better.  G.B. Shaw was his equal and of course outlived him in every way if you can consider Shaw's life a life, a sexless, vegetarian life that bordered on breatharian.  But his keen wit did not fail him until death.  I'm not really a fan of either's plays though I understand why they are important just as I understand why the plays of that dour Ibsen were important, too, and understanding that breeds no love.  I might as well throw Flaubert in here, too, while I'm running amok of my point. 

Wilde would have been fun today in a way the others would not.  Early in life, he was crazy for fame as only Yeats could be in his time: "God knows; I won't be an Oxford don anyhow. I'll be a poet, a writer, a dramatist. Somehow or other I'll be famous, and if not famous, I'll be notorious. Or perhaps I'll lead the life of pleasure for a time and then—who knows?—rest and do nothing," said Wilde.  He was right.

But that isn't a simple joke.  This might be:  "A simile committing suicide is always a depressing spectacle."  Or this:  "It is always a silly thing to give advice, but to give good advice is absolutely fatal."  But in light of what Q almost said, I'll leave him with this:

"Art is the only serious thing in the world. And the artist is the only person who is never serious."

It is the advice I would have looked for today.  

*   *   *   

Oh, I forgot.  I want a wall like the one in this picture.  I want to shoot this way.  Won't somebody please make me a portable wall like this?  I need to be in the sunlight.