Fun

  

I just read a Times article on fun.  Apparently, I'm not having any.  I need to schedule time for fun, they say.  Watching Netflix does not count.  I'm guessing pleasuring myself doesn't, either.  I'm supposed to have "flow," some shared event.  That, they say, is the key component.  Often, however, when I am with others, I do not have fun.  I guess I need a partner in fun.  

I wonder if they are right, though.  I mean, I have always been fairly solitary.  I was an only child whose early years were spent in a rural town on a farm.  No playmates, at least not my age.  My grandmother watched me and we did fun things like collage (why am I so bad at that now?) and. . . I don't know what else.  I guess I had imaginary adventures.  I learned to read before I went to school and I remember children's books with fantastic illustrations.  Maybe it was that which shaped my personality.  I've always liked the pretend version of things.  

But yea.  I think I need a companion in fun.  There again, however, I fall into the category of "a world for two" as in Hemingway's novels.  His characters are always looking for a separate peace even as he recognizes that a man alone hasn't got a bloody chance.  The protagonist of "To Have and to Have Not" needs his mate. 

I do miss laughing.  That is hard to do alone.  I do sometimes, but there is nothing like shared laughter.  Couples make touchstones of hilarity so that a simple phrase, perhaps, or even a single word, can prompt sidesplitting mirth.  

Yes, that is the thing I miss most.  Well. . . maybe not "most," but it is up there.  

And I don't seem to dance any more.  I am the world's worst dancer, but I am certainly entertaining.  I can make you laugh with one of my Laura Petri moves, I'm sure.  I have the agility of a stone when I dance, with little T-Rex arms and the stiff neck shake, knock-kneed, with maybe a small forward bend at the waist.  Yea, I don't seem to do that any more.  

Playing ball with the boys was fun, but none of them are that mobile any more.  Maybe a game of horse.  But hard courts ruined us.  

We should have played lawn darts or horse shoes.  

I guess I do laugh quite a bit when I go to art exhibits with my friend.  I go a bit nuts there.  I am good at that.  

Do text messages count?  There seems to be some fun there.  Flow and all.  

The maids come today, but that's no fun.  The lawn guy came yesterday and we had a squabble about payment.  That was no fun, either.  I have some straightening to do before the maids arrive, and that brings me little joy.  Then I will go to the gym.  Is that fun?  I talk to more people now.  Is that flow?  

Maybe I'm more social than I think, but I usually end up saying something too weird for that crowd.  Maybe that doesn't count.  

One day when I was driving across the middle of the state looking for "stuff," I came upon a carnival or fair that was setting up outside a speedway.  Fairs are supposed to be fun, but I was there while the workers were setting up.  That was not fun.  They were not fun.  There I was, fay boy with a camera, they greasy and sweaty and dourly criminal living in travel trailers and moving from town to town.  I'm sure they would have hurt me if it wouldn't have brought "the law."  

I didn't stay long. 

That article, it got to me a bit.  I think a person is happiest when it has something to look forward to.  

I haven't had that for a very long time.  I appease my longings sometimes with the occasional sushi.  Jesus.  

Maybe I should join a club.  Play bingo.  Shuffleboard.  Go to church.  

Seriously. . . isn't that what people do?