Guest Blog by Eric Jones: I'm Silly, Deal With It

Our third guest blogger on The Cynical Sarcastic is Eric Jones.  Eric is, without ever trying, the funniest person I know and believe me when I tell you that I'm not even factoring looks into the equation.  Eric and his wife Cheri are just over a month away from welcoming their second child into the world. He was gracious enough to take a minute away from practicing his lamaze breathing (passing out twice is just not cool) to write a little something for us.  And so in the best tradition of Steve Harvey (and because I haven't been able to get him to try an open mic night for almost twenty years and God only knows where else he's gonna get an intro...)

He hails... from Garner, North Carolina.  You've seen him in most of my really good blackmail pictures from Western Carolina University and at the head of the line for An Evening With William Shatner.  He currently stars in daily episodes Whose Case of Sundrop Is This? on the CW and was nearly beaten to death for trying to attend Russell Simmons Def Comedy Jam.  He has broken hearts from the mountains of North Carolina to the hottest parts of Florida and all points in between.  He still wants to grow up to be Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau's love child.  Ladies and gentlemen... get on your goddamn feet and put your hands together for my friend... thank you Jesus the one and only... Eric 'Hambone' Jones!

I am silly.

I am also pretty damn cranky about it, thanks for asking.

I have been asked repeatedly through the years why I am so silly.  My standard answer is that I see so many people daily with dour or mean expressions on their face.  No one acknowledges you when you speak a word of kindness or courtesy anymore.  That is why I am silly: to deal with these people.

I have always had an inner muse: a clown.  Even as a kid I liked to do things that made people laugh.  My silly side came out by splitting sides during my parents’ divorce.  I guess you could say that one single event defined me and will continue to do so for the rest of my days.  When you are twelve and on the cusp of discovering girls, cars, and rock and roll like any other teenager and your parents have an ugly separation, it tends to put a scar on you.  It tears you up.  On pure instinct I took my pain, confusion, guilt, and thoughts of ending it all and redirected them out on society as a whole.  The world got an insecure teenage Jerry Lewis instead of yet another angry, mean spirited Rush Limbaugh clone.  I guess you could say that my silliness started as a survival mechanism.  I still get silly when I am depressed or anxious to this day.  Just ask my groomsmen from my wedding.  I’m still paying for at least one therapy bill.

If the universe was wiser I would never have discovered comedy.  I was indoctrinated at a very young age with the Looney Tunes, The Three Stooges, The Little Rascals, and The Addams Family.  It became natural for me to be as zany as I could be.  It was what I watched.  To those who think television doesn’t shape your brain, allow me to introduce you to my Roger Rabbit impersonation.  Today we have become so absorbed in the Internet and our own lives that we look over people as just a part of the scenery.  Rush to work, rush to the store, rush the kids to this that and the other.  Don’t talk to people; you don’t know who they are or what they want.  Damn right you don’t.  When I pass a lady in the store, I will say good afternoon or good morning.  I get no acknowledgement, co-workers included.  Now if I let Mr. Silly man out, I get smiles and laughter.  Most people let their guard down for that moment.  If you are an astute people watcher, you can read a person while this is going on.  Even when you’re in mid pratfall.

I enjoy making people laugh.  I was reminded recently of my claim to fame.  A group of us were on a trip to Myrtle Beach just after graduation.  Of course I was the fifth or seventh wheel, I don’t remember, it depends on how you tally up boobies.  We had all driven all day to get down there and suffered from weariness and hunger.  Trust me when I say that was a bad combination with this group.  We went to Harry’s House of Pancakes in North Myrtle.  We had an older waitress who you could sense had a rough night and was obviously receptive to something abnormal.

And down we sat.

So, to start things off while I ordered, I pretended to have a short circuit.  I jerked my whole body around right in the middle of ordering then keep right on going through as if nothing happened.  Well that started something that to this day eight people will never forget.  She starts playing back.  By the end of the night, she took a utensil cover, put two E.T. finger like link sausages in it and told me that I could use them as an extension if I needed a little extra in the bedroom. 

We fell under the table!!!

It took the poor lady 15 minutes or longer to wait on the next table because every time any of us would see her walking by and we would lock eyes all of us would crack up.  Poor lady laughed so hard she was crying.

Recently I was talking to one of my customers when one of his employees came in.  I stopped what I was saying so he could talk to the manager.  He begins with “I took it out and stuck it in.”  Being that this is a grocery store, there are not many things you can stick something into.  I bit my tongue as long as I could.  I excused myself and went back to the back of the store to pick up some of my product to merchandise.  When I reached the back room, I had a giggle, then a laugh, then a side splitter.  I was laughing so hard I was sweating.  When I finally calmed down, I still hat the giggles the rest of the day.  That one silly moment put me in a good mood the rest of a day where I had been letting the job get to me.  I saw the guy the next day and told him what I had heard and thanked him for the laugh.  Something about silly came up but then he realized the silliness of it and got himself tickled in the process.

I am also silly for my kids.  My son is still baking in the oven but I do not plan on changing when he gets here.  I didn’t for my daughter and with the meds she seems just fine.  I enjoy playing with children.  My sillies bring me closer to their level of thinking.  When we play wrestle or do some other activity, it’s nice to know she thinks of me as a big child.  She knows when the daddy voice comes out its time to be serious.  I like to think that she will be able to talk to me about anything in the future and I can help comfort her. 

When you get to be this close to forty, you get a little cranky when change comes along.  Personally I’ve decided not going to bother. I am going to try and bring a little smile or giggle to people.  I am going to have laugh wrinkles not frowning wrinkles.  I am going to keep being silly to stay young.  I am not going to walk around so down people ask me “Who died?”  I’ll let my diet give me a heart attack, not stress, thank you very much.

When I pass on I want people to be talking about the screaming Taun-Taun incident, the breakfast sausage, ten million inside jokes and many other things.  My kids will grow up to appreciate true humor.  

So am I silly? 

Damn skippy. Deal with it.