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Sunday, May 23, 2010

Uncle Cecil




My Uncle Cecil and Aunt Sherry have been married for oh, 100 years or something. They have always fit one another so perfectly and they have had a lifetime of laughter. I am a comic and I have seen EVERYBODY. (I'm a pretty big deal) There is not one person alive that is as funny as my Uncle Cecil. Aunt Sherry has been his audience all these years and is his biggest fan. At any gathering, Aunt Sherry would say to Uncle Cecil, "Tell that one story..." He would tell it and she would laugh as if it was the first time she heard it with tears rolling down her face.
Growing up all the family holidays were held at my grandparents house. No one missed it. My Uncle Cecil and Uncle Dean would go back and forth telling stories and acting out events for the entire day. They were so, so funny that half the time we would be falling on the floor holding our stomachs and hurting from the laughter. They went on and on. I know they had challenges in their lives and things that had broken their hearts. But for those days, they had a captive audience and we could not get enough. Of the thousands of comedy shows I've seen, I have still never laughed as hard as I did during the Cecil and Dean Show. And the fact that they could go on for five or six hours of non stop halarity, was amazing. And this was EVERY gathering, they were on fire. As a comic I have thought hundreds of times about a story that Uncle Cecil told and think, why couldn't I do it? Uncle Cecil has a certain thing. His body language, his facial expressions, his timing and just the way he talks. He is the only person that can do him. The thing that is clear in my head is that Aunt Sherry continued to laugh. Now, for the married people, okay, he says the funny thing, but that's it. You don't want to hear that thing again. It doesn't matter how funny it is. How many times has a married person said, "Hey, tell that one story..." Most people I know are saying to their spouses, "Jesus, don't tell that story again. You're killing me with the stories." But Aunt Sherry would give him her complete attention and he would act the whole thing out and tell the story as she laughed holding her stomach and laughing as if it wasn't the fiftyith time she's heard it.
Uncle Cecil loves Aunt Sherry so much that he has spent his entire life making her laugh. And Aunt Sherry has spent her life laughing. I can't think of a better way to spend a life. How often do you hear of two people like that? Married people. Not often. If you have spent your life making the girl of your dreams laugh, you did good. Really, really good.