Thursday, June 12, 2008

Why do I laugh?

I feel like such a horrible, evil person when I laugh when someone falls. I don't know what about it strikes me as funny. I don't laugh when a child falls because its expected. But when an adult, dressed up for work, ends up splayed pancake-style on the floor, I have to cover my mouth and think about depressing things so I don't appear callous and rude.


It happened at work today, while the 4'oclock news was on TV. One moment this person is talking and joking with me, then next minute all I see are his black-polished shoes waggling in the air. He scrambles up and smiles with a sheepish grin, but there's really no way to recover from a fall across a TV wire.

I also laugh at myself when I fall. Like the time I was carrying an armload of books at the University of Oregon and decided to eat pavement in the middle of an intersection. Or the time when my butt made a washboard out of the school bus steps. My tailbone was bruised and I had to sit out of PE for 6 weeks. I also fell in the lobby of Fisher Plaza about 6 months, but luckily I was past the security guards (and this was after I tripped TWICE in the newsroom).

Do you laugh when people fall or am I just a horrible person?

1 comment:

andrea said...

Or remember that time you dressed up as a fruit and rolled down a ramp?

Ha ha ha! Hilarious!