It’s a new month and that means another opportunity to give myself arbitrary deadlines. I‘ll be attempting to publish a new post every week in August. Stick around to see if I do and by all means, shame me if I don’t.
On a slightly less arbitrary note, we’ve now passed the 3-month mark until Jokes to Offend Men comes out! And as I say every time, this is supposed to be a newsletter about comedy and writing and angst, but I’ve mostly just been covering the angst part…So for the next month, not only will I write with consistency, but I will earnestly try to stick to the prompt. I’m going to try to explain to you the circumstances that led to me writing a feminist joke book (and I’m going to hope you find it interesting).
So to start, let’s go back to the beginning.
Part 1: Funny girl
Growing up I was very a shy, nervous kid. Afraid to speak in groups, paralyzed to speak to boys. But always my mind was going a million miles an hour. I had so much to say. So once in the company of my most trusted female friends, I acted like a lunatic. I mean that in the most loving way. All the strange and silly observations from the day came shooting out of me in safe spaces like sleepovers and Dairy Queen.
I’ve heard many authors say they were inspired to write because of a particular book they read as a kid. But my earliest motivation for writing was pure expression. I had a lot of things to say but when I said them out loud I would stumble, mumble, generally trail off and recede into the background until someone else mercifully changed the subject. But on paper, I was in control of my thoughts. And while I wouldn’t say my early writing was good, I would say it was the first time I ever felt confident with my words.
Once I discovered this powerful tool called writing, I wasn’t about to give it up.
But what did I even write about during ages 8-17? The early years, cats mostly. Later years, sad bad poems about not having a prom date. I was just writing down what I saw and trying to describe it in as much detail as possible. For someone that had such social anxiety, it was very freeing to me to discover that I could actually come up with clever interesting things to say. All I needed was a little time and a quiet space. Thus, a writer was born.
Was my fear of public speaking a part of my innate personality or a product of my environment? It’s safe a bet to say both. But the older I get, and certainly the experience of writing a feminist joke book, I’ve come to realize how my behaviors were influenced by the patriarchy, and by that I mean Brendan Holmes (name changed, but representative of every Brendon or Brandon I went to school with).
In my classes, the loudest boys said the dumbest shit that got the biggest laughs. In 7th grade I specifically remember Brendan Holmes loudly declaring, “smells like tuna in here” after a girl sitting next to him uncrossed her legs. And everyone cracked up, including me, because that’s what passed for comedy in suburban Connecticut in the year 2000. This continued to be the gold standard through high school and then on into college, where it morphed from merely sophomoric sexist idiocy to edgy sexist idiocy.
I always thought it was bullshit that these boys got all the laughs. But what I hadn’t considered until recently was the cumulative damage it had done. How years of being silenced by loud, unfunny men* set me back and messed with my head. Because I can intellectually know that Brendan Holmes is not funny, but when that’s all that anyone’s laughing at, and you’re 13, then 21, then 34, and still desperately want to be liked, you question if it’s worth even sharing what you have to say (even if it’s super funny and ahead of its time).
I blame Brendan Holmes for everything wrong in my life. Just kidding but for real, he influenced my very misguided, early attempts at humor and laid the groundwork for my internalized sexism! Namely thinking that comedy was making fun of people, especially other girls, so I could seek the approval of…boys. Good lord. It’s problematic, folks! Let’s all take a moment to weep for our younger selves. And then celebrate that we all survived middle school and hopefully have access to therapy or maybe just a newsletter :)
I promise to be back next week with the second part of my journey to joke book!
*In our book we created a composite man, “Greg.” But we invite you to slot in whatever boy terror or nightmare boss applies to you.
About me: I’m a Brooklyn-based writer, deeply inspired by the 18 years I spent growing up in the Connecticut suburbs during the 90s and early 2000s. My first book, Jokes to Offend Men, is out this October. Pre-order now!