Hi, I’m Judith Ashley, author
of The Sacred Women’s Circle series, soul nourishing romantic women’s fiction
that honors pagan spiritual practices. My stories show you what life could be
like if you had a place like The Circle where you are unconditionally accepted,
supported and loved. And where, with this support, you do overcome obstacles and
find your happily-ever-after.
Romancing The
Genres’s January 2020 topic is about humor. We’ve challenged ourselves to tell
a funny story about family, friends or perhaps a funny scene in a book we’ve
written or read. And, as you follow the Genre-istas through this month as well
as check in on our Romantic Comedy Author guests each weekend, I’m sure you’ll
be entertained to the point of at least chuckles if not outright laughter.
I was raised in
a family with an excellent sense of humor. Memories of people laughing so hard
tears coursed down their cheeks are many. So I start this post from the position
of laughter being a good thing, agreeing with the saying “Laughter is the best
medicine.”
Imagine my
surprise when I scoured those memories I just mentioned for The Story to tell in this post and nothing
showed up. Somehow trying to write about the time my mom and I got the giggles
or, according to my dad, hysterically laughed, in church and “the look” he gave
us did not translate to the page.
A warning: while
I do believe laughter heals, I also know some people weaponized humor and
laughter. Talking about writing this post with my best friend who visited a
couple of weeks ago firmed my decision to take this tact with this post. Over the
course of her several day visit, we talked about the political climate in the
United States and other parts of the world. As we shared our perspectives, we
both said pretty much the same thing. Humor can be deadly, laughter can harm.
In a scene in Book
1 in The Sacred Women’s Circle series, Lily:
The Dragon and The Great Horned Owl, my heroine Lily Hughes is explaining to the hero, Jackson Montgomery, that
her first husband would say something cruel and then add “I’m just joking.” Underneath
his denials, she knew he did mean what he’d said. If she or someone else challenged
him, his pat response said looking and sounding wounded was “You can’t believe
I meant that.”
Like Lily, I’ve
been in situations where someone has said something untoward and couched it as “teasing”
or “joking.” Then when I said something about what they said was hurtful, the
comeback was “What was wrong with you?” And that was often followed by a remark
designed to embarrass or humiliate.
Unless we’ve
buried our inner knowing so deep, we’ve
lost contact with it, we do “know” when someone’s joke is an actual attack. And
when that inner knowing tells us the other person is serious what can we do?
How do we
defend ourselves?
How do we take
exception when someone weaponizes humor?
Can that be
done without becoming the target ourselves?
In this
political climate having strategies to protect oneself from “teasing” or “just
joking around” or “you can’t believe I was serious” statements is important.
My best friend
was in line when she heard two people “joking” about shooting someone living in
a car. She turned and said “That’s not okay.” And, that’s all she said before facing
forward again.
It behooves us
all to know where that line is; that line where we will stand firm; where we
will state out loud “That’s not okay” where we will challenge the ‘teaser’ and
call him/her on their word choices.
Words do
matter. And while I may believe most of the time that “words can never hurt me”
unless I allow them to, that belief is not held by everyone.
Let’s help
each other create a rich and varied arsenal of responses to those who weaponize
one of our best “medicines” that gets us through the tough times.
A word of
caution: do be aware of your environment. Can you stand firm and be safe
yourself. This is not about putting ourselves in danger but, instead, letting
people know that the joke isn’t funny.
I’m adopting “That’s
not okay” but also adding “Are you serious? You’d really in this case kill someone who is living in a car?”
How
would you or do you deal with people and in situations where humor is
weaponized? By sharing, you make all of us stronger in an effort to keep humor
as one of our best medicines.
You can
find all of my books at your favorite e-book vendor. Be sure to ask your local
library if you’d prefer to read my books through that resource.
© 2020 Judith Ashley
