This lemonade stand CEO was almost beat. It’s been nothing but work, work, work, and drive, drive, drive. Last week was not pretty. In fact, I don’t think last week has even ended yet; I don’t remember even having a weekend. Let’s see: I did my full-time work during the day, drove home, did my freelance work during the night, went to sleep, and drove back to work again — day after day after day. I had to come in to work on Sunday, so I keep thinking I’m a day ahead. Gosh, is it Friday yet? My mind is fried.

Last night, things looked up. Most of the work was done, and I was able to giggle again. Yes, I giggle. It’s how my joy bubbles out. In this case, a joke started it, and the giggle right away turned into full-fledged laughter, the kind that has a person rolling on the floor and gasping for breath. It was silly, really. The joke wasn’t even that funny, and worse, I was the one who told it.

We were watching Politically Incorrect, and I didn’t have my glasses on. I pointed at a blurry guest and said, “He looks like a Klingon without my glasses on.”

Then, realizing how that sounded, I quickly followed it up with, “But I’ll bet he’d still look like a Klingon even if he had my glasses on.”

From then on, I was lost. I giggled, guffawed, and howled in laughter. I was genuinely amused by my own words — how sad is that? I think I laughed for half an hour, off and on. It didn’t help that my bosom buddy kept calling me Gracie Allen and saying things like, “I can’t believe I just shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas, I’ll never know.”

And I laughed and laughed and laughed and laughed. The laughter warmed my blood, relaxed my muscles, and loosened my limbs. It was only then that I realized how tense I’d been, how tight my face was — starting with the production meeting (where I explained the relationship of my work to everyone else’s by saying, “I’m the farthest from the exit in a burning building; if you all run quickly, I might just get out on time”) and ending with last night’s drive home (which seemed 500 days longer than usual because of the headache I was nursing).

It was a happy, exhilirating laugh… but probably far too freeing. I enjoy my workplace — truly enjoy it — because of the camaraderie (when we’re not all stressing over a book) within and between departments, extending to our down-to-earth, easily approachable executive officers. But, oooh, when I’m happy, I get this irrepressible streak of irreverence in me, and I make jokes with everyone — and I mean everyone.

So it came to happen that today, when our company’s president asked to see my copy of the book we were all working on, I told him, “Sure. In fact, you can take it.”

“What if I lose it?” he asked, and without missing a beat, without thinking a thought, I said with a smile —

“Then I’ll slap you.”

Egad.

The president. I can’t believe I said that to our company president. I think I turned every shade of red when I realized it, and thank God he really is a nice guy.

“Ooh… I’m nervous now,” he joked with everyone in the room, and it was worth a hearty laugh or two then and even throughout the rest of the day.

How cool is that? It’s people like him and everyone else I work with that make the work worth it.

They know how to laugh. 🙂

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