Did you know that I used to win awards for my writing? (Says the blogger who frequently keyboard smashes and uses excessive question marks...)

When I was in college, I was ALWAYS writing. Of course, being a liberal arts major at a liberal arts college obviously lent itself to a liberal (ha! I made a funny!) amount of writing -- if I wasn't working on an ~award winning~ poem, I was coming up with a column or feature for the school paper. I was thrilled when I finally got to the usually-dreaded Senior Thesis 401, because it meant that I was ready to plunge into an entire course where the only outcome was a paper.

That being said, almost the instant I graduated, I stopped writing. I don't know if the lack of looming deadlines was honestly THAT connected to my creative process, but whatever the case, it's been rare for me to actually open Word or pick up my Moleskine and get out something I'm at least a little proud of.

Luckily, my closest friend from college gets on my case every now and then and encourages me to write. A few weeks ago, I finally bit the coffee-fueled bullet and got this out. It's not much and it's definitely not my favorite, but it's something. And it's out there now, so it feels good.

First Love 

The first love

I had was not

romantic love.

The first love

I had was for the comedy

my father loved.

I’d return from delighted

evenings in neighbors’ yards

and ask dad for a tuna sandwich.

He’d laugh, turn his eyes Belushi-black

and yell “Cheeseburger!”

The darkness behind Belushi’s humor

was irrelevant.

The weakness and addictions

my dad kept hidden

didn’t matter.

What mattered was the grin

that spread across my dad’s

time-worn face

as he kicked his legs,

a homage to Steve’s Happy Feet.

I laughed, sure, at the jokes

that he told (or rather, stole

from his comedy heroes).

But I laughed more at the joy

that wove

through our house. My dad

was happy and that made me

happy.

He could have quoted

the greatest comedian alive

(he often did),

and I wouldn’t have cared,

so long as I caught

his smile,

the one I mirror

when I watch SNL today.