Birth of a grey hair.

This morning it appeared to me. A little grey hair nestled comfortably in my beard. I pulled that bastard as quick as Grady Little should've pulled Pedro. Not because I was ashamed, but because it meant something and I wanted to look at it. It seemed like I should do something today, that's what it said to me. Not literally, because then I'd be off the the funny farm. I thought I should make a document my adventures in stand-up comedy.

I'm a newbie at it, but have been watching stand-up since I can remember. I've always wanted to try it, but I've been scared to fail at it. But a life event happened recently that made me rethink my fear. (Grab a tissue, this is where it gets heavy). My mom passed away recently from complications from cancer. I've often done charity things with a comedy acoustic band I'm in called Pork & Beans for cancer research. It was something that hit home. My brother-in-law had a bout with cancer and survived, which prompted me to look into making more of a positive difference. We play shows and raffled items off to fans to make money and donate to charity. My mother unfortunately didn't survive, and I took a long hard look at myself as she was fighting her illness. She had always taught me to be proud, a gentleman, a hard worker, and right then she taught me not to be afraid of something so trivial as failure. If she could go through what she was going through, and I could cower because people wouldn't laugh at some of my jokes, it felt pretty odd that I should still carry that fear. So I went out and signed up for a workshop, and that's where we are today.

I worked through the Comedy Connection in Portland, Maine under the tutillage of Tim Farrell who has a pretty impressive resume, but that's for another time maybe. I met some great people, and if they knew it or not, they were my once a week therapy for what was going on in my personal life. The class was seven weeks long, and at the end we had a graduation show. I was put on last (a little pressure, but nothing the kid can't handle) and had a great set. The room was packed, and I had all kinds of people coming up after the show telling me how funny I was. I'll go into the detail in another post. Cut. Tarintino forward one week to Lewiston, Maine as the end of my set at a club called Confetti's comes to an end, not nearly the same reaction as a week before. More detail later on, but I'll tell you I sure learned a couple more lessons there.

Basically, I'm going to do a write up of the shows I've done as they progress, and maybe if you'd like you might have been to one of the shows and you can give me your 2 cents. Feel free, that's what this is for. That's pretty much the intro, no horn section or marching band, but it'll get the ball of wax rolling. And who doesn't like rolling wax balls?