So You Think You’re a Comedian?

I’ve been writing all my life.  Seems like I replaced the bottle with a pencil.  No, really, that’s what I remember.

I never really talked to my Mom growing up.  But, I remember one day leaving a question on a small notepad in the morning before school (I was a genius at 7, I’m telling ya. Ok, ok, I wasn’t into the existentialist questions like this poor young fellow).  When I got home there was an answer.  WOW!  That was really cool.  So every morning I’d write a question in my book and every afternoon when I got home there’d be an answer.  At first it was weird because I didn’t know who was leaving the answer. 

Finally, being the genius I was, I figured out that it was Mom. This actually turned out to be quite fun and humorous as we continued this little game over the years.  By the time I entered high school I was writing more than just questions for the universe to answer.  Questions sometimes became stories and answers returned in poetry. I spent most waking hours scribbling (yes, scribbling because back then we didn’t even have computers in the schools much less in the home) in one notepad or another. 

The Things People Write 

I found that I had quite the knack for writing.  I wrote funny things, sad things, and one story in particular was very very bitter, at least according to my English teacher.  I even tried poetry, but my feel for that was not as good as with prose.  I remember how my talent as a creative fiction writer was received by my English teachers in high school.  This lead me to the best Creative Writing instructor of all time:  Dr. Chard.  He was the best writing instructor I ever had. I actually lost a lot of my shyness in college thanks to him: “Put it out there.  Leave nothing on the table.” 

Unfortunately I didn’t 

Like most people life got in the way and my dream of becoming the next greatest American Author faded as I jaunted off to the Air Force  where I thought writing would take a back seat.  Less than a year into my AF career I found that writing played a very pivotal part of everything I did.  

I was writing briefs for pilots, I wrote instruction manuals for new computers that came with little or no documentation, I wrote newletters for staff that couldn’t make the meetings, and I even wrote training documentation for newbies coming in. 

So what does all this have to do with being a Comedian?  

Everything.  Each area of my life involves writing, sometimes I get to be funny.  Even as I blog now, I always look for the funny angle.  I was reprimanded once in the AF because my sarcastic funny wit was not appreciated for some of the staff summaries I wrote up every morning (they were funny and I just can’t help myself – most people liked them, I just got out-ranked).  

As I look back at all my years of writing, I have learned (without really realizing it) that there is a time and place for funny. I have learned like most good writers, that style is dictated by audience.  A user manual has no place for digression or a funny story (though I have even bent this rule from time to time with my screenshot examples).  A web site on real estate or mortgages needs to be serious and informative. The only time I got around this slightly, was a ghost blogging job I got.  They, luckily, liked the funny slant to the mortgage blog.  Of course the website content did not include humor. 

So despite the fact that I’m always looking for the funny line, I have learned when to use a specific style or voice.  Web site content is different than blog content which is different from user and training manuals and so forth and so on. 

If you want to be a great writer, you must first enjoy writing.  I can write anything so long as I enjoy the genre.  Second, you can be an excellent writer if you can write in different styles and voice.  Listen to your client.  They will give you your voice which in turn dictates your style.  Don’t be afraid to have fun with it.  Sometimes you never know where the funny can come from. 

Keep writing. A really excellent writer never stops.  If your fingers are on a keyboard or wrapped around a pen or pencil, you’re a writer and everything you write makes you a better writer. 

So how do you inject your writing with humor?