Laughter
I mentioned recently that most successful couples share a similar sense of humor. It's true for Mrs. Happy and me. We don't take ourselves or each other all that seriously, try to keep a playful outlook on life, and laugh at every opportunity. One problem we have, though, is that I don't laugh out loud very much. I tend to say things like, "Heh, that's funny," instead of letting loose with a hearty guffaw.
Not that I never laugh. Sometimes something catches me off guard and tickles me to the point that I laugh both loud and long, and sometimes just one or the other. My wife can't figure out and can never predict what will make me laugh out loud, and usually the thing that makes me laugh (more often than not it's something she herself says or does) is something she doesn't find the least bit funny.
Earlier today we were watching the President's Day Law and Order Marathon on TNT. During a commercial break, an ad came on for a movie called "Bad Apple starring Chris Noth. Brought to you by Cat Chow." My wife, sitting in her green denim bean bag chair, commented, "I'd be embarrassed to star in a movie brought to us by Cat Chow." That was the funniest thing I had heard all day. I laughed out loud, left my seat on the couch, crawled over to her, and kissed her, laughing the whole time.
Sometimes she tries to be funny and I don't notice. Sometimes she says something witty and intelligent and I smile. Sometimes she makes a joke and I say, "Heh, that's funny." But sometimes she makes me laugh out loud, typically when she can't understand and I can't explain the humor I see. It works the other way too. She gets hysterical over Nickelodeon's Ren & Stimpy while I don't understand how it ever became popular. Still, our individual senses of humor overlap enough that we laugh together a lot, and plan to do so for the rest of our lives.
