Bet You didn't Think I'd Do This!

I’ve always been told how funny I am and have often been told that I should be a comedian. Personally I know I look at things a bit differently than most but I’ve never seen myself as one who can “tell jokes”. I do much better telling stories and “working off” other people. I add things to conversations. Kind of like a counter puncher in boxing. I see what’s thrown out there and react to it. Fortunately most people find the things I say funny. I’ve always enjoyed that.

Stand up comedy has always fascinated me. The balls it takes to get up in front of a crowd of strangers is something that I’ve always thought very highly of. I used to stay up watching Johnny Carson until 1:00 am when I was young just because he used to have the comedian on last. I could never count the amount of times I’ve gone to local comedy clubs and concerts featuring comics. Suffice it to say its well into three digits. Hell, I used to be a local at The Comedy Store in La Jolla.

With all that being said, I went and did something that, I’m sure, none of you out there thought I ever would. I went down to the Detroit area and found a comedy club that was having an amateur night and I got my nerves under control and actually did it.

I had been thinking about this for ages. As I stated earlier, I’m not into the telling jokes with setups and punch lines and that’s all you ever see at an amateur night. I wanted to find a couple subjects and then try to just talk about them and give my somewhat odd take on that subject. I did practice some. I have found a couple places where people do readings and things like that, you know, coffee shops and things out in Ann Arbor. I would go and read an essay or two that I wrote and I found that I would throw in a couple comments about what I was reading about and people would laugh. It was really cool because I wasn’t even trying, it would just be something that would pop into my head about the subject I was reading about.

So, I got myself all dressed up, suit, tie and all that stuff and drove down to the club. I didn’t tell anyone where I was going because I know I couldn’t have done it if anyone I knew was there. I did tell Karen and Bobbie, one of the girls here at the office, what I was doing, just not where. It was about an hour and a half drive and the entire way down I kept running the essays I’ve written in my head. I was trying to figure out which ones I felt I could play off of without stumbling. I settled on a few I thought would work and felt pretty good about what I was about to do.

Of course, when I got there I was as nervous as could be. I sat in the car for quite a while trying to find the right excuse to not go through with it. After convincing myself to go ahead and just do it I went inside and signed up. The guy at the sign up desk asked me what music I wanted. I told him I had no idea what he was talking about and he explained that there was a list of songs that I could go through and choose from to play me on and off the stage. Cool. I looked through the list and saw “Born To Run” by Springsteen and figured, what the hell, I love the song, it’s an up tempo kind of thing and I thought it would be a kind of motivating factor in getting me up for what I was about to do.

Well, of course the dreaded time came and they announced my name. It was different from the time I did Karaoke. I felt totally prepared with how I wanted to do this and wasn’t nearly as scared as I was when I did the singing thing. As I went up and the song was playing the crowd cheered and that was nice. As the music ended the crowd kept cheering and yelling “Bruce” real loud. There were only about 25 to 30 people there and at least half were yelling. I mentioned something like “You gotta love Bruce” and they cheered louder.

It was at that very moment that everything changed. The plan I had went out the window and I decided right then and there that I was going to talk about Bruce and see where it went. I mentioned that a number of years ago some state representative from New Jersey had submitted a bill to make “Born To Run” the state song of New Jersey. Again, the crowd cheered and started yelling his name. I asked if they really thought it was a good idea and again, they cheered.

I then took the next three or four minutes and recited the lyrics to the song pausing numerous times along the way to talk about what I had just said and how ridiculous it was that this could be a state song. With lyrics like:

“Baby this town rips the bones from your back
It’s a death trap, it’s a suicide rap
We gotta get out while we’re young
‘cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run”

and:

“Together we could break this trap
We’ll run till we drop, baby we’ll never go back”

It was quite easy.

I think they actually had fun with the whole thing. The further along I got the more comfortable I was. About mid way through I took the mike off the stand and had one hand in my pocket and was just strolling around the stage. Then something really cool happened.

I’ve spoken before about how there are moments that happen where everything just fits. Well, this was one of them. I had forgotten to turn my phone off and, needless to say, it started ringing. This was how I knew things were going my way. My ring tone is “Born to run”. I pulled the phone out of my pocket and put it up to the mike and that got a few laughs. I then asked if they minded if I took the call and they laughed some more. Of course I didn’t, I just turned it off and put it away and asked where we were in the song. A couple up front told me exactly where I was and I just continued. I finished the song with the line in the last verse that goes:

“Everybody’s out on the run tonight but there’s no place left to hide”.

And I said something like Resolved: Born To Run should not be the state song of New Jersey. I got a nice hand and I told them thanks for making a dream come true and that was it.

I went out to my car and just sat and brought myself back to reality for well over an hour. I didn’t get home until 2:30 in the morning. I was and am very proud of myself with the way I changed my plan with no warning and was able to go ahead and talk about something off the cuff. Of course it seemed like I was up there for hours but I’m sure it couldn’t have been more than three or four minutes. I’ve been asked by the gang around here if I’d do it again. The answer right now is absolutely not. But, who knows. That could change someday. I did like the feeling of being up there but it was the two or three weeks I spent convincing myself to do it that was pure torture.

Anyway, another item off the list.