How to make cancer funny?
— Hodgkin lymphoma? More like Hodgkin lame-phoma.
—Did you hear about the tin can soldier who informally addressed his tin can general? The general responded, “It’s ‘Can, sir!’”
—Did you know that a bald head actually helps you blend in with your surroundings? They call it chemo-flage.
Those three mediocre jokes took me over a half-hour to come up with. How to make cancer funny?
I have always believed strongly in the power of humor. Throughout every crisis in my life — be it a big adult scare or teen-angsty heartache — I’ve always been able to joke my way through it. And I’ve joked my friends through whatever they’ve been going through. Finding the funny has always been my superpower. So why do I now find myself without a cape?
When I first heard that my beloved cousin has cancer, I didn’t reach out to him. I knew I couldn’t summon the funny, and I didn’t want to burden him with the quiver in my voice. I didn’t want him to feel as if he had to take care of me.
I watched the movie “50/50” for research. That was a comedy about cancer, right? I could be the Seth Rogen to my cousin’s Joseph Gordon-Levitt. But if I learned anything from the movie, it’s that you can only make cancer patients laugh by making fun of your tubby body, small privates and Jew ‘fro. That wouldn’t quite work for me.
This is scary. It’s scary, and I’m not the one going through it. It’s scary, and it’s happening nearly 3,000 miles away.
My husband asked whether he could shave his head in solidarity. We considered mailing a swim cap so my cousin could get used to how he looks without hair. Maybe send a swim cap for his new dog, too. An animal lover, my cousin is looking for a comfort pet. Maybe he should get a Lab because he’ll be spending so much time in labs. Ugh!
How do you make cancer funny?
Over a week had passed since I heard the diagnosis, and I still hadn’t called. Still hadn’t figured out how to talk without exposing the quiver in my voice, without feeling the urge to go completely manic, making a million jokes per second, which would inevitably fall flat.
I stuck to sending text messages. It felt safer, as if I had more control.
My cousin has a crass sense of humor. He loves a good chuckle, an inappropriate joke, an assault on the politically correct. That was something I could deliver on.
My son and I took a walk around the city, taking pictures of all the disgusting trashed tissues we could find. And there were plenty of options. Gnarly, gag-worthy tissues. Tissues that looked as if they were covered in blood. In dirt. In sewage. And one that for sure looked soaked in polio.
I made a portfolio of these pictures and sent them to my cousin, with a note that read, “I know you’re scared about your nasty tissue, so here are photos of tissues guaranteed to be grosser than yours.”
My cousin laughed heartily, giddy in his disgust — or at least I think he was. It was all done via text messaging, so I was interpreting his LOLs.
I racked my brain for what could be funny and personal to my cousin. Perhaps a clown? Specifically, Clowny. Clowny was a stuffed clown that he had used as a pacifier, literally sucking the doll’s face, causing it to fade away. Clowny spent years by my cousin’s side. His comfort, his security blanket.
Its image far from clear in my mind, I took to searching the Internet and found a clown that fits my memory, with one exception: This one has a face.
I sent it to my cousin, wondering whether I had finally done it, whether I had made cancer funny. I mean, I sent him a clown! What’s funnier than that?
But it wasn’t funny. It was sweet. If I got the doll right. It’s downright creepy if I sent the wrong clown.
And that’s when I realized that I can’t make it funny. Cancer’s not funny. What I can do is be supportive. What I can do is tell my cousin I love him. So I picked up the phone for the first time since the diagnosis and dialed.