J.P. Patches

  

 J.P. Patches was a well-loved Seattle personality.

As his website claims, “Julius Pierpont Patches, with an inherent understanding of children and a good natured sense of humor, helped raise a generation of Northwest children.  Long before there was Microsoft, Starbucks, the floating bridge or even the Space Needle in Seattle, there was J.P. Patches.”

Patches was a clown portrayed by a man named Chris Wedes, who hosted a children’s television program beginning 1958 and lasting for 23 years, accumulating 10,000 hours of clowning around.  At the time it was the longest running locally produced children’s TV program in the U.S.  To date it remains the 2^nd longest running TV show for children, second only to Sesame Street.   In addition his show would become the first live show and the first color TV show in Seattle. 

It was a highly improvisational endeavor, with no rehearsal, no script, no second-takes and definitely no writers like today’s shows.

In Fremont, where all fun things reside, lives the playful bronze statue erected in his honor.

Rest in Peace.

Photo:  Statue of J.P. Patches and his “girlfriend” Gertrude

Adele's Story

An 80-year old woman told me this great story when I asked if anyone could share a time when they used laughter and/or humor to cope with a difficulty.

When Adele was a child she had done something that was considered misbehaving and she knew she was going to get a physical punishment for it.  Unfortunately this was in the days when corporal punishment to children was considered perfectly normal.  Knowing what was coming, she ran upstairs to her room, opened her dresser drawer, and pulled out every pair of little panties she had, putting them all on to pad herself against her father’s blows.  Then she went downstairs to receive her spanking.

But when her father saw what she had done he burst into laughter.  And laughed so hard he never punished her at all.

I love this story because it shows that all it took was a laugh for this man to come into balance enough that he no longer needed to hit his child.  Truly magic.

Photo:  Stock.xchnge

Even a Fake Laugh Will Do

The online publication, High Energy For Life (Bottom Line Publications), is currently running an article featuring Laughter Yoga and myself, called Even a Fake Laugh Will Do.  Check it out:

http://www.bottomlinepublications.com/content/article/health-a-healing/even-a-fake-laugh-will-do

Quote

"Never frown.  You never know who's falling in love with your smile."

Anonymous quote

Photo:  Stock.xchnge

Meet-Up

No discussion about laughter is complete without some mention of Meet-Up.com.

It’s a concept born out of 911.  The founders were living in NYC at the time the towers fell and experienced the type of community that evolves only from tragedy.  Wanting to keep the sense of connection going, they birthed Meet-Up as a way of using the internet, to get people together off the internet, to grow local communities.

It has been instrumental for me in the creation of a new life:  meeting people, connecting with affinity groups, and forming lasting friendships.  With all that comes all the laughter naturally present in all great social events.

Laughter is a social activity and Meet-Up has brought in so much of it. The more the merrier.  The more you are with people you like, the more you connect with people, the more there’s laughter.

A shout-out to Maurice, Keoni, and John G (and myself too) who have hosted some fantastic events with lots of laughs, lots of great food, lots of fun people.  Shout out to my opera Meet-Up where we have gotten into such passionate discussions, with so much raucous laughter, the other restaurant diners pause and stare.  And the HSPs (highly sensitive people) who inherently understand me like no others.  And more and more.

Let the laughter flow.  Meet-Up is a great thing.  I wish I had thought it up.

Photo:  Stock.xchnge