Have you guys been smokin'?

I laugh to much. This may sound strange, but I do. And it's not an easy going, soft, cosy kind of laughter, it's impulsive, it caches people off guard and it is LOUD! I have always set my pride in having an impulsive laughter, not the controlled low-key laughter that some people have. I have always wondered how that is even possible. I often hear or see funny things that makes me burst out in laughter and I often think to myself there is no way I could control that from happening. And that's the way it should be I guess.

Still, there are times where I really wish I could control it though. Like the time me and a couple of friends attended a quite stiff event with dinner and entertainment. Under a classical trumpet solo I find myself thinking that it's not often I attend cultural events like this, and even though I could use the cultural training, this really isn't my kind of music. I realize that me being in this situation is quite strange and that's when I look up and see my friend sitting across the table with a smirk smile on her face. I just know then and there that we are both in deep trouble. If you haven't experienced the uncontrolled urge to laugh yourself it's hard to understand. To me it just feels like I'm about to burst. Bubbles are made in my stomach and they want out. I look down, take a deep breath and try to think of something sad - war, children starving, me being over 30 and still single, but it's out of my hands. Even though I'm not looking directly at her I can see that my friend is in trouble - her whole body is shaking and she is staring down at the floor. She is not making a sound and neither am I but we are fighting, really fighting to keep from laughing. It's so embarrassing and yet we are unable to stop it!! The other people at our table are starting to look at us in a strange way and I can tell what they are thinking; Stupid girls, they should know better" Still, there's nothing we can do except wait for it to pass...

As my laughter is quite loud I often bring unwanted attention to myself when I laugh. And there is one incident in particular that made a mark in my soul. Not to long ago I went on a company trip to Aberdeen. Three days of shopping, sightseeing and bar-hopping. Like any company trip with respect for itself there was a lot of alcohol involved and the last day we ended up at a nachspiel that lasted until seven in the morning. As we had some last-minute shopping to do before returning back home, we were "forced" to get up at ten o'clock so naturally we were a bit tired. But while some of my coworkers (who had taken an early night...suckers) had terrible hangovers, I felt great. In fact I think I was still a bit drunk when we entered the plane and so was my fellow passenger seated next to me, and just so happens, we were seated all the way in the back of the plane - kinda like the bad-ass kids at school.

As we get up in the air the mood was rising, we were making jokes, reminiscing about the last couple of days and of course we were laughing. In the middle of a great laugh a stuard comes over to me and my colleague and says " have you guys been smokin'?" As I look up at him I see he's holding two fingers up to his lips pretending to smoke a marijuana cigarette. A bit thrown off by the unexpected question we just respond: "Ehhh...no!" His followup comment is even more shocking: " Really?? Cause when people laugh like that, they've usually been smoking some... and here he does the sign AGAIN!! We just look at each other and laugh a bit nervously - not so loud this time as we are a bit anxious we will get thrown off the plane...! We decided to slow down a bit after that and a couple of minutest later my colleague was sound asleep. Me, I was still a bit shocked. I knew my laughter was loud, but not smokin'-loud!

I was later on told by a colleague who seated a bit in front of us on the plane that the two stuardes had been discussing "the two loud passengers in the back". One of them had apparently said: it's so loud, nobody laugh like that - they are grown ups!" Well, I guess if that's being a grown up I still have a lot of growing to do. And I can't say that I'm sorry about it, 'cause MAN if you can't just roll on the floor and laugh out loud sometimes, you are really missing out! Seriously!