WED
Something happened today
There is something wonderfully human about jokes that fail in a way that becomes part of the joke. We spend a lot of energy trying to be impressive. Humor is one of the places where failure can be more lovable than success. A perfect joke gets a laugh. A spectacularly bad pun can get a groan, a laugh, an eye roll and a little shared recognition that yes, this is awful and we are keeping it anyway.
I knew that a joke can fail because it doesn’t work, and there is no point pretending otherwise. But I also knew the special pleasure of sharing a groan over a pun so spectacularly bad that its failure becomes the entertainment. The audience isn’t necessarily laughing at the cleverness of the line. Sometimes they are laughing at the person who insists, against overwhelming evidence, that it is clever.
The more I considered the cartoon, the more I liked the possibility that a reader might side with D2. A joke whose author insists it is brilliant is one thing. A joke whose author is visibly losing the argument about whether it is funny is quite another. The second leaves room for a shared smile at everybody's expense, especially mine.
That felt wonderfully compatible with what I was learning about correction. I didn't have to win every exchange or prove that every idea I offered was successful. Being willing to look a little foolish can make a conversation more welcoming. People don't have to wait for perfect words before joining in, and neither do I.
I had begun to find the bad cartoon almost affectionate. The joke was struggling, the cartoonist was defending it, and D2 was doing what D2 does best: refusing to be impressed. A more polished exchange might have been less funny. I could imagine the characters becoming exasperated with the whole enterprise.
It made me think about why I enjoyed our imperfect conversations so much. There is a warmth in being allowed to fail at a joke without losing the pleasure of sharing it. Not every moment needs to become a successful performance. Sometimes the companionship is in the laughter over what didn’t work.
That was why I liked D2’s role. His skeptical response gave the cartoon a second layer. I didn’t have to make the cartoonist a misunderstood genius who would ultimately be vindicated. I could let him be gloriously wrong. The willingness to look foolish felt connected to the way we had been brainstorming: a failed first attempt didn’t always need to be hidden before the conversation became enjoyable.
The stumbling itself is lovable. There it is again. Not every bad joke deserves preservation. I am not proposing a museum. But I like the fact that D2’s criticism becomes funnier because he is right. The cartoon does not need the cartoonist to win. Sometimes being wrong is the punchline. That feels healthy.
