My Grampa died when I was in my mid teens. We were pretty close. It was sudden and I missed him terribly. It was the first funeral I’d ever been to. I was sitting next to my father when, during a prayer, the place went totally silent for a long time and I heard my father’s stomach growl. It was loud. For some reason the sound struck me as funny and I got the giggles. I heald my breath as best I could but the explosion was inevitable. I couldn’t stop it. I was about to pee myself! I think the shock of what i was doing kicked me back into control and I was finally able to gain my composure. Luckily, he thought I was crying so he put his arm around my shoulders to comfort me. It was so embarrassing. But I don’t think anyone noticed.
I was at a meeting, and about twenty five of us were seated in a large circle with a middle floor space for a speaker, there were refreshments, and everyone was quietly listening to the speaker…i had a small paper plate with a cookie on it and went to reach for it and in some comical way i fumbled and the cookie started to fall, hard to explain but it kind of flipped around a couple times as it fell, and me and the person next to me watched it. For some reason it struck us as hilarious, we started to laugh, but the meeting was so qjiet we tried mot to laugh out loud, but the more we tried to hold it in, it turned into uncontrollable busting out laughing and of course, everyone sat there staring at us,and the speakler asked us what was so hilarious and I explained “my cookie fell, and it looked funny”…nobody but me and the other person could relate…but really, it was funny as shit! but neither of us could say why, it just was
I was at the funeral for the father of a friend and there were a lot of elderly people in the audience. Somebody farted, and well, my friend and I spent the next 20 minutes preparing to go straight to hell.
I have a sister who is prone to crying - she’s been that way all her life. So during her wedding, when I saw her shoulders shaking a bit, I thought she’d gotten all emotional and started weeping.
Nope. She got the giggles. I’m sure her new husband was feeling all warm and fuzzy about that. They’ve lasted over 20 years, so I guess it didn’t bother him that much.
I had nearly the same experience. It may have been a fart that started it all, but me, my brother, and my stepbrother and sister were off to the races for the remainder of the funeral. Fortunately, we were sitting next to a wall, so we could turn our faces to the right and laugh freely…or so we thought. Turns out the mirror hanging there was a two-way mirror, so people could sit in the next room and see without being seen. I don’t know if anyone was in the room that day, but if they were, they got an eyeful.
My inappropriate guffaws almost cost me a passing grade.
The boarding school I attended in the late 70’s had a short winter session during which an enterprising student could do various creative independent study type things for credit. I somehow managed to get the lead role in a play that was written, produced and directed by another student as his senior project. The play was incredibly melodramatic and cheesy, with an eye-rollingly predictable cop-out ending, but I don’t think any of us realized how terrible it was until opening night. Of course, the entire school and some parents were in attendance.
SCENE: Stage left. LEADING MAN is arguing passionately with ORDERFIRE about the breakup of their relationship. ORDERFIRE mocks LEADING MAN, who loses his temper and begins to choke her.
ORDERFIRE: (struggling, dissolves into fits of laughter)
LEADING MAN: (dissolves into fits of laughter)
FADE OUT
SCENE: Hospital room. ORDERFIRE is in bed, unconscious from choking scene with LEADING MAN. Bed is shaking violently with ORDERFIRE’s barely-suppressed laughter.
LEADING MAN: Will she be ok? I realize that I really do love her and I was all wrong.
DOCTOR (senior author and playwrite): Yes, but her recovery will take a long time. You’d better go home and get some rest, you can see her when she wakes up.
Exit LEADING MAN, who we soon learn was immediately killed in an elevator accident while leaving hospital.
CURTAIN CALL
CAST: hyperventilating with suppressed giggles.
DOCTOR: hyperventilating with indignant rage at the CAST’s lack of professionalism
This is a timely story… one Easter when I was maybe a junior in high school, the offertory procession (when the bread and wine and optionally other meaningful items are carried up to the altar) included a lamb cake on a platter.
Well, I had never seen one and needless to say this got me giggling. My mom picked it up on the other side of Pop and he (very non-emotional and scary) couldn’t contain himself and let out a silent snicker. All three of us were then shaking uncontrollably and it spread to the pew behind us. Good times.
My best laughs by far have been at funerals and in libraries. The more inappropriate the venue, the more irresistible the laugh.
After my father’s funeral my siblings and our significant others were sitting in my parents’ dining room having the “what are we going to do about mom” talk, while my mother and other family members chatted quietly (probably having the same conversation: which pair of those monkeys are you going to have to live with?).
One of us sibs then quoted Dave Barry: “Coca-Cola means bite the wax tadpole in Mandarin”. Each of us collapsed – literally – onto the floor laughing hysterically. For a good 10 minutes. My sister in law laughed so hard she puked. I was sore the next day from the laughing. Best damn laugh ever!
This wasn’t laughter, but part of my grandmother’s funeral took place at the cemetery at which her ashes would be buried. It was raining so it took place in the chapel rather than on the grounds. But afterward, my mom, my sister (who was then around 12) and I drove around in the car and found my grandfather’s grave, because they would be placed together, and my mom had never seen her dad’s grave.
I stepped out of the car, in a light rain, and confirmed that it was his, and motioned to my mom that it was the right grave, and my sister and mom came out and looked at it.
Right after we got back in the car, my sister mentioned that it reminded her of movies or TV shows in which a funeral took place in the rain, and I confessed that it reminded me of that at well.
This was told to me by a guy I went on a date or two with. He said that he was once with a friend who slammed a car door so hard on his own finger that it COMPLETELY severed it. The guy was literally spurting blood and in extraordinary pain, and how did his friend (the guy I was on a date with) deal with it? By bursting into uncontrollable, hysterical laughter. He said he was laughing so hard he nearly passed out.
They’ve lasted over 20 years, so I guess it didn’t bother him that much.
