Dear God,

“Your last book of poems deserves half a dozen Guggenheims. It is really splendid, you have really got in there now: the others I always felt were sort of tending in the right direction, now you are on your beam. I didn’t find any clichés anywhere, and that in a book by a Catholic and a religious is a major miracle. It is terse and even Zen-like, and it is the integrity of the experience that above all comes through. Great, man, great.” Merton

I’m finishing Skinny Legs and All at the moment. It’s all leading towards the final, apocalyptic, catastrophe, but I’m certain it will end up a joke. Robbins’s a comedian after all, and a damn good writer. He has some of the best metaphors of anyone I’ve read. He’s witty, and wise, and irreverent, and funny. He’s someone who I’d love to write like someday.

I read Matthew McConaughey’s “13 Lessons I Learned” when I woke up today. Great read. Great writing. (I’m certain he had a ghost writer, or a great editor, which is pretty much the same thing. I need to get me one of those.) Great wisdom. I love McConaughey, or at least his work and the image he presents, which in this article seems like the real deal. Two of the central messages were live in the present and embrace yourself. Something I keep coming back to.

The other night, Drew read tarot for me. He used seven cards. Three for the past, three for the future, and one connecting both. Without getting into the whole thing, empathy connected the past with the future, where humor was central. Sarann thought it brilliant. (She was there, as were several others; tarot is not some supernatural thing, especially not demonic or some nonsense; it’s a medium that allows two people, or more, to mine the subconscious; it gives what you give it, nothing more.) She said I have no problem being empathetic with others (with the exception of certain politicians and religious leaders), but that I really struggle with being empathetic with myself. This is something I’ve desired to lean into lately, and it was reconfirmed with the tarot cards. I know how to do this, but it’s going to be hard. I have beat up on myself for a long time. Sarann and Drew translated the empathy card for me so I wouldn’t be confused, “Give yourself a f-cking break!”

When it comes to humor, though, now that’s going to be tough. How do you learn to be funny? I’ve never been funny. My first thought was that I should get some books on humor.

Can you read your way to being funny?

“God, Dan, that was hilarious. I mean really, really, kick in the ass funny.”

“Thanks man, been reading a lot.”

That doesn’t sound right. Maybe I should just smoke weed and watch comedy, kill two birds with one stone — learn how to be funny while giving myself a f-cking break. God, who said this spirituality stuff wasn’t easy? That seems about as hard as getting a free back massage. I should probably do that too. You must be proud of me; I’m finally making some headway here.