Comedy Mission: Accomplished!

.:Comedy Mission Accomplished:.

A few weeks ago, I had my first ever headliner set in standup comedy. I hit the stage for about three quarters of an hour, and somehow managed to hold the crowd's attention for that long, peppering the night with a lot of laughs along the way.

And it wasn't easy, I have to admit. I came in with a lot of mental and actual preparation. Unlike a lot of the veterans out there, I don't see myself just hitting the stage and randomly delivering a twenty-minute set or more without some serious prep time. None of this comedy ever came naturally to me, because I'm not a naturally funny guy.

But seeing a room full of people with different sensibilities, different things that they think is funny, all laughing in unison does instill a sense of accomplishment in a comedian. Top it off with a bunch of people who were just outside Barley that night, yet apparently still paying close attention to my set, and I realized the reason why entertainers do what they do, and why they have a place in the world, even while other people pursue more seemingly worthwhile things, like landing a spacecraft on a comet while wearing a tacky shirt.

It doesn't matter if what we do doesn't revolutionize the world as we know it. If I were selling taho, I'd probably be selling the best damned taho of all time. Or something. I don't know, really, but I'd just want to think that even the most menial of things can be made meaningful somehow. And maybe we don't see it as we feel stuck, but we owe it to ourselves to see it through.

It was a genuine surprise to me that I managed to pull it off, in all honesty. Almost a half-hour of standup comedy, punctuated by 15 minutes of my magic and mentalism. It was something

So another day another dollar for this comedy mentalist. Tonight, I'm performing again, and someone else will be headlining it. It doesn't matter. I will keep on keeping on, because after doing standup comedy for five years, I realize all too well that I really, really enjoy entertaining people, and that's a noble endeavor in and by itself, no doubt.

Thank you to every single person that night who went to support me. From my fellow magicians to my improv groupmates to the fine people of the Comedy Cartel to my friends from Geekfight to even one of my M:TG teammates, it was a night where I really felt that the five years I put into standup comedy were more than worth it. I felt a kind of affirmation that spurs me to push it forward. And so I will.