Assignment 19 Victor Allison

One piece of advice that I've always kept close to my chest is actually a piece of advice given to my father, who then repeated to me decades after his own initial enlightenment. My dad, having grown up in overcast Northern Ireland, worked as a security guard at a nearby warehouse, where his colleagues included both inappropriately young lads and old IRA-fighting coots. One elderly gentleman with whom my father frequently conversed during his career there allegedly illustrated to my father many times that, "Ye have to have a laugh now and then. Wanna know why?" "Why?" my father would retort.
"Because you'll be a long time dead."
Only after hearing someone with a mild Northern Irish accent repeat this sage advice while mimicking a hilariously thick Northern Irish accent can one truly appreciate both the dark humor as well as the foolproof logic of the statement, but it's easy enough to understand, though rather morbid. Although I may not consider this advice to have had a particularly significant impact in my life, it certainly puts life in perspective regarding one's happiness. From an atheistic point of view, it may be difficult to "have a laugh" in the eternal darkness of death. So we might as well joke around; we don't have forever, after all.