JOKE TK

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I think, often really, about a work-joke a colleague once made—who are you! remind me!—which was a screenshot of part of an essay they were writing that said: “JOKE TK”, basically insert joke here. In this job we both had, jokes were the main reason for us to be writing at all. The placeholder instead of the—well, I actually hesitate to write more, and I worry I’ve already killed the joke.

If you’re feeling a lackluster JOKE TK about your life, there’s a new book just for you, written by someone who is not quite a former colleague, but a wonderful former classmate from college, Chris Duffy. Humor Me is, blessedly, not an assessment of like post-2020 stand-up comedians and the elongation of physical humor or whatever. In fact, in a way that I felt extraordinarily connected to, this book is comic-skeptical? It’s a book about how to bring delight & surprise & wits to the people around you while not being: an air-sucker, a bloviator, a conversation-killer, a shithead, a hog. It’s a book that extremely understands why many comedians are quite dreaded socially. This book is just as much about being a great social companion, as it is about being funny.

It’s just a really lovely project. It’s gently instructive, and kind and generous.

It’s a book the recommends the high virtues of one of my favorite activities: simply looking around. Here’s Chris’s suggestion of a place to begin this habit, which is perfectly nosy, silly, and anthropological:

The last personal bathroom I spied had no bathroom mirror!! I didn’t know how to continue on with myself and my hair. I felt like I couldn’t leave the room without this glance in the mirror, and so felt the specific sensation of being trapped. Nothing else to do, I finally left baffled, bewildered, and full of curiosity and possibly a little poppy seed still in my teeth.

And, we are lucky!, Chris has recommended some of his favorite Purse Book-sized books:

• What Are You Going Through by Sigrid Nunez: “This is such a great book and also so weird! I mean that in the best of ways. At one point, the voice of the narrator switches from a person to a cat. You just get a cat chapter out of nowhere! And yet it’s also extremely readable and accessible not one of those confusing for the sake of being confusing books. Instead, this is a beautiful story about friendship and mortality and what it means to be alive. It’s much funnier than you’d expect for a book about death and suffering! Pulling this out of your bag immediately makes you look chic and philosophical.”

• The Quiet American by Graham Greene: “A 1950s classic, with that good mass market paperback smell and design. Reading this book, I felt like I had instantly traveled across the world and through time. It’s so pretentious to call a book “transporting,” but this truly was! Also, we’ve got to love a book that’s exciting, fun, and also a critique of colonialism and American imperialism and war!”

• Your Hearts, Your Scars by Adina Talve-Goodman: “As a staunch nonfiction writer myself, I can’t only recommend fiction purse books. This book of posthumously published essays by the writer Adina Talve-Goodman is short but has stuck with me for years. Adina writes about her life, her romances, and her experience of a full heart transplant in a way that you cannot forget. It’s a beautiful, beautiful, beautiful book. And I personally love a book of essays where you can read one at a time and savor it or tear through them all in one sitting.”