If you’ve ever had the wonderful (or maybe not so wonderful) opportunity to play Cards Against Humanity with me, then you know how to get me to pick your card. It’s not going to be the most logical card. It’s not going to be the dirtiest card. It’s not going to be by using a box card. It’s going to be the card that makes me laugh the most.

My friends will tell you about how many times I’ve had to pause during a game because I can’t read the cards that were handed to me because I’m nearly crying from laughing so hard. Sometimes I can’t just choose one and trying to decide between the best gets me into a giggling fit that last at least a minute and everyone gets annoyed because I can’t stop laughing.

I’ve always loved to laugh but I think it’s only been lately that I’ve actually allowed myself to laugh. Why did I go see Marvel’s The Avengers and Guardians of the Galaxy so many times in theaters? Because they made me laugh. Why do I watch YouTube videos of The Try Guys or How It Should Have Ended? Because they make me laugh. (Seriously though if you haven’t watched either of those, why haven’t you?)

I seem to always find myself laughing at the most inappropriate moments. It’ll happen at school during a test when you’re supposed to be quiet. Or during a funeral when you’re obviously supposed to be somber. My favorite is when it happens during prayer. The dirty looks I would get from all the adults as a kid and teen when you couldn’t stop laughing. There was this one time a friend asked for prayer because her dad had been deployed and just for protection for everyone while he was gone. Our youth group leader heard it as unemployed and proceeded to pray for her dad to find a new job. The two of us could not stop laughing during the entire prayer because it was completely wrong and it was just hilarious. Ah I’m finding myself chuckling about it even now.

The thing is that while I can be somewhat sarcastic and I attempt to be witty, I’m not someone who can spit out hilarity at the drop of a hat. And yet I am always drawn to people who have a really good sense of humor. In fact that is one of the things that is near the top of my list of things I find attractive in other people. I always click on that as the trait I want the most on those Buzzfeed quizzes anyway.

Having a good sense of humor with a good balance of seriousness is the perfect balance. Life isn’t serious ALL the time but neither is life always a joke. Finding a good mix of two is the best way to handle life because when the hard stuff comes, you need to still be able to find a way to laugh. I’ve gone through a bunch of hard stuff in my life over the past years and besides having my faith and good friends, being able to laugh is the other thing that has gotten me through it all.

For the record when I was younger, I couldn’t figure out why Mary Poppins was such a Debbie Downer. If you could only fly from laughing….