With each turn of my head, pairs of eyes were on us. Some eyes were smiling, some were glaring, some appeared puzzled, and some danced with laughter. Others appeared a bit weary and tired, but the eyes still stared. We could no longer simply hide out in our little corner of the local Dairy Queen. The hyena type laughter was simply too much to be ignored. Our presence was known! We had the giggles (actually – beyond simple giggles). We were laughing so hard – the tears poured! When was the last time you laughed like that? It’s certainly been awhile for me.
We just returned home from a pre-Thanksgiving gathering with family in Virginia. We spent a couple days visiting, talking, eating, and laughing! The intense laughter, however, really began when we journeyed to the Bristol Motor Speedway in Bristol, TN to see the race track all lit up in Christmas lights.
My husband, his sister, her husband and I piled in the car and began the 4 miles drive-through trek to see over 1.5 million lights. It was absolutely beautiful and so much fun to see, but we seemed to find something funny about everything that night. You know how that is when stupid things all of a sudden become hillarious? Like the fact that I couldn’t dim my headlights to park like the speedway wanted us to do, because I have a daytime running light system that won’t shut off. OK…so what? But…that became the basis for almost all of the jokes the rest of the night. We really did have a great time, but we were quite silly.
Aside from the laughter, the highlight of the speedway adventure was actually getting to drive on “The World’s Fastest Half-Mile” (the actual racetrack). Granted – I did get a little crazy when my car felt like it was going to flip over, but it was still a blast!
We finished off the night at the Dairy Queen, and that’s when the laughter grew to the point that the “eyes” I mentioned earlier began to follow us. I don’t even remember everything we laughed at, but I do know that it felt extremely good to do so.
I don’t know about you, but I’ve had a rather difficult month with various issues. I’ve learned to praise God through those storms, but often-times that’s much easier said than done. However, sometimes the storms seem a little calmer and perhaps not as alarming when we’re able to invoke a little laughter into our day! I challenge you to allow yourself to be silly sometimes…even when you don’t feel like it. Open yourself up to the kind of laughter that might even make you cry! Even more, allow those around you to get a glimpse of it – it might even make their eyes dance a bit too!
Our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with songs of joy. Then it was said among the nations, “The LORD has done great things for them.” Psalm 126:2
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