Anyone who knows me will know that I simply can't tell jokes. What, of course, is embarrassing is that I insist on persisting, and when people groan, or look embarrassed, or realise that they have a cuticle that urgently needs picking, I just self-deprecate "I can't tell jokes".
It worried for me ages, it seems such a girlie thing for someone for whom the term 'ladette' may have been invented (although I'm not quite sure what one calls an ageing ladette).
One of the great revelations of being elected to Lambeth Council almost ten years ago wasn't the confirmation of my oratorical skills, or my strategic thinking, or my ability to analyse a budget or a problem, or my political instinct, or my natural empathy with vast swathes of the electorate, or my popularity (born from courtesy) with officers.
No, my greatest ability is my spontaneous humour. It's a really special feeling when something just falls out of my head without any effort, and it makes me laugh, and more importantly, it makes my interlocutor laugh. Like yesterday, Sandra was moaning about DWP withdrawing from our strike, saying that if it's supposed to be a strike about solidarity between the workers across Departments, they should support us. I quickly pointed out that with delegated pay bargaining, we are only legally allowed to be in dispute with our own department, , otherwise it would be secondary action, and then we would all become Flying Pickets, and that would be awful, because we'd all have to sing a capella.
See, it was frigging hilarious when it tumbled spontaneously out of my over-active brain. But I can I recount in a way that's funny. Can I heck?
Maybe it was my tone of voice. I'm quite good at tone of voice. And facial expression. Maybe I should have been an actress. Damn it, I should have been an actress. But I have no recollection of ever having an opportunity to act way back in my dim and distant past. Or wanting to.
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