"Fun, Goddammit"
We May Need Fun More Than Ever. Luckily, It’s Never Far Away!
One of my quirks (and they are manifold) is that whenever anyone leaves to go do something, I always tell them the same thing:
“Have fun!”
It’s not sarcastic. It’s not a bit. I’m being completely sincere. I should note that I don’t literally say this every single time someone leaves. If they’re heading to, say, a memorial service or jury duty or a New York Jets game, I’ll pivot to something more comforting and supportive. (“Oh my God. I’m so, so sorry. Even during the Zach Wilson years? Wow. My condolences.”)
But “have fun!” is my default setting. I couldn’t tell you when I picked up this habit, but I can tell you why it’s stuck with me: I try to do it and it’s important to me that others do, too. I don’t mean by seeking an endless supply of hedonistic hobbies or dopamine hits. What I really mean is more like “Whatever you’re off to go do, make sure you appreciate the good parts.” There’s a lot of fun to be found in day-to-day life, provided you’re looking. People say and do some hilarious, charming, zany, mind-bending stuff. (Animals too, naturally.) And at the core of it all, I’d argue, is a simple concept that seems to be experiencing something of a renaissance lately: Joy.
In addition to being a great movie, I included the clip from Bull Durham at the top because it dovetails nicely into my earliest sports memory: Watching Joe Carter hit a walk-off home run to win the 1993 World Series. You guys remember that, right? If not, don’t worry — that was a flimsy pretext to post the clip anyway:
Goosebumps. It gets me every single time, even now, 30-plus years after it happened live. Look at Joe Carter. Watch him as he rounds the bases. With every step it’s like his body needs new outlet for the pure elation coursing through it. He jumps, fist pumps, claps, skips, high fives, hugs. Short of ripping off his shirt a la Brandi Chastain or tackling Mitch Williams and teabagging him, I’m not sure what else he could have done in one home run trot. This video is amazing. The moment was amazing. And yes, it probably stings if you’re a Phillies fan, but there’s no mistaking the sheer, delirious joy that’s on display. Even in sports, where one side inevitably has to lose, this is the kind of outcome we all root for. It’s fun, goddammit!
Of course, these incredible moments didn’t begin or end with Joe Carter, and they aren’t limited to the world of sports — even though that’s essentially all I’m going to bring up next. They’re just one of the most convenient places to look when we need reminders to find the joy in our own lives. Think about what it was like to watch Bad Bunny’s halftime show at the Super Bowl. Even if you don’t speak Spanish (and somehow I don’t, even though I passed the IB Test 20 years ago and worked in a Latinx-focused bookkeeping company for, like, two years), and even through a TV screen, the energy was palpable.
Did it help that the halftime show was bookended by dreary ads for AI and unregulated prediction markets? Yeah, probably — but only in terms of the contrast being more stark. Bad Bunny wasn’t there to lecture or scold or solemnly remind us that people who look and speak just like him are being disappeared in America. Even though he would have been well within his rights to go full Sinead O’Connor on a picture of the president, he didn’t really need to. Besides, there was hardly time — it would have taken away from the unbelievably cool celebration of Puerto Rico and Latin culture and a real, actual wedding and people dressed as grass and a Jumbotron reminding us to love. Who needs lectures when you’ve got all that?
Think also of Alysa Liu, whose story is now the stuff of overnight legend. She quit figure skating and came back to it on her own terms, which is awesome in and of itself. But it also seemed to give her the gift of lightness, a gift that — like Joe Carter rounding the bases — could not be contained within her. Fortunately, skating on her own terms is exactly the outlet that lightness needed. To hear her tell it, the real aim was to share her art with others, medals be damned. My favorite part of her story was watching her look directly toward camera and exclaim “That’s what I’m fuckin’ talking about!” as soon as her routine ended. I’m not kidding when I say I literally said “Fuck yeah” in response, out loud, alone in my office but for my sweet sleeping dog. It’s probably worth noting that I don’t really care much for figure skating and I don’t really follow it during the Olympics, let alone outside of them. Catching her routine was a happy coincidence. There’s a lot of fun to be found in day-to-day life, provided you’re looking.
A lot has already been made of the recent World Baseball Classic and the way every nation seemed to relish the chance to show us what made them special. Every nation save the USA, that is, as they marched through the tournament like it was a Call of Duty sidequest en route to their true mission: saving us from the scourge of demonstrable fun. I would watch Aaron Judge take an at-bat against literally anyone at any time of day because he’s a baseball-playing Typhon. But I’d sooner have to pitch to him than spend a moment in the dugout with Mark DeRosa and his team of joy vampires. Catch me over with the Italians slamming down espresso instead.
Ultimately, as a straight white male, I understand how easy this all is for me to say. I’m about as privileged as it gets. I’m no nepo baby and I’m certainly not wealthy and I’ve had my share of terrible events, but still. Most everything else in life is curated around people just like me. That’s always worth acknowledging, and of course it makes finding the fun in things a lot easier. But one thing that’s stuck with me since I read it is this bit from Dan Savage, courtesy of local favorite the Portland Mercury. It’s long, but it’s more important than any of the shit I’ve written so far, so it’s worth it:
The next four years are gonna suck. But they’ll suck worse if we let the news cycle — and the man who dominates it — drain the joy from our lives. We need to pay attention and we need to stay in the fight. Because of course we do. But we should spend as much time as we possibly can over the next four years with friends and lovers doing things that bring us joy. Anyone who tells you that making time for joy — however you define it — is a distraction or a betrayal has no idea what they’re talking about. During the darkest days of the AIDS Crisis, we buried our friends in the morning, we protested in the afternoon, and we danced at night. The dance kept us in the fight because it was the dance we were fighting for.
“It was the dance we were fighting for.” I love this so, so much. Joy doesn’t have to disappear just because sorrow or despair or anxiety show up. My hope is that everyone finds their dance and remembers to have fun with it.
