I’m not naturally funny. Whatever sense of humor I have I developed as a self-defense mechanism. 

The first time I remember being consciously aware of making fun of myself was better than waiting for someone else to make fun of me. It was in third grade at Curé of Ars Catholic School in Merrick, Long Island in 1965. I was a scrawny kid; people used to call me The Biafrin. I got picked on, not too much but enough for me to want it to stop.

That year we had a surprise snowstorm in early November. On the playground before school started we all got completely soaked playing in the snow. Snowball fights, wrestling in the snow, you name it. All of the boys pants were totally wet. The nuns, in a surprising show of compassion and concern, were afraid we were going to catch cold. Sister Patricia, the sixth grade teacher, was in charge of Operation Pants Removal. She was the most evil person on the planet. She was squat, and wore her wimple so tight her face was red all the time and made her look permanently angry. She was strong as she was mean. She came up with the bright idea of having the boys take off their pants so they could be brought to the nearby convent to be dried. We would wrap our coats around our waist for cover. 

Out of all the boys in the school, she chose me to be the guinea pig. Sister Patricia dragged me to the boys room and told me to take off my pants and wrap my coat around my waist while she waited outside the door. When I came out of the stall, my Robert Hall Department Store wool coat with a fur collar wrapped around my waist, two fifth grade boys were washing their hands. When they saw me, they broke out in uncontrolled laughing. Sister Patricia barged in to the boys room, slapped both of the fifth graders and told them to get back to their classroom. 

She took my pants and handed them to the novice who was walking by in the hall and commanded her  to bring them to the convent and put them in the dryer. She dragged me back to my classroom. Every kid we passed in the hallway stifled a laugh. Each time Sister Patricia’s face got even redder. By the time we reached my classroom I’m sure she realized what a mistake Operation Pants Removal was. Standing there in my wet socks and shoes, wet underwear and my Robert Hall fur-collared coat wrapped around my waist, I know I certainly did. I knew the whole class was going to laugh at me the rest of the day.

Feeling a little smart and a lot desperate, I wanted to do something to make them laugh before they laughed at me. When the door opened, I ran into the room, jumped up on Susan Leo’s desk and started to dance. I jumped from desk to desk with Sister Patricia trying desperately to catch me. The whole class was in hysterics. Sister Patricia grabbed the pointer and started swinging it at me. I avoided her for three or four swings and she finally caught me in the back of my calves and tripped me. I fell to the floor from the desk. She grabbed me by the collar and dragged me out of class. 

The beating I got hurt—she whipped me with the pointer, boxed my ears and cuffed me with her college ring —  but I returned to class a hero. 

After that day, I realized that if I could make people laugh, I might fit in. People who made others laugh started to become my heroes: W.C. Fields, Abbott and Costello, the Marx Brothers – anybody who was funny. I also watched Three Stooges shorts on a TV show hosted by Captain Jack McCarthy on WPIX, a local New York station. 

For the rest of my elementary and high school career,  I read everything I could about my new heroes. I tried to emulate them by doing outrageous things. In sixth grade, we were doing a science project with salt. At lunch time, I opened the window on the stairwell, and as kids went out to the playground for recess I poured salt on them and said “Bless you my child, go forth and sin no more.” Sister Rita Ann, who was generally one of the nicer ones, heard the commotion and came and slapped me on the back of the head.

“Salt costs money!” she snapped. 

I remember looking at the box and seeing that it cost 9 cents. I thought it was worth every penny.

In eighth grade, the day before we were supposed to graduate, our homeroom teacher Sister Mary Joseph let us bring in records to play. I got a little carried away and lip synced to the songs while sitting on Sister’s desk, while using the pointer as a microphone. She had papers on her desk and they were pushed off the desk as I wiggled around singing to the Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Grass Roots, and The Archies: “Sugar, Sugar.”  Pretty soon all the papers were on the floor and most of the kids were up on their desks dancing.

When Sister came back in the room she looked around for her pointer, but I had it in my hand for my microphone. She grabbed it from me, gave me a swat and told me to get off her desk and go to the principal’s office. As I walked down the hall, I heard her screaming at the rest of the class, whacking her pointer on the desk. Then she came out and dragged me herself to the principal’s office. To get to the principal’s office we had to walk by her secretary, who told Sister Mary Joseph that the principal had somebody in her office. Sister Mary Joseph didn’t care. She threw open the principal’s door and threw me into the office. Inside there was the pastor, Father Cuddeback, and Father Whalen, associate pastor. Sister Mary Joseph launched into her tirade about what I had done and the principal just stopped. She stood up and took out her paddle. She told me to bend over. Before she hit me, Father Whalen started laughing and said “Leave the poor kid alone. It’s the last day of school.” Father Cuddeback had a smile on his face, too. 

The principal let me go. She told Sister Mary Joseph to make me go back and clean the classroom as my punishment.  Cleaning up the mess was a lot better than the paddle.