“Some things in life are bad,

They can really make you mad,

Other things just make you swear and curse,

When you’re chewing life’s gristle,

Don’t grumble,

Give a whistle

And this’ll help things turn out for the best.”

⁃ Old British Proverb or something

I was probably around 7 years old the first time I heard “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life” from Monty Python’s Life of Brian. We had lasagna for dinner that night, which my sister threw up onto my bed (sorry, not sorry, I’m not letting it go!). My father was watching tv and there were a bunch of guys on crucifixes singing this uplifting song! I was too young to really get the joke, that something as harrowing as death by crucifixion could be juxtaposed with a song about looking at the bright side of things. I didn’t get the joke all those years ago but I knew something was up. Eventually I’d get the joke and learn how much my dad had enjoyed Monty Python and that song I’d heard at that ripe young age would take on a life of its own and a whole new meaning, at least as far as I’m concerned anyway.

Dad used to tell us all things he wanted to be carried out after he died, which is really a kind of morbid place to go with things when you’re nowhere close to death, but I always tried to indulge him best that I could. He once told me he wanted to be buried barefoot to give everyone one last laugh. We didn’t honor that one obviously, but it is kind of funny to think about how we send our loved ones to the great beyond with footwear. I seemed to remember him telling me at one point to sing Always Look on the Bright Side of Life but I figured it was a joke and besides, I couldn’t find anyone else he said it to, without someone to corroborate it didn’t seem like an issue worth pushing, so I didn’t.

Most of his requests were reasonable while still true to who he was as a person. He hated wearing neckties (the apple doesn’t fall far in this regard) and in fact he eschewed entirely the convention of being laid to rest in a traditional suit. Nope, he wanted a nice comfortable sweatsuit and that’s what he got. At his repast we had to have table service because, in life, he found buffet lines to be most abhorrent. When the day came, I stood in front of nearly a hundred people in the restaurant we were holding it at, I said a few words of thanks to all, and I led everyone in a rendition of For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow, which is what he had done for his own father some years earlier. And that’s when it happened…

My brother, Sam, comes up to me and says something about how he thought I might try and sing The Lumberjack Song, which was another song that Monty Python had done. I took that as a sign from our father, I had to. So I went and told my mom and got her blessing and I did it. I sang it, fumbling through the words, but I sang it that day after all.

Last year, I made a video of myself performing…you guessed it…Always Look on the Bright Side of Life. It had been 3 years since my father had died and I wanted to go about remembering him a little differently for a change. I have a thoroughly unspectacular singing voice, I can sing in key and all that and I don’t embarrass myself but it’s nothing I’m particularly proud of. And I’m not exactly Django Reinhardt incarnate when it comes to my guitar playing but I guess I manage. One thing I could never do was play and sing at the same time. I just couldn’t figure it out. Yet when I attempted it this time around it was actually kind of easy. The lyrics committed to memory and the chords changed smooth as butter. It was as though I had help from someone. It was him. It had to be.

I was still in a pretty dark place when I did that. I was just trying to find a way out but I wasn’t quite there. I get it now. It’s okay to contrast the darkness with the light even when you think that might not be the case. Something as simple as a song can help in finding the light. But if you ask me, he wanted me to find it. He helped and I willed it. As bad as things were, I just had to find the bright side.

I did.