Unleash your inner Bart

All this business about growing up and staying grown up has all but slaughtered the joy in men, don’t you think? A couple of weeks ago I wrote about joyless men who have turned whining into a sport. The piece received much reaction from readers so I decided to push the envelope farther and figure out what, in fact, leads men to this sorry state, and how, in practice, they can avoid it.

Yes, there is a worldwide economic recession; yes, global warming is a phenomenon that has finally descended upon us; yes, no definitive cure has been found for AIDS nor cancer; yes, terrorism remains a clear and present danger, but there is also this business called living in spite of all.

So how does one make the experience tolerable, if not fun? Laughter, I believe, and a little, if not a whole lot of mischief, from time to time, to make this mind-boggling concept and exercise called living a lot more palatable.

Watch little boys at play, in complete abandon, and oblivious to all that is unpleasant and threatening. Isn’t the image priceless? And isn’t it sad that they, one day, will have to grow up and turn into sourpusses, if they don’t watch out?

Let’s revisit the Peter Pan Syndrome for a minute, that condition which psychologists have coined to classify men who psychologically never grow up because of a desire to remain young and dodge the responsibilities of adulthood.

Although it has gained a negative connotation in quasi-psychological use, it is, according to blogger Evan Bailyn of Never Grow Up: A Tribute to Peter Pan, “A normal part of the post-adolescent mindset. It is the natural result of anyone who had a good childhood. If, however, the Peter Pan is to completely shun adult responsibilities, he can be said to be a ‘victim’ of this syndrome.”

What of men who thrive in the adult world, of those who hold down responsibilities with efficiency, dependability and dedication? What of those who are caught up in the daily grind of making ends meet, of feeding, clothing and housing families? And what of those who are vanguards of world peace, of those tasked with keeping the global economy from crashing down? Must they all suppress their inner child and slay their Peter Pans? 

I hope not. I think it is necessary to nurture this instinct. I find it actually quite refreshing — this childlike ability in grown men, this sense of wonder, this playfulness, this ability to find delight in the corniest of things, this gift of looking at the brighter side when life gets gloomy. 

In fact, I would wish for them to take it a step further, to elevate this playfulness into what I shall refer to as the “Bart Simpson Syndrome.” It is that tiny pocket in time and space where one may revert to a state of youthful, devilish menace — something so natural and spontaneous in little boys — in order to temporarily unload the stress and the pressure brought on by adulthood. 

Remember Bart, the spike-haired, yellow-skinned boy in the animated television series The Simpsons? He is 10 years old, the eldest child and only son of Homer and Marge Simpson. His most prominent character traits are his mischievousness, rebelliousness and disrespect for authority.

Bart, the character, has become so popular that Time magazine named him one of the “100 Most Influential People of the 20th Century.” Richard Corliss writes in Time, “Talk about arrested development — this kid has been 10 for 11 years. And we hope he stays there. Deplorable, adorable, Bart is a brat for all ages. Bart knows right from wrong; he just likes wrong better. The reason for his appeal is that he’s so brilliant at being bad; his pranks have a showman’s panache… He is a complex weave of grace, attitude and personality.”

Grown men should, on occasion, unleash their inner Bart Simpson as they shed that suit and the tie and all the weight and baggage that comes with it and, as the quote from Mark Twain goes, “Dance like nobody’s watching; love like you’ve never been hurt. Sing like nobody’s listening; and live like it’s heaven on earth.”

I have a friend — an articulate and eloquent businessman with a larger-than-life personality — who is simply in love with life. I am in perpetual wonder of how he can remain so positive in light of the disappointments and setbacks that besiege everyone’s life. Once, he was relating how he had to confront an employee whom he had suspected of embezzling money in the six-figure range, earmarked for a particular project. He said he was livid as he spoke to the person, but at that very moment of retelling, he was smiling and laughing at the whole situation. I had expected him to be foaming at the mouth and fuming smoke from his ears and nostrils, so I asked, “How could you laugh at such a time?” He replied, “Because I called him ugok (stupid, but also a rumbling sound in the bowels)!” So, then, we both laughed. And he added, “It’s done and things won’t get better if I continue to be angry.”

Then he went on to deliver joke after joke after joke, flailing his arms and guffawing away as though there was nothing the matter with his day. He is Mr. Sunshine Boy, himself: youthful even at middle age, radiant and happy.

Another friend, a stockbroker, resorts to the good old karaoke room as his de-stressor of choice. After a particularly trying day at the office, he heads over to his favorite karaoke joint and not only sings and hogs the mike until the cows come home but howls rock songs and mimics drugged-out rock stars complete with head banging and air guitaring, and enacted false exits and reentries to imagined encores. And then, just as quietly as he slips out of the grown-up, responsible man persona, he slips right back into it when the night is over. How’s that for wild abandon?

Another man, a friend’s friend, a computer engineer this time, plays pranks on his kids during weekends. He claims that he slaves in the office the entire week and looks forward to Saturdays when he can finally put into effect the plans he had been hatching in his mind all week long. He becomes Bart Simpson on weekends. His kids have come to expect the pranks and anticipate them, so their family’s weekend is a fun-filled and dramatic celebration of sorts for the week that was. 

He tells of his favorite moment, when he replaced an entire bottle of shampoo with honey. His 10-year-old son came rushing out of the bathroom in all his naked glory, dripping with honey from the head down. “Dad! Help!” the boy said. “It’s all sticky and gooey!” To which he answered, “That’s okay son, just ask Mom for pancakes to go with it.” And so, later in the day, the son, who of course did not fall very far from the tree, ingeniously snuck into his Dad’s shower and liberally poured red powdered dye into the showerhead.

You can guess what happened next, right? This Stanford alumnus, a computer engineer, stepped out of his bathroom as naked as the day he was born, covered in streaks of red, and still oozing droplets of blood-like liquid from the tips of his hair, literally screaming bloody murder. “And what did your son say?” I asked. He shook his head from side to side and with an impish grin answered, “He said, ‘But Dad, you started it.’”

“You didn’t get pikon (pissed off)?” I asked him. “Are you kidding me?” He was laughing now. “Talo ang pikon. I’ll get him good next weekend.”

If simply reading these anecdotes makes you feel lighter, maybe it’s time to unleash your inner Bart Simpson, as long as you don’t hurt anyone and you do it with a good measure of control. And so to borrow again from the late, great Mr. Twain, “Dance like nobody’s watching…”

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Thank you for your letters. You may reach me at cecilelilles@ yahoo.com or visit my blog at www.fourtyfied.blogspot.com.