Laughing in the Dark A Comedian's Journey Through Depression

Chapter One:The Big Crash In a very roundabout way, this journey begins in a remote, exotic setting on a small island off the coast of Mexico. And you know the saying: What happens in Mexico doesn't stay in Mexico. Or is it the other way around? Anyway, there I was in Cozumel, Mexico, with my family just for the day. When you're on a cruise you can do that -- hop off at a port in one country, spend the day buying monkey heads made out of coconut shells, hop to the next country, spend the day buying pocketbooks made from coconut shells, hop to the next and -- well, you get the picture. We were in Cozumel with a gaggle of other Christian artists like Rebecca St. James, Mark Shultz, the guys and gals from FFH and Avalon, and various agents and promoters. Someone had the great idea that instead of shopping for coconut clothing, coconut furniture, and coconut lamps, we could ride mopeds across the island, have a quaint lunch at a secluded cafe -- away from all the tourists -- and then moped back. "Wow!" my husband and children said. "That sounds like fun!" Me? I had my heart set on the coconut salt and pepper shakers. But I got outvoted, and off we went on our rented mopeds. The trip started out just like I'd imagine the brochure would promise (had there been a brochure). Sunny, sandy, tropical. A gorgeous shoreline that would take your breath away (but then again, so would an errant bug down the windpipe). What no one told us, however -- and the reason there probably was no brochure -- is that for most of the trip, we were going to have to share the road with all the normal traffic. All the normal, speeding traffic. Jeff Allen is a fellow comedian who hates to shop, so he'd talked his wife into the moped jaunt (is that the right word?). At the halfway point she careened into a ravine and nearly broke her leg. Another woman did -- break her leg, that is. And another woman, one who was putt-putt-putting along just ahead of me, simply drove off into the swamp. It was like she never even tried to turn. I was afraid I'd just witnessed suicide-by-moped. My husband and son stopped and helped pull her out of the muck. She was scratched up a bit, but otherwise fine. I still don't know her name. To this day I call her "the-lady-who-almost-died-on-a-moped." But then, there is a busload of people who probably know me only by that name as well. Yes, I too nearly got creamed on a moped. Mopeds are strange animals. Ours were so old and rickety that you had to aim to the left to make the front wheels go in a straight line. Therefore, a right-hand turn was almost impossible. I know because I risked it. And I risked it because a city bus was coming at me head-on. I needed to turn and turn fast. I'd take a swamp over a city bus any day! Now, I was no stranger to "the hog." I'd driven a motorcycle in high school. I know what it feels like to hop on 80cc's of raw power. I'd also learned in high school (besides the fact that it's totally impossible to miss a chicken that decides to cross the road in front of you) that if you jerk the front wheel of a motorcycle with all your might, something will happen. So I turned hard, just as I felt city-bus metal brush against the sleeve of my jacket.So this is how it ends,I remember thinking. Smashed by theOcho Nueve in Cozumel, Mexico.(That's Bus Number 89 for those of you who don't speak Spanish. And for those of you who do, I won't repeat what I heard coming from the people inside the bus.) I yanked the moped onto the grass and came to a dusty halt. And then I cried. Hard. When I finished, I slowly putt-putted myself back to town and spent the rest of the day buying coconut souvenirs for people I hadn't thought about in years. A near-death experience will do that to you. So thanks to my motorcycle expertise and, no doubt, a whole host of guardian angels, I avoided a nasty crash in a faraway lanPierce, Chonda is the author of 'Laughing in the Dark A Comedian's Journey Through Depression', published 2007 under ISBN 9781582296418 and ISBN 1582296413.