Laughter is the Best Medicine

             "Laughter is the best medicine." And so, along with Naso-Hex, Sominex, Dristan and castinettes, let us stock laughter on the druggist's shelf.

             I visit my neighborhood chemist. "Uh, let me have the large extravagant size of Smiles Laboratories' Compounded Laughter," I say.

             He looks at me thoughtfully, then retreats with a sibilant shuffle to the mysterious glassed-in cubicle where he supposedly mortars and pestles, though actually he takes pills from large containers and puts them into small. Then, on a very large typewriter he laboriously types very tiny labels, charging five dollars a minute for his time.

             I realize he is wearing a white coat. Is his toe sneakily on a button that is connected to a bell that is located in the local precinct?

             He looks through the glass. Sadly. And returns. "No," he whispers. I feel as though I am at confession. He is a kindly but befuddled old priest. "For your penance say..." No, I imagine that. But the news is worse than three Hail Marys and a good Act of Contrition. "There's been a terrible run on that product since it came in last night," he says. "But I've made a note-oh, yes I've made a note-and I'll notify you when it comes in."

             Having been trained in a Catholic school I obediently start for the door. There is a great convex mirror above it. I look like a balloon in a coat. I open the door, and a bell tinkles. He calls out, "I've got your number, you know." I ponder that remark all week.

             But finally there is a card in the mail.

I leave work early. I recklessly neglect to center my typewriter, nor do I cover it with its leatherette shroud. "Naked to the world," I think. "Be naked to the world. Do you good."

             I am elated. Already the large extravagant size is beginning to work.

             Mr. Prescrip places a plain wrapped package in my hands. "Thirteen twenty-six plus tax," he says. "And o, yes, Smiles Laboratory has temporarily suspended production." He peers around a pyramid display of enema bags, red and naked and very cruel looking inside their glossy windowed boxes."Smiles is being investigated by the Pure Food and Drug for possible additives. Dirty Jokes, they say, so I've taken the liberty of giving you another product. Better stuff anyway GRINNO. You've heard of it. 'Be in with agrin. Laugh it up; GRINNO WON'T LET YOU DOWN!'"

             Once home, I tear off the wrappings. I am still wearing gloves, "One tablespoon three times a day. And one at bedtime, unless you prefer the boredom of sleep. Not recommended for children." Okay, I haven't been a child for a long, long time.

             I hold Grinno in my trembling hands. It is a large brown bottle with Laurel and Hardy on the label. I kiss Ollie; I kiss Stan. I search the clutter of the kitchen for a tablespoon, but all three are dirty. Bluecheesed and mayonnaised, they lie greenly in the sink.

             But clever in the theory of cookery if not in its practice, I know that three teaspoons make a tablespoon, and there is a clean teaspoon in the kitchen drawer. My lips are feverish. I have forgotten to take off my coat. With surprising ease, I break Grinno's seal. Remove the cap. A delightful odor, like an escaped genie, rushes out and surrounds me.

             I smell the Strand Theater, where I spent my childhood rainy Sunday afternoons. The musty, popcorny, thrill-charged, warm and mohair-upholstered Strand. There is a whiff of the beach. Seaweed, baloney sandwiches, warm fuzzy peaches and iced-tea in a thermos.

             Or do I smell chalk? New-sharpened pencils? I think I see fresh loose-leaf, with its true blue lines, its one delicate red line running forever, like Heaven and Hell, not to be doubted, like your mother and father, red line running gloriously straight like the promise of an angel, down the left side.

             I am standing over the sink. I lean over it, so as not to spill any on my coat, and hastily pour.

             The bottle slips out of my woolen hand. Breaks. Breaks in the rotten old sink. Stan and Ollie are split apart.

             "Control yourself," I scold, as my tears add unneeded salt to Mrs. Small's Fried Clam and Hominy Grit Frozen De Luxe Platter. "There is always tomorrow. The drugstore is open till nine. Only one more day with the Bills of Lading. The fluorescent lights. And the ten o'clock coffee that looks green in the cold foam cup.

             Tomorrow you'll get another bottle of Grinno. With the best medicine, you'll see everything in a happy light." I finish the breaded clams, which are amazingly like breaded rubber bands, swallow hard, then resolutely take off my coat and gloves. I wash the tablespoons with much soap and rinse with care. I line them up like silver soldiers. Ready for morning, noon, and night!

             In bed at last I watch the eleven o'clock news. Camaraderie unlimited. Thousands of smiling teeth. Thirteen seconds of world events, five of national. Four and a half minutes of an unknown freaked-out jazz combo with a bearded arts editor who tells you whereYou can see them if you'd like. Five and a half commercials, four of which take place in spacious immaculate kitchens. I put my hands over my eyes.

             Then: "Druggists have been instructed today to remove all bottles of Grinno from their shelves. A Queens undertaker has found what seems to be a piece of seaweed in a recently purchased bottle, and a Rochester woman has discovered a pale blue thread. And Mrs. Everett Grumback of this city was horrified to discover a piece of very worn maroon-colored upholstery in her large extravagant size of the product."

             There is little more to say. The coffee has become more gray than green, and no one has yet told me what a bill of lading is. And even without Mr. Prescrip's exaggerating mirror, I realize that I truly look like a balloon wearing a plaid coat.

              But there is a ray of hope. Mrs. Small has announced a new gourmet-gourmand line of filet mignon, potatoes au gratin, baby peas, fresh picked, ad apple crisp with true whipped cream, all in the same disposable dish. I know that it will taste no different from the fried clams. But I am pretending.

© Catherine Murray