<del></del>By Lee Scott

Isn’t it amazing how just the sound of laughter can set you off laughing.  I was in the grocery store on Lady’s Island,  when I heard two females laughing and giggling. I thought they were teenagers, but as I rounded the corner I found two very mature, white haired ladies with beautifully lined faces. They turned and looked at me and stopped chuckling. I laughed and said, “Too late, I could hear you two carrying on.”

This reminded me of a story with my own mother when she was nearing eighty.   I walked in to her house one day and could hear her chatting on the phone with one of her childhood friends. She was trying to tell a story, but was laughing so hard you could barely understand her. I started laughing and I didn’t even know what it was about.

After she got off the phone I said, you sound like you are sixteen years old.  She said “I feel like sixteen. I know I look like an old woman to everyone, but deep inside I feel sixteen. “

My mother then told me what was behind all the laughter.

It turns out that she and her older sister Aunt Rita who was 80 at the time decided to go to a movie. They had heard about a particular film that had won lots of awards and wanted to see it. They walked up to the ticket counter and asked for two tickets to see Pulp Fiction. The Ticket Agent asked them if they were sure they wanted to see Pulp Fiction. They assured her they did.

After they watched the movie they walked out to the ticket agent and said, “What were you thinking about selling two old ladies tickets to that movie.” The Ticket Agent said, “I can’t believe you two stayed for the whole movie!”

They walked away laughing!

As I have gotten older, I have appreciated her comment about feeling young inside. I hear older men and women laugh like children and I am comforted with the fact that joy and laughter are not restricted to young children. That as we age we are allowed the freedom to laugh at jokes and old stories and even shock young ticket agents.