There is much I have learned in a journey that has taken me from Beverly Hills all the way to the Beverly Hills Post Office with a brief sojourn in the Fairfax district. I have learned that no sojourn in the Fairfax district is too brief, and that by cutting through Loma Vista, I can avoid the rush hour traffic on Coldwater.
My mother tried to instill in me an ethos of toughness and self-respect through the oft-repeated aphorism, “Never let anybody spit in your kasha.” I have taken those words to heart and have never, not once, served kasha. My father showed me by example that a deeply contented life can be had if lived by the abiding principles of kindness, graciousness, respect for the dignity of others, and major denial of all things scary and bad.
I, myself, have concluded thus far that life is glorious and magnificent beyond description, and the notion that we live this life fully aware of its inevitable end is fundamentally a comic one. Laughter, therefore, seems the most appropriate response to that Universal Joke.
David Kohan is the co-creator of Will & Grace.
