Nancy Norton discovered her superpower at an early age. “My first memory of making someone laugh was probably around age 4 or 5,” Norton said. “That’s when I realized I had a little something, a silly little gift. It became part of my identity pretty early.” She didn’t decide to ta ke the leap until decades later, when she had an epiphany in the unlikeliest of places. As a registered nurse, doing home care in Hawaii, she interacted with several patients in the final days of their lives. “Some of them were really at peace at the very end,” she said. “Patients told me they weren’t afraid to go because they had lived their dream. It made me think that I had forgotten my dream.” The same day she had that realization, she watched a commercial for a Hawaiian comedy club that challenged viewers who thought they were funny to enter a contest. “That was like a bolt from above,” Norton said. “I knew I had to try.” The club owner offered her a job, and she hasn’t looked back since. That was more than 35 years ago. The award-winning, Boulder-based comedian brings her high-energy brand of comedy to Loonees Comedy Corner on Friday and Saturday. Norton has a long-standing relationship with the Colorado Springs comedy venue, having performed there when it was still Jeff Valdez’s Comedy Corner. “I’ve been playing Loonees since before it was Loonees,” she said. “I love the club, I love the diverse audience, and I love Erik (Hawkinson), the owner. He really knows how to run a comedy club.” Norton’s decades-long career has taken her around the globe. She has done several tours with the USO, entertaining troops in overseas venues in Europe and Asia. In the U.S., she has played to large and small audiences, occasionally at venues without a stage or a microphone, and has done several shows at a women’s prison. “(Inmates) are one of the most appreciative audiences,” she said. “They are so grateful to have a two-hour period where they are all just people having a good time.” Along the way, she has compiled an impressive list of accolades. In 2018, Norton was the first-ever female winner of the Boston Comedy Festival. The next year, she entered the 40th Seattle International Comedy Competition, winning top honors there as well. Not bad for a kid from the Ozarks. Norton’s nursing career, though relatively brief, has taught her that humor is essential for health care workers. That’s why she completed a three-year program, through the nonprofit Association for Applied and Therapeutic Humor. She is now a Certified Humor Professional, crafting custom shows and workshops with health care events and conferences. “It is especially important to have a sense of humor in that field,” she said. The longer she does this job — mining humor from even the darkest of situations, making people laugh in an increasingly divided climate — the more convinced she is that she made the right career choice. She has embraced her superpower — the power to bring people together through laughter. “When we laugh at a joke, it doesn’t matter if we’re male or female, young or old, straight, gay or nonbinary,” Norton said. “When we all laugh together, we are one in that moment. It’s transcendent.” IF YOU GO What: Nancy Norton Live! When: 7:30 p.m. and 9:45 p.m. Friday; 7 p.m. and 9:15 p.m. Saturday Where: Loonees Comedy Corner, 1305 N. Academy Blvd. Price: $12 and up, looneescc.com ...read more read less